The quiet rebalance in transatlantic intelligence

Writing for Just Security in November, Michael Schmitt, Marko Milanovic, and Ryan Goodman set out the legal risks for U.S. allies that continue to provide intelligence related to the alleged “narco-terrorists” whose vessels the Trump administration says it is striking in the Caribbean and Pacific. The authors explained why narrowing particular streams of intelligence by some U.S. allies “was a sensible decision from the perspective of international law,” and warned that continuing to share information that facilitates the strikes could itself amount to an unlawful act.

As those legal risks were being debated, new reporting described European leaders giving fresh political backing to a different kind of intelligence adjustment: the European Commission’s effort to strengthen its internal fusion capacity, building on years of work to make better use of information already held by member states and EU institutions. The Venezuela-related carve-outs did not create that initiative, and the Commission’s plans long predate the U.S. boat strikes. But both raise a larger question: are European partners just managing discrete problems, or are they beginning to hedge more systematically against U.S. volatility in the intelligence domain?

Isolated decisions to limit intelligence sharing would matter under any administration. They may carry a greater weight, however, in the current U.S. political context. A second Trump term introduced a variable absent under previous presidents: a U.S. leader more inclined to view alliances as short-term transactions and who openly uses intelligence support as leverage over other countries. Against that backdrop, adjustments to intelligence sharing that might once have passed for routine housekeeping now take on sharper significance and risk hardening into more conditional, guarded cooperation.

Read more at Just Security