Friday, February 13, 2026

WRECKING BALL POLITICS: Trump savaged for global ‘sweeping destruction’ as crucial Munich Security Conference opens

The Munich Security Report 2026, titled Under Destruction, says that ‘the world has entered a period of wrecking-ball politics’

Sam Kiley World Affairs Editor in Kyiv
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World leaders gathering in Munich for the annual security conference are being greeted by a report from their hosts that takes an axe to the policies of Donald Trump and warns that global security structures risk being turned to rubble.

The Munich Security Report 2026, titled Under Destruction, says that: 
“The world has entered a period” of “wrecking-ball politics”.
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“Sweeping destruction – rather than careful reforms and policy corrections – is the order of the day. The most prominent of those who promise to free their country from the existing order’s constraints and rebuild a stronger, more prosperous nation is the current US administration. As a result, more than 80 years after construction began, the US-led post-1945 international order is now under destruction.”

The view is widely shared in Europe and among America’s allies in Canada, Japan, and above all in Ukraine. But in setting the discordant tone for the weekend of discussions between world powers, which will include the US, the 123-page report savages the US administration and sets the stage for a jarring score.

Report from Munich Security Conference takes an axe to the policies of Donald Trump
Report from Munich Security Conference takes an axe to the policies of Donald Trump (Getty)
  • Not least because in the G7 countries surveys found that people did not have much faith in their own governments either – “only a tiny proportion of respondents say that their current government’s policies will make future generations better off”.

“The most powerful of those who take the axe to existing rules and institutions is US president Donald Trump,” the Munich Security Conference report says.

  1. This might suit his followers, it went on, but “it is unclear whether destruction is really clearing the ground for policies that will increase the security, prosperity, and freedom of the people. 
  2. Instead, we might see a world shaped by transactional deals rather than principled cooperation, private rather than public interests, and regions shaped by regional hegemons rather than universal norms. 
  3. Ironically, this would be a world that privileges the rich and powerful, not those who have placed their hopes in wrecking-ball politics.”

The architecture of security, once known as Pax Americana, is breaking down across Europe and the Indo-Pacific, especially while humanitarian work and efforts to slow down climate change are collapsing, the report said. . .

In a survey of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, the US, Brazil, China, India and South Africa, not one country agreed that “Donald Trump’s policies are good for the world”.

In Ukraine, Europe’s leaders were being “forced into a posture of accommodation – not towards Russia but toward Washington” as Ukraine is in danger of being a “first victim” of Trump’s approach.

“Rather than being treated primarily as a question of sovereignty and international law, the war is at growing risk of being reframed as a negotiable dispute between powerful leaders, in which territory, security guarantees, and even natural resources become bargaining chips,” which risk a “victor’s peace”.

Europe is already dealing with hybrid warfare waged by Moscow, and now dealing with an administration in Washington that has backed Vladimir Putin against Ukraine.

The site of a Russian drone strike in Odesa, Ukraine
The site of a Russian drone strike in Odesa, Ukraine (Emergency Service of Ukraine)

But the region is struggling to put up a united front to counter Russia’s threat. The UK, Spain, Greece and Italy are all identified as “fiscally strained low spenders” on defence, where politicians have failed to make the case for more money for “guns over butter”.

But what increases there have been in defence spending have been inefficient because Europeans seem unable to work together efficiently: “Rising defence budgets are instead fuelling a new wave of industrial nationalism that risks deepening fragmentation, inflating costs, and eroding fragile public support.”

Cuts to multilateral humanitarian work, led by Trump but reinforced by many other countries, including the UK, posed an immediate risk to life for millions around the world, but also added to the fragmentation of organisations like the UN.

Rules-based trade is being undermined, and “whether the system will collapse into the law of the strongest remains an open question”, the report added.

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The Independent
2 hours ago
US not powerful enough to survive without Nato warns German chancellor

 The 2026 Munich Security Conference (MSC) started today, convening global leaders at a pivotal moment for international security. 🌍 Led by MSC Chairman Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger, the conference brings together hundreds of

Under Destruction – Munich Security Report 2026 

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Bibliographical Information: Tobias Bunde and Sophie Eisentraut (eds.), Munich Security Report 2026: Under Destruction, Munich: Munich Security Conference, February 2026, https://doi.org/10.47342/JWIE5806.

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REFERENCES
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6 hours ago
LIVE: Munich Security Conference 2026 (Non-Stop) | Merz, Rubio, Zelenskyy & The Global Crisis - YouTube

 

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19 hours ago
Are we in an era of "wrecking ball politics?"
 
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