German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has sharply criticized elements of the United States’ latest national security strategy, arguing that Europe does not require outside help to safeguard its democratic systems. According to reporting from the Times UK, European officials have grown increasingly uneasy over the document’s language, which urges the U.S. to cultivate resistance to Europe’s political trajectory, rebalance military focus toward the western hemisphere, and reintegrate Russia into a framework of strategic stability across Eurasia.
The strategy paper has alarmed several European governments, particularly its implication that Washington might more actively support hard-right or national conservative movements while undermining liberal democratic administrations. The critique echoes recent tensions following Vice President JD Vance’s meeting with leaders of Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD) party before the Bundestag election — a meeting in which former Chancellor Olaf Scholz was conspicuously excluded. Times UK also notes that Elon Musk, then part of the Trump administration and overseeing the government’s cost-cutting agency Doge, intervened aggressively in support of the AfD during the campaign.
Merz said he was unsurprised by the broader thrust of the U.S. doctrine but rejected key assumptions, especially the idea that Europe’s democracies are endangered by their own political elites. “Some of the things in there are reasonable; some of it is understandable; some of it is unacceptable for us from a European perspective,” he said. “That the Americans now want to save democracy in Europe — I don’t see any need for that. If it needed saving, we’d get it done ourselves.”
While emphasizing that Germany and the wider continent must become more strategically independent from the U.S., Merz also argued that an “America alone” policy runs counter to Washington’s own interests. He stressed that the U.S. still requires global partners and that Europe, or at the very least Germany, remains essential to American security architecture.
Concerns extend beyond rhetoric. Sinan Selen, head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, said this week he could not rule out the possibility of U.S. attempts to influence future German elections. Other European officials interviewed by the Times UK described the strategy as a crystallization of Vice President Vance’s earlier tirades against Europe, with one calling it the “end of an era.” Some, however, offered a more tempered view, suggesting that Trump pays minimal attention to doctrine and is likely to take a more transactional approach toward Europe than the document implies.
Competing voices in Washington further complicate the picture. While parts of the administration appear more sympathetic to Moscow or skeptical of Europe, others maintain traditional alliances. U.S. War Secretary Pete Hegseth recently said Washington was prepared to grant “special favours” to allies such as Germany that have significantly increased defence spending, signaling that internal divisions may shape how the strategy ultimately unfolds.
