History offers a lesson from the rise of ancient Rome. As a city-state among rivals, Rome had to build alliances, divide its enemies and give potential partners reasons to stand with it. Power was not simply a matter of defeating opponents; it was also a matter of making allies willing to remain allies.

Yet the habits that help a state rise do not necessarily sustain it once it becomes a superpower. “Divide and conquer” can weaken rivals, but reliability is what gives an alliance system its lasting value. A superpower is only as strong as its word, and an ally is only as dependable as its consistency.

Fast forward to today. Driven by domestic political maneuvering and a frantic search for a “tactical win” ahead of the midterms, the current U.S. administration is sticking strictly to the playbook of the first rule while entirely trampling on the second.

Look at how we got here: an open-ended, grinding quagmire with Iran that began with explosive escalations, only to be put on a cynical political chessboard where grand strategy takes a backseat to ballot-box optics. Instead of keeping its eye on the real ball—securing a lasting containment of adversarial threats and actively downsizing the existential shadow cast by Russia—Washington is caught up in hollow threats and short-term posturing.

When unpredictable whims and the weaponization of private tech monopolies like Elon Musk’s Starlink become standard U.S. foreign policy, the writing is on the wall. Relying on Washington as a stable anchor is no longer a “partnership”; it’s a geopolitical hazard.

And when European nations—from Finnish tech giants to Belgian upstarts—start engineering their own sovereign communication grids to escape this chaos, how does Washington react?The U.S. EU Ambassador threatens “devastating” retaliation against European companies seemingly to protect American monopolies. WTF? This reeks of downgrading “Allies” to Warsaw pact style “Vassal states”.

Fortunately, this is a bit more complicated than simply shouting “Orange Man Bad.” Radio spectrum is a finite resource, and satellite-to-smartphone connectivity is no exception. The EU’s proposal concerns a specific frequency band, not satellite communications as a whole. The Commission wants to reserve part of this capacity for European operators, including a share for government, security and defence needs. That inevitably raises difficult questions about market access, competition and who gets priority.

There is a legitimate technical and regulatory debate to be had here. But that is precisely why Washington’s reported threat of “devastating” retaliation is so troubling. If the EU’s proposal is flawed, challenge it on its technical and economic merits. Threatening European companies with retaliation because Brussels wants to develop its own capabilities is a different matter entirely.

Strategic autonomy does not mean every European proposal is automatically right. It means Europe must be able to make its own decisions without having to fear economic punishment from an ally whenever those decisions threaten American commercial interests.

1. The Starlink Wake-Up Call: When the “Ally” Holds the Kill Switch

The illusion that commercial tech empires and U.S. national interests align with stable European security has shattered. When critical communication networks can be throttled, restricted, or leveraged based on domestic political squabbles, electoral calendars, or a single billionaire’s mood swings, dependency becomes a liability.

By treating wartime communications and critical infrastructure as leverage, the U.S. is fracturing its own alliance network far more effectively than any adversary ever could. Trust isn’t lost in a day, but threatening allies for trying to build a basic digital safety net finishes the job.

2. Taking the Eye Off the Ball: The Iran Quagmire & The Russian Threat

The core failure of American strategy goes beyond trade disputes. The war with Iran has become a grinding test of whether Washington can translate overwhelming military power into a durable strategic outcome. Military superiority is not the same as political success, and a campaign that consumes attention, resources and diplomatic capital without a clear end state risks becoming a strategic liability.

The domestic political calendar raises an uncomfortable question: is Washington pursuing a coherent long-term strategy, or looking for a tactical victory that can be sold to voters before the midterms? Whatever the answer, Europe cannot afford to have its security treated as a secondary concern.

And there is an obvious strategic irony here. After choosing to act without sufficient allied participation, Washington has had to seek additional allied naval capabilities for the theatre. If a campaign requires support that its architects did not adequately secure beforehand, that is not just a military planning problem. It is a failure of alliance management—and another blow to the very reliability on which American leadership depends.

Meanwhile, Russia remains a structural threat to European security. A superpower cannot afford to confuse a dramatic military confrontation with a coherent grand strategy. The question is not whether Iran matters. It is whether Washington can manage that confrontation without undermining its alliances or losing sight of the wider strategic balance.

Real leadership means keeping the eye on the ball: neutralizing major structural threats like the ongoing menace from Russia. Instead, foreign policy is being hijacked for short-term political theater. A superpower distracted by its own manufactured or mismanaged flashpoints has nothing reliable to offer its partners.

3. Europe Fights Back: Sovereignty from the Arctic to Brussels

When Washington’s leadership becomes a moving target, Europe need to build its own floor. This is a continent-wide awakening.

First, look to Finland, where Nokia and ICEYE are working to develop a sovereign satellite communications system for government and defence users. The aim is to give the customer state operational control over its satellites, ground infrastructure and terminals, rather than leaving critical communications entirely dependent on a foreign commercial provider.

This is not an operational replacement for Starlink today, and it would be foolish to pretend otherwise. The first satellites are expected to launch in 2028. But that is precisely the point: strategic autonomy is built before a crisis, not improvised in the middle of one. Europe does not need to abandon American technology. It needs credible alternatives, so that cooperation remains a choice rather than a necessity dictated by dependency.

Simultaneously, across the broader continent, companies like Belgium’s Aerospacelab are scaling up heavy-duty manufacturing to ensure Europe has its own resilient eyes and ears in orbit. This is what true strategic autonomy looks like: ensuring that if a partner decides to play political games, your infrastructure doesn’t go dark.

The Bottom Line

You can’t treat your global allies like a captive audience while losing focus on actual geopolitical security, and expect them not to look for alternative providers. If the U.S. administration wants to keep playing the “divide and conquer” game without the baseline requirement of reliability, it shouldn’t be surprised when Europe decides to build its own future—with or without Washington’s blessing.