The blow-by-blow of an American military strike on Yemeni Houthis, inadvertently shared with a journalist from The Atlantic on a public messaging app, has given the world a remarkable glimpse into the thinking of the people directing US foreign policy.
But one exchange was stunning not because it revealed something new — but because it didn’t.
Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other high-ranking members of the Trump administration spoke with palpable fury about Europe.
Their sentiment was so strong that Vance suggested halting an attack on the Houthis, who had disrupted key international shipping routes for months, because it would help European economies more than it would America’s.
“I think we are making a mistake,” Vance wrote. “3 percent of US trade runs through the suez. 40 percent of European trade does.” He was referring to the Suez Canal, a vital sliver of ocean upon which much of the global economy depends.
“I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now,” Vance added. Then, later in the exchange, he wrote: “I just hate bailing Europe out again.”
Hegseth argued in favor of the strike, but told Vance: “I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC.”
Finally, a compromise emerged: the US would go ahead with the strikes, but it would invoice the Europeans. “Per the president’s request we are working with DOD and State to determine how to compile the cost associated and levy them on the Europeans,” wrote national security adviser Michael Waltz.
The dialogue chimes with the jarringly confrontational tone Trump’s team has taken towards Europe, particularly on contributions to NATO and on the war in Ukraine, which have sparked a race on the continent to shore up its own military readiness.
Vance has led that charge, but others have readily backed him up. In an interview published Saturday, the White House’s foreign envoy told podcaster Tucker Carlson that “Europe is dysfunctional today.” He added an another point: “Europe is dying, unfortunately.”
There were few officials on the continent who still clung to the belief that the rhetoric was tough love, intended to help Europe stand on its own two feet.
But the messages make it clear, in black and white, in case there were any room for doubt: Trump’s inner circle shares a visceral disdain for European reliance on the US. It isn’t merely posture: Vance, especially, is fed up.
It will rankle European capitals. Britain and the Netherlands joined the Biden administration in striking Houthi targets last year, and London provided air-to-air refuelling support for the very strikes that were discussed in the Signal group.
The leak will also heighten concerns on the continent about Vance’s seemingly prominent voice in foreign policy discussions. The messages underline his deep-seated frustration with what he views as scrounging, but which Europe sees as a mutually beneficial arrangement that allows intelligence, military support and security cooperation to flow both ways.
But while the leak was embarrassing for the White House, the ideologies it revealed were consistent with its public tone.
The messages are “another wake up call for a real European Defence,” former Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt wrote on X. “When will EU leaders act?”