J.D. Vance, an honorary Frenchman, sends Europe into panic mode

When American senators are asked to name a political idol, they usually reach for a figure carved on Mount Rushmore. J.D. Vance, the newly minted Republican nominee for the vice-presidency, unexpectedly plumped for a Frenchman. Asked by Politico, a news site, earlier this year whom he looked to for inspiration, Mr Vance paused for a moment then cited Charles de Gaulle. Zut alors! Might this transatlantic admiration be good news for Europe, badly in need of allies in the Trumpian camp it fears will be back in power in Washington come January? Not so much. What Mr Vance admires in the French post-war president was the “invigorated self-confidence” he exuded on behalf of his country, diplomatic talk for telling allies to go stuff themselves when he felt like it (as the general did with NATO when it displeased him, say). Europeans fretting about America’s continued support for Ukraine are unlikely to be reassured.

A glum mood has pervaded Europe as the realisation of a return of Donald Trump to the White House has become not just possible but likely. The former president’s choice of an establishment Republican figure as running-mate might have soothed nerves set jangling by past promises that the war in Ukraine would be settled “in 24 hours”, whatever that means. Mr Vance is not that. His MAGA rhetoric on Europe exudes the brash confrontationalism perfected by Mr Trump. If the man on the top of the ticket has a visceral feeling America is being ripped off by Europeans scrimping on defence, his vice-presidential pick adds a layer of indifference to what is happening in a faraway land of which he knows little. “I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another,” he once told an interviewer. Earlier this year he spearheaded the opposition to a $60bn military-aid plan to Ukraine, then skipped a meeting with its president, Volodymyr Zelensky. A peace settlement Mr Vance has mooted includes Ukraine losing much territory and accepting “neutrality”, two Kremlin demands.