Speaking on February 15, 2025, at the Munich Security Conference, America’s Vice President, James David Vance, took the moral highground by provocatively asking the political leaders of European countries: “What is the positive vision that animates this shared security compact that we all believe is so important?” From his pulpit, Vance made the thunderstruck audience part of his personal belief that “there is no security if you are afraid of the voices, the opinions, and the conscience that guide your very own people.” He then lashed the stunned Europeans by informing them of the fact that “[i]f you’re running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you, nor for that matter is there anything that you can do for the American people who elected me and elected President Trump.”
The Sacred Principle
Stating the obvious, the Vice President told his European colleagues: “You cannot win a democratic mandate by censoring your opponents or putting them in jail, whether that’s the leader of the opposition, a humble Christian praying in her own home, or a journalist trying to report the news. Nor can you win one by disregarding your basic electorate on questions like who gets to be a part of our shared society.” […] “What no democracy, American, German, or European, will survive is telling millions of voters that their thoughts and concerns, their aspirations, their pleas for relief are invalid or unworthy of even being considered. Democracy rests on the sacred principle that the voice of the people matters. There’s no room for firewalls. You either uphold the principle or you don’t.”
The NATO Treaty’s Preamble
By making the Europeans acutely aware of the fact that the Trump administration is set on upholding this “sacred principle”, the Americans made it crystal clear that currently there is no joint “positive vision” that “animates” the security compact between the United States and the member countries of the European Union that refuse to uphold it. To be sure, the NATO Compact’s short preamble does state that the parties “are determined to safeguard the freedom, common heritage and civilisation of their peoples, founded on the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law”. If we are to believe the Vice President, the Trump administration holds the view that, now that the U.S. has begun to “domestically” uphold these principles, all the parties to the Treaty are obligated to follow suit.
EU’s phony democracies
Vice President Vance then hinted at the fact that, as a consequence, the failure to uphold the principles means that the Treaty must be deemed null and void. Surely, European pundits, politicians and governments won’t hesitate to define their countries as “democracies”. They will even go as far as claiming that “firewalling” opponents is absolutely necessary to save democracy, that silencing the voice of the people is very necessary to save the freedom of speech and that depriving people of their liberty is the best way to save individual liberty. But, as clarified by the Vice President, the Americans are no longer interested in continuing a security alliance with the leaders of such phony “democracies”.
Just Powers, Safety and Happiness
Constitutionally speaking, the American “democracy” isn’t a democracy but a Republic that was, indeed, founded on the sacred principle that the “voice of the people” matters. This was the voice that ignited the separation between the united States and the “European” political praxis. According to the 13 American peoples that signed their Declaration of Independence in 1776, the “voice of the people” is the only thing that matters when it comes to being governed. They held as truth that it is by speaking their voices that people shall make it known to their Government that it derives its just powers from the consent of the governed and that it is instituted among Men for the sole purpose of securing the unalienable rights endowed to each of them by the Creator of Man: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. It is this unique voice that also messages that “whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them [the people] shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Acts that may define a Tyrant
In 1776, the American colonists concluded in their Declaration of Independence that a “Prince” ‒ King George III of Great Britain ‒ whose character is marked by answering humble petitions to end his oppressions with repeating the injury and committing “acts which may define a Tyrant”, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. The Americans also blamed their British brethren for having been “deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity”. […] “We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold [you], as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.” In 2025, America’s Vice President took aim at the current European “Princes” whose acts mark the character of a Tyrant. He told them that, should they wish to save the NATO security compact, they’d better start listening to the “humble petitions” of their peoples and stop repeating the injury of suppressing their voices. If they don’t, so he warned, the Americans will once again declare their independence and leave their European “friends” to their fate.
What about Europe’s peoples?
Laudable as his speech may be, the key issue that Vice President Vance left unaddressed is: what can and what will America do for the Europe’s unfree peoples? Where does America’s current “positive vision” leave them? Unlike the late 18th century Americans, people in Europe are not in a position to fight a war of independence with their “Tyrants” to “assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them”. Their only realistic option is to try to alter or abolish the Governments that suppress their voices by dissolving the political bands which connect them with their “Princes” and institute new Governments by electing leaders whose character is marked by the preparedness and willingness to lay their Governments’ foundation on such principles and organizing their powers in such form, as to them, i.e. the peoples, shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
The Uphill Battle
Given the deep-seated and incurable antisocial character of Europe’s modern “Tyrants”, many of whom comfortably reside in the European Union’s institutions, there’s no chance whatsoever that they would consider, let alone positively respond to the American Vice President’s admonishment. They hate and fear rather than respect and love their peoples. The threat to make the NATO security compact contingent on the unconditional and wholehearted acceptance of the sacred principles embedded in America’s Declaration of Independence, will not change these “Princes'” character. On the contrary, it will only energize the libido dominandi that defines and dominates their character. Incapable of resisting and overcoming the “voice” of their Will to Power, they will double down the injuries of oppressing, firewalling and chasing their opponents. More than ever will they try to silence rather than listen to the voices of their peoples. In other words, for the European peoples, the effect of Vice President Vance’s Munich speech may be quite counterproductive. In light of the fact that the Trump administration is intent on Making America Great Again and that it chose to bluntly and publicly tell the leading European “Princes” in their faces that the acts of most of them define those of a Tyrant, the Vice President left European people whose voices are silenced pretty much out in the cold. They’re on their own in their uphill battle to institute just Governments that are prepared to defend and secure their unalienable rights.
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Photo/ Courtesy MSC / Vice President Vance addressing Munich Security Conference / 15 February 2025
