The threshold of the new year provides political leaders with a unique opportunity to connect past, present and future before their national audience. Then they provide more than a business look back and forward, but offer a meaningful place in historical time.
The time horizon that emerged from the New Year’s speeches from across Europe last week is that of a continent at war. The past? Europe’s Old Wars. The present? Ukraine, the Middle East. The future, on the other hand, is a path to peace for all speakers, including Putin.
As the leader of a nation at war President Volodymyr Zelensky the Ukrainians for the courage and unity shown in 2024. He promised a “just peace” by 2025 […] achieved by the strong.” He thanked partners, allies and friends for their support and outlined the perspective of a “European Ukraine” that will be in the European Union and “one day” in NATO.
Yet the current moment of war dominates the Ukrainian perception of time. Zelensky related the anecdote of an elderly Ukrainian gentleman who was asked by Russian soldiers what time it was. The old man’s response, quoted by the president: “Time to leave our country.”
From Moscow, in a short TV speech just minutes before midnight, I attempted President Vladimir Putin to radiate optimism: “We are sure that everything will be fine, that we will move forward.” The Russian president sought a temporal anchor in the great victory of 1945, calling 2025 “the year of the defender of the Fatherland” and saying: “We are the children and grandchildren of those who defeated Nazism.” Ukraine was left unmentioned.
The shadow of the Second World War hangs over Europe’s sense of history, even outside Russia. The grandly celebrated 80th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied landing in Normandy, was remembered by both British King Charles III as France’s President Macron. Like the Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said: “This year marks the 80th anniversary of the Liberation. Europe faces greater challenges than at any time since those five damned years. And when Europe is under pressure, so is Denmark.”
The short period of time was remarkable Chancellor Olaf Scholz moved in his speech: Germany’s present came in poignantly, with the shock of the recent attack on the Christmas market in Magdeburg – many words of comfort for victims and relatives, thanks to aid workers and the public. In terms of the past, Scholz looked no further back than 1989, the year of the fall of the Berlin Wall, while the future also came off poorly: “What happens next in Germany is up to you.” With the Bundestag elections on February 23, the chancellor was cautious about future plans, perhaps to avoid being accused of campaigning.
The. had such trepidation Polish President Dudawhose mandate also expires in the coming months, is not. On national channel TVP, he accused Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government of causing “chaos” and “discord.” Tusk for his part the next day, used the theater gala at the opening of the Polish EU presidency to emphasize to an international audience: “If Europe is powerless, it will not survive.”
The same sound was expressed Emmanuel Macron in Paris. Although the big domestic news from his speech was that the president apologized for his hasty dissolution of the French parliament in June, he also had a message for the rest of Europe. Without naming the United States, Macron said that our continent “can no longer outsource its security and defense to other powers.” That is why France will continue to ‘invest in rearmament’, while Europe ‘must accelerate’ in this regard.
In all these speeches, no leader mentioned Donald Trump’s name more clearly than Zelensky. The upcoming change of power in Washington is of vital importance to Ukrainians; she decides war or peace.
For other European nations it feels less acute, but the stakes are no less high. The era of American protection – which began with the Normandy landings of 1944 and continued after the Berlin Mauerfall from 1989 – may be coming to an end.
To anticipate what is coming, European leaders must look further ahead than one or two years, or the next elections, but learn and act again in terms of decades. On to 2050.
Luuk van Middelaar is a political philosopher and historian.