Patrick Wintour
Since 1963, the Munich Security Conference has seen many consequential speeches, notably Vladimir Putin announcing in 2007 that Russia would never accept a subordinate role in the new world order. But Friday’s speech by JD Vance, the US vice-president, has the potential to be the most consequential – the moment the world order against which Putin railed fell apart.
Sometimes, even in this digital age, speeches can act as clarifiers. Yes, the 22 minutes were full of laughable hypocrisy, distorted portraits of European democracy and insensitivity to Europe’s trauma with fascism, but for what it said about the chasm in values between most in Europe and the Trump administration, it was hard to overlook.
The shock was in part because the conference traditionally tends to talk about the polarisation of populism, as opposed to invite a populist to speak. The organisers had expected a dissertation on Ukraine, but instead got the full populist pulpit, and therefore something more significant.
The speech signalled that the pre-existing dispute between Europe and the US was no longer to do with the sharing of the military burdens, or the nature of the future security threat posed by Russia, but something more fundamental about society.
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