A Geopolitical EU With/out the United States? Transatlantic Asymmetrical Interdependence Through a Relational Lens

This paper examines how the transatlantic relationship has shaped—and constrained—the European Union’s trajectory toward security and defense integration. While the EU’s post-2017 push for strategic autonomy gained rhetorical traction, Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine exposed the Union’s persistent dependence on U.S. support and its fragmented defense posture. By adopting a relational perspective, this article situates the EU’s current struggles within a longer historical arc. Through a comparative analysis of the early 1990s and the post-2017 period, it shows how enduring transatlantic asymmetries—military, economic, and cultural—have shaped EU security and defense policies. The article argues that the EU’s contemporary efforts toward autonomy are not entirely novel but echo past moments when the transatlantic relationship both enabled and limited integration. Understanding this dynamic is crucial to interpreting current developments and assessing the EU’s prospects as an autonomous geopolitical actor given the recent critical shifts in US foreign policy towards Europe.