Confidence in the United States as a dependable long-term partner is declining, particularly in Canada, according to a survey conducted for the security conference
Just days before the Munich Security Conference, a report has said that countries should come together and work on investments and other measures to increase credibility and trust in the wake of punitive actions taken by US President Donald Trump.
According to CBC, the report highlights Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos last month, where he warned of Trump’s growing threat, saying, “Middle powers must act together because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”
The conference is set to take place in the Bavarian city later this week. In their report, researchers Tobias Bunde and Sophie Eisentraut warn that countries that fail or refuse to adjust to a more coercive global landscape risk being sidelined in an international system driven increasingly by power instead of consensus.
Survey finds trust on US is fading
Confidence in the United States as a dependable long-term partner is declining, particularly in Canada, according to a survey conducted for the security conference. Two-thirds of respondents in Germany, along with clear majorities in Canada, the United Kingdom, and France, believe the United States has become a less reliable ally.
“More strikingly in Canada, more respondents now view the United States as a threat than as an ally,” Bunde said.
Despite the downbeat findings, the polling indicates that Canadians largely continue to back an active international role.
Thirty-five per cent say Canada should step up when other countries retreat, while another 35 per cent support keeping current levels of engagement. Only a small minority favour pulling back.
What does the report say?
The report said, “International rules are only as strong as the democratic states willing to defend them.”
“The new leadership of the United States, the country that has long acted as the guardian of the post-1945 international order, has concluded that upholding that is no longer in America’s interest,” Bunde said.
“More than that, it has begun to actively dismantle it, at least in several key dimensions. So when bulldozers tore down the East Wing of the White House in October, we felt this offered a fitting metaphor for the moment we are living in,” he added.
Last year, US Vice President JD Vance delivered a scathing remark against Europe at the Munich conference, saying that the biggest threat to the continent is not from Russia or China but “from within.”
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