We are gathered here present as participants in a historical alliance that saved and changed the world. The boundary between communism and freedom was passed through the heart of Germany.
The first barbed barriers of the Berlin Wall appeared only 2 years earlier. And a fewer months before this first conference, before our predecessors first met here in Munich, the Cuban crisis led the planet to the brink of atomic destruction.
At a time erstwhile the memories of planet War II were inactive fresh in the minds of both Americans and Europeans, we faced a threat of a fresh global disaster — 1 that brought irreversible demolition of apocalyptic size that humanity had never experienced before. During this first gathering russian communism marched with force and force. A thousand-year Western civilization hung in the balance. At the time, the triumph was far from certain.
But we had a common goal. We were united not only in what we fought against. We were united in what we fought for. And together, Europe and America won. The continent has been restored. In time, our peoples began to develop. The east and western blocks were reunited. Civilization has become 1 again.
This celebrated wall and everything that torn this nation in half collapsed, and along with it fell the evil imperialist regime: East and West became unity again.
However, the euphoria of this triumph led us to a dangerous delusion – to the thought that we entered the “end of history”. We thought that all country would become a liberal democracy, that the bonds created by trade and trade would replace national identities, that a principle-based global order — a harsh word — would replace national interests, and that we would live in a borderless planet where everyone would become a citizen of the world.
It was a stupid thought that ignored human nature and lessons from more than 5 1000 years of documented human history. And it cost us a lot.
In this illusion, we adopted a dogmatic imagination of free and unlimited trade, while another countries defended their economies, subsidized their businesses, systematically undermined our factories, deindustrialised large parts of societies, sent millions of middle-class jobs abroad and passed control over key supply chains to our rivals and opponents.
We are increasingly transferring our sovereignty to global institutions, while many countries have invested in immense social safety systems at the expense of their own defence capabilities. And this happened against the background of the fact that another states led the fastest military expansion in human past and did not hesitate to usage hard force to carry out their own interests.
To satisfy climate worship, we have imposed an energy policy that impoverishes our citizens, while our competitors usage oil, coal, natural gas and everything that is not under our control – not only to drive their economies, but besides as a tender over us.
In our quest for a planet without borders, we have opened the door to an unprecedented wave of mass migration that threatens the cohesion of our societies, the continuity of our cultures and the future of our nations. We made those mistakes together. And now we must recognise them together before our citizens and decision forward – towards reconstruction. Under president Trump, the United States will resume its task of renewal and renewal, driven by the imagination of the future as proud, sovereign and resilient as the past of our civilization.
And although we are ready, if necessary, to do it ourselves, we inactive want and hope to do it with you, our friends here in Europe. due to the fact that the United States and Europe belong to each other.
America was founded 250 years ago, but its roots go deep in the past of this continent. The people who inhabited and built the country of my birth came to our shores, carrying with them the memory, traditions and Christian religion of their ancestors as a sacred heritage—the inextricable link between the Old and fresh World.
We are part of 1 civilization, a Western civilization. We have the deepest ties that nations can have: centuries of common history, Christian faith, culture, heritage, language, origin, and sacrifices which our ancestors have made together for the common civilization that we have inherited.
And that's why we Americans sometimes seem a small direct and insistent on our advice. That is why president Trump is demanding the seriousness and reciprocity of our friends here in Europe. The reason, my friends, is simple: we care. We care about your future and our own. And if we sometimes disagree, these differences arise from our sincere concern for Europe, with which we have not only economical and military ties, but besides spiritual and cultural ties. We want Europe to be strong. We believe that Europe must survive. due to the fact that the 2 large wars of the last century are a constant reminder of past that yet our destiny has always been and will always be intertwined with yours. due to the fact that we know that the destiny of Europe will never be indifferent to us.
National safety — which is mostly the subject of this conference — is more than just a set of method issues. How much we spend in defence and where we implement it are crucial questions. They're truly important. But that's not the most crucial thing. The key question we gotta answer first is: what precisely are we protecting?
Because armies don't fight for something abstract. Armies fight for people. Armies fight for the nation. Armies are fighting for a way of life. And that is what we are defending: a large civilization that has all reason to be arrogant of its past, to be certain of its future and to strive to always be master of its economical and political destiny.
It was here, in Europe, that ideas were born that sowed the seeds of freedom and changed the world. Europe has given the planet the regulation of law, universities and the technological revolution. It was this continent that gave emergence to specified geniuses as Mozart and Beethoven, Dante and Shakespeare, Michelangelo and da Vinci, Beatles and Rolling Stones.
And it is here that the vaulted ceilings of the Sistine Chapel and the advanced towers of the large cathedral in Cologne attest not only about the greatness of our past or about the belief in God that inspired these miracles. They foretell miracles that await us in the future — but only if we accept our inheritance without regret and are arrogant of this common heritage. Only then can we work together to realize and form our economical and political future.
Deindustrialisation was not inevitable. It was a conscious political choice — a long-term economical course that deprived our countries of wealth, production possible and independence. The failure of sovereignty over supply chains was not a consequence of healthy and prosperous global trade. It was unreasonable – the voluntary transformation of our economy made us dependent on others to meet our needs and dangerously susceptible to crises.
Mass migration has not been and is not marginal. It is and remains a crisis that transforms and destabilizes societies throughout the West. Together we can reindustrialise our economies and regain our ability to defend our citizens. However, the work of this fresh alliance should not focus solely on the military sphere.
Not changing this is not just abandoning 1 of our basic responsibilities to our nation. It is simply a critical threat to the very foundations of our societies and to the endurance of our civilization.
Finally, we can no longer put the alleged global order above the key interests of our nations and our countries. We do not request to abandon the global cooperation strategy that we have created. And we don't gotta dismantle the global institutions of the old order that we built together. But they must be reformed. They must be rebuilt.
For example, the United Nations inactive has large possible to be a tool of good in the world. But we cannot ignore the fact that present it does not give answers to the most urgent questions and practically plays no role.
The war in Gaza failed – the American government did so, freeing hostages from barbarians and reaching a fragile truce. This did not resolve the conflict in Ukraine — it was the United States, in collaboration with many countries present today, that simply led the parties to the negotiating table in search of inactive elusive peace. She was powerless to halt the atomic program of the extremist Shiite clergymen in Tehran – this required fourteen precise strikes by American B-2 bombers. The threat to our safety by a drug addict and dictator in Venezuela has not been eliminated — instead, American peculiar forces have led a fugitive to justice.
In an perfect world, diplomats would solve all these problems by adopting hard resolutions. But we don't live in the perfect world. And we cannot proceed to let those who openly endanger our citizens and undermine global stableness to hide behind abstract concepts of global law that they themselves regularly violate.
This is the way president Trump and the United States have chosen. This is the way we encourage you here in Europe. It's the way we've been walking together in the past, and we're hoping to get back together.
For 5 centuries, until the end of planet War II, The West was expanding. His missionaries, pilgrims, soldiers and explorers left their native coasts, crossed the oceans, conquered fresh continents, and built vast empires worldwide. But in 1945, for the first time since Columbus, it began to shrink. Europe was in ruins. Half of it was behind the Iron Curtain, and the remainder seemed to follow her soon. The large Western empires entered the phase of the final collapse, accelerated by the heartless revolutions of the communist and anti-colonial uprisings which in subsequent years covered the vast areas of the map with a red hammer and sickle.
Against this background, as it is today, many believe that the era of Western domination is over and that our future is doomed to be the light echo of our past. But together our predecessors understood: falling is simply a choice. And it was a choice they refused.
That's what we've been doing together before — and that's what president Trump and the United States want to do again now, with you.
Therefore, we do not want our allies to be weak — that makes us weaker too. We want allies to defend us. We want allies who can defend themselves so that no opponent can be tempted to effort our collective force.
That is why we do not want allies to be restrained by guilt and shame. We want allies arrogant of their culture and heritage, who realize that we are heirs of 1 large and noble civilization, and who are ready and able to defend it with us.
And that is why we do not want allies who justify the corrupt position quo alternatively of honestly admitting what is needed to fix it. Because we in America do not want to be polite and cautious observers of the controlled fall of the West. We are not striving to break up, but to renew old friendships and renew the top civilization in human history.
We want a renewed relation — a relation that will admit that our societies are suffering not only due to bad political decisions but besides due to a bad sense of hopelessness and resignation. A Union that is not paralyzed by fear – fear of climate change, fear of war, fear of technology – but bravely rushes towards the future. And the only fear we have is the fear that we will not leave our children proud, stronger and richer countries.
We want an alliance that is willing to defend our people, our interests and keep the freedom of action that allows us to form our own destiny — not an alliance that exists to lead a global welfare state and to atone for the alleged sins of erstwhile generations.
An alliance that does not let the established boundaries to be exceeded, restricted or subjected to systems beyond its control. An alliance that does not depend on others in critical national needs. A relation that does not pretend that our lifestyle is just 1 of many, and does not ask for approval to act.
Together in the West we inherited something special, unique and essential – and this is the heart of the transatlantic bond. By acting together in this way, not only will we reconstruct a healthy abroad policy, but we will regain a clear knowing of ourselves, we will regain our place in the world, and thus we will defy the forces that endanger present to destruct both America and Europe.
Therefore, in the era of headlines announcing the end of the transatlantic era, let it be clear: this is not our goal or desire. Because for us Americans, the home may be in the Western hemisphere, but we will always be children of Europe.
Our communicative began with an Italian sailor whose journey into the large unknown in search of a fresh planet brought Christianity to America and became a legend that shaped the image of our pioneering country. Our first colonies were founded by English settlers, to whom we owe not only the language we speak, but our full political and legal system.
Our boundaries were conquered by the Scottish-Irish, those proud, persistent people from the Ulster hills who gave us Davy Crockett, Mark Twain, Theodore Roosevelt and Neil Armstrong. The large American mediate West was built by German farmers and craftsmen who turned the empty plains into a planet agricultural center and, among another things, importantly improved the quality of American beer.
Our march inland followed the footsteps of French fur merchants and explorers, whose names, by the way, inactive adorn the street signs and city names throughout the Mississippi Valley. Our horses, our ranch, our rodea — the full romanticist of cowboy image, which became a symbol of the American West — come from Spain. And our largest and most recognizable city was called fresh Amsterdam before it became fresh York.
The year my country was founded, Lorenzo and Catalina Giraldi they lived in Casale Monferrato in the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, and José and Manuel Arena Seville, Spain. I'm not certain they knew anything about thirteen colonies that gained independency from the British Empire. But I am certain they never imagined that 250 years later 1 of their direct descendants would be here on this continent as the chief diplomat of this young country. And yet here I am, and my own communicative reminds me that our stories and our destiny will always be linked.
Together we rebuilt the destroyed and destroyed continent after 2 destructive planet wars. erstwhile the Iron Curtain divided us again, the Free West stood side by side with courageous dissidents who fought against tyranny in the East to defeat russian communism. We fought each other, then we reconciled, then again — and again we reconciled. We shed blood and died shoulder to shoulder in conflict fields from Kapyen to Kandahar.
And I am here present to make it clear: America paves the way for a fresh century of prosperity — and we want to go back that way with you, our dear allies and our oldest friends. We want to do this together with you – together with Europe, which is arrogant of its heritage and history; with a Europe in which there lives the spirit of creativity and freedom that sent ships to the unknown seas and gave emergence to our civilization; with a Europe that has the means to defend and will to survive.
We should be arrogant of what we have achieved together in the last century. But now we must face and embrace the possibilities of a fresh era — due to the fact that yesterday is the past. The future is inevitable, and our common destiny stands before us. Thank you.
Marco Rubio
Speech at the Munich safety Conference, February 14, 2026
Photo: Wikipedia
