Yanis Varoufakis on Why European Rearmament Will Weaken Europe

Europe is hurtling toward disaster. Under the illusion of "Peace Through Strength," EU leaders are driving the continent into deeper crisis—economic ruin, political paralysis, and the rise of the far right.

In this powerful address, Yanis Varoufakis exposes why European rearmament is not just a mistake, but a catastrophe in the making. With the failure of the EU’s strategy in Ukraine and Trump's open abandonment of Europe, the bloc is left grasping at militarisation—blind to the fact that this path will only accelerate its decline.

What’s the real alternative? A bold, independent Europe, free from war-mongering and economic decay. A Europe that stands for peace, not subjugation.

This is the message EU leaders don’t want you to hear. Watch now.

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[olufemidavies]

Mr Varoufakis, great peace plan, however, only the strong can choose peace, the weak are merely relegated to it but cannot defend it

[leomartin]

negotiating without an army with putin is a 0/10 geopolitical move, putin don't care about words

[firefield]

I think you miss the point: Europe for 80 years have relied on the strength of others to secure it's transnational borders. This cannot continue. There's a lesson from The Prince that Europe has forgotten. There are no easy solutions, only tough (and dirty) compromises.

[markfenlon]

Yanis is mistaken. The EU can't rely on the USA for future security. In the face of Russian despotism, there is no choice, EU will have to strengthen its defences. Yes, the EU desperately needs to improve its combined political structure, now is the time for EU to get its act together to become stronger.

[imnodog]

Very important to have this kind of opposition in any political realm. However, that peace plan is straight out of fantasy land.

[jurgisvalancauskas]

You know what happened when in 18th century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth demilitarized itself, semi-outsourced its military to Russian Empire? It was simply divided between Russian, Prussian and Austrian empires without a lot of shots fired and by 1795 Poland-Lithuania completely "peacefully" disappeared from map ... militaries are backbone of any nation's existance. If you don't "feed" your own army sooner or later you gonna feed foreign one

[blumuffin]

Varoufakis contradicts himself in several ways.

Firstly, he wants federalist institutions such as an EU treasury reflecting the US department, but an Eurofederalism implies a rearmament plan and a centralized army.

Secondly, he wants to negotiate for peace with russia by giving them all their money back, while Russia just promises to do better. How did that go in 2014? Putin isn't trustworthy with deals.

His solution is to essentially appease to "neo-, fascists" where he actually means the rise to populism in Europe. Do what they want so they don't come into power. But this oftentimes goes contrary to economic growth or pan-European stability.


Therefore, I wonder what Varoufakis' solution truly is.

[christianeschmitz]

Absolutely brilliant! I agree with everything 🙏🏻

[keithalfred]

The Putin regime would see a stable pro-EU Ukraine as a threat to political stability. It now looks on confrontation for regime security, and as a petro-state it doesn't want a green new deal anymore than Trump does. And military Keynsianism sounds better than the present stagnation.

[hamzamale]

I’m truly so proud that smart & decent people like yourself still exist on this earth and make a significant difference to it . All the power to to you👍👍👍
Malek

[george.carlin]

500 km DMZ Measure the distance between Kharkiv Ukraine and Belgorod Russia.

[ciprianpopa]

Sure, but how do you convince Putin to demilitarize 500 km on his side?

[ExiledGypsy]

I saw this last night and for some reason stuck in my mind. So, I had to watch it again because I usually agree with Yanis and I am surprised at his reaction because if you take out notion of weapons out of it this is exactly what he had been advocating and criticizing the EU for not doing so when interest rates were low. Isn't this about investment in production? Isn't this about cutting out the bankers and making sure that the money is invested in manufacturing industry? Isn't this an opportunity for workers to unite under one banner?

Besides history has proved him wrong over and over again at least in the short term and as Keynes put it in the long-term, we are all dead anyway. The U.S. got rich because of WWII where the new deal could be driven by government rather than left to the market forces. Even Russia saw a bump in its GDP in the short term after deciding on militarization as did Germany under Hitler's National Socialism.

Therefore, from purely an economics point of view this is exactly what Europe needs to finally wake-up from long hibernation of post WWII.

Regardless of what will be imposed on the rest of us by Trump and Putin which would prove the necessity of haste in this regard this Europe wide enterprise is exactly what is needed as preparation to creating the kind of institutions he is proposing. Those ideas have failed to materialize because of lack unity in Europe and if fear of an arm conflict is not going to unite Europe, then his proposal will continue to remain in the fog of future. As I said take the dark connotation of building weapons out of it and then you can see the light.

Finally, the fantasy of Chinese rescue or rebalancing force it just that. They are far too smart and too far away to get involved in anything other than as a source of material.

[johnnyblue]

I don't know is Mr. Varoufakis is wrong, or right, but I'd love to go on a long motorcycle trip with him and listen to his ideas... He's a cool dude...

[alexlazaridisf.]

I really like Varoufakis ideas sometimes. I think his concept of techn-feudalism is very interesting. But he’s always been in love with arguing, trying to be original, and being right. As a Greek myself, I know that kind of Greek. It’s not that different from sitting around in the cafe and having it out with the other guys in the cafe while slamming the back gammon tiles on the board. Yes the discourse is more refined. I’d love to hear Varoufakis admit he was wrong about something. Maybe he has but I haven’t seen it. I never trust people who think they are always right, who always think they are the smartest person in the room. Oh yeah, that’s another ages old Greek thing. It’s called hubris.

[jurius]

This was a waste of time, Russia would not agree to the terms mentioned.

[Just_another_Euro_dude]

I agree with many points, especially regarding the west leaving Ukraine to fight alone vs Russia, that's excelent observation. I disagree with the thinking that EU doesn't need to invest HEAVILY in it's military. Oh boy it does! That is LITERALLY the ONLY WAY for the EU to have it's own FOREIGN POLICY that will be completely independent from the USA. France did all of this stuff DECADES ago, starting from the 1966 when it literally LEFT the NATO, and built it's nuclear arsenal, aircraft carriers, fighter jets with ZERO USA parts in them, etc. France didn't experience rise of the far right because of it. It also didn't become a poor country because of it. It remained to be among the richest countries of the world.
And this man should remember it all regarding the France MUCH better than me, as i am several DECADES younger than him. He certainly remembers the 1960s and later on. He knows what France did and what France achieved. It achieved a fantastic military sovereignity as there's ZERO USA bases and USA soldiers in France.

[MrMysteryMortal]

500km deep of DMZ on both sides? That would take at least 2/3 of the entire Ukrainian's pre-war area, including Kyiv. It will also include Moscow, which I don't oppose at all, but I'm afraid that the Russians may not agree to this.

[Nebukadnezzer]

Mr. Varouvakis has forgotten the age old adage that the strong do as they can and the weak suffer what they must.

[bennodabaus]

Without defensive military capabilities of its own, with what bargaining power do you think the EU could get through even one of the points you mentioned, mr. Varoufakis? If we proceed as you outline the US will simply enforce its peace terms with russia on Ukraine and Europe. Europes geopolitical irrelevancy increasing is likely, without the military leverage to help ukraine even without US let alone defend ourself, this irrelevancy is certain.