The reason for this is not primarily the poor performance of EU countries in using integrated EU tools to fight the virus and its economic impact - although that plays an important role as well.
The main reason is that Europe could end up being too broke to still be resilient, let alone be a shaper of foreign policy outcomes on its own continent, let alone the world.
My view is that a stronger EU is the threat to European defenses and to democracy in Europe, not the EU's weakening or failure.
Still, despite reporting on that silver lining to a dark Wuhan Flu cloud over Europe, the author seems to conflate political "Europe" with geographic Europe, assuming the decline of the former means the decline of Europe in general. I disagree. The EU should be a trading bloc without the stifling hand of an imperial state on top of the countries of Europe.
Nor do I agree with the author's notion that American ties to Europe have weakened since the Obama "pivot" and Trump's election. And I find additional humor in the fact that Bush 43 and Europe's popular opposition to the Iraq War--which we won without their help, in the end--used to be the defining moment in the American-European divide. Never mind, I guess.
The idea that America is at fault for strains in American relations with Europeans is nonsense. Maybe look at how badly relations are between European states within the EU and maybe that indicates who is actually at fault for tensions that predate Trump, Obama, or even Bush 43.
Face it, there has long been cross-Atlantic tensions and the collapse of the Soviet threat to Europe is what made some Europeans safe to be more vocally anti-American.
If the Wuhan Flu weakens the EU, I'll at least make a favorable reference to the coronavirus in the House of Commons.
