Karl von Habsburg gave this year’s speech on the future of Europe under the motto: Integrity. Direction. Hope. In the speech he gave on his birthday (January 11) in an online matinee, he made a firm plea for the defense of the rules-based order, the rule of law and a regulatory policy (in the sense of economic policy). This means, among other things, a clear commitment to the defense of Ukraine. Europe, the EU, needs a real European foreign and security policy.

We live in interesting times. This was also shown by the remarks made by Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, for which I would like to express my sincere thanks, because he also made it clear how important European unification is for all of us. But there is no denying that interesting times offer many opportunities, both for improvement and for decline.

It will depend a lot on how prepared we are to intervene ourselves to shape the future. At least we in Europe have the chance and the possibilities to do so. Because despite all the discussion on the increasing polarisation of politics, about the false solutions that are being sold to us by sympathetic or rabid populists, we live in democratic systems in which it depends on how much we ourselves get involved, and how much we are prepared to influence the shaping of the future.

Of course you can sit back and say to yourself – and to the rest of the world – why does it matter to me. I have a secure income, if not, the welfare state will take care of me, so I don’t have to make any effort. I don’t care whether Donald Trump actually ends the war in Ukraine in 24 hours, as he has promised, or not. And if Putin conquers Ukraine as quickly as possible because we stop the  support, then at least there will be peace and we won’t have to listen to news of cruel attacks every day and see pictures of the destruction and all the human suffering.

You know that is not my attitude. Integrity. Direction. Hope are three keywords that I have chosen as the title for this speech, and which should also serve as a motto; a common thread, for various organisations in which I hold leadership positions this year.

Anyone who has integrity stands for something. For fundamentals, for principles, for commitment, for values. Anyone who shows integrity will not be discouraged by political polarisation or seduced by populists and false ideologies. Anyone who shows integrity can also provide direction and can act as a role model for others. Where there is direction, there is also the hope of achieving a goal.

You don’t have to invent anything new for this. Because the European culture that has shaped us all, which today may be a little different but not broken, gives us the necessary foundations. This culture is based on Judeo-Christian values. This also includes the understanding, which lets us recognise that these values, regardless of how intensively one follows one’s own belief in God, are fundamental to a good and peaceful coexistence.

It is no coincidence that this Christian-influenced culture has developed the rule of law that made Europe a model for other continents. The rule of law does not mean that the state enforces a certain idea of happiness or welfare by force, but that the state protects law and liberty.

It sets general rules within which we can live our freedom, our personal idea of happiness, without disturbing the freedom of others.

In business, this would be called regulatory policy („Ordnungspolitik“), the concept that once made the German and thus also the Austrian economic miracle possible because it allows for a real market economy. And if we now dare to step onto the international, global stage, then we are dealing with what we call the rule-based order.

None of this is self-evident, as we can hear, see and read in the news every day. But precisely if we live the attitude outlined above, it gives us a duty to ensure that these very principles, which are not at all self-evident, become a guide and thus give us hope for shaping these interesting times into a good future.

When I say that none of this is a given, it is also an indication that these elements of the attitude had to develop, partly from the very brutal experiences that our ancestors had to go through, and that today we are at a crossroads: will we manage to take the right steps in time, or will we allow ourselves to end up in a hole again in which the rule of law no longer applies but rather the rule of the strongest or rather the rule of the brutal?

To describe it with an economic example. Before the First World War, we had an initial phase of globalisation in the sense of world trade. This had many advantages for general development. It then took around 70 years until we reached this level of world trade again, with all its advantages.

In between there was a period of wars, whether fought on battlefields or a cold war. Thank God, some lessons were learned from this.

Let us think back to 11th March 11 1938. Hitler marched into Austria and annexed the country. The rest of the world applauded. Only Mexico protested. It was thought that giving Hitler little Austria, where Germans would live anyway, would satisfy his hunger for new conquests. Hardly anyone knew or wanted to take seriously his true program, which he had laid out in „Mein Kampf“.

But then came the Sudetenland, the whole of Czechoslovakia, the pact with Stalin to divide Europe, and finally the attack on Poland.

Only then did Great Britain and France begin to make good on their promises of guarantees. Millions of men and women had to give their lives to bring the tyrant to his knees. Germany, which had been taken over by the brown criminal gang, was able to develop into a constitutional state and a democracy after the regime change, as we would call it today, i.e. after the military defeat.

The parallels with today are unmistakable. Putin broke the peace with Chechnya in 1999, shortly after he became prime minister. He invaded parts of Georgia and took territory from the country. He invaded and annexed Crimea. The rest of the world took note.

Because, many people thought, Crimea had always been Russian. People who say that do not understand the situation, but they do have an opinion. Anyone who remembers the invitation to Putin to come to Vienna, immediately after the annexation of Crimea and the invasion of Donbas, can only be ashamed of the representatives of this country, who were still making stupid jokes with the tyrant of Moscow.

Here, too, illusion prevailed over reason. People wanted to believe that they could appease the tyrant of Moscow if they just gave him part of the neighboring country and otherwise carried on doing business with him as normal. Hundreds of thousands of people have paid for this mistake with their lives. Sometimes I wonder how those people who joked with Putin in the Chamber of Commerce back then can still sleep with a clear conscience.

24th February 2022 has once again proven the lesson of history. Anyone who thinks that they can appease a tyrant in his desire for submission with spoils of war has not understood one of the basic rules of politics.

In 1945, the lessons of 11th March 11 1938 were learned. The United Nations – the UN – was founded. The UN Charter was formulated to be much stronger than the statutes of the League of Nations. 

Article 2, paragraph 4 of the UN Charter states: „All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”

This formulation is generally known as the prohibition of aggression. In other words, a very clear prohibition on attacking and conquering another country.

 

Many articles later, namely in Article 51, the right to self-defence is enshrined. Individual and collective. Individual self-defence means that every country that is attacked has the right to defend itself. Collective self-defence means that all states have the right to rush to the aid of the victim of aggression. This ranges from supplying weapons to logistical and intelligence support to sending troops.

This right to self-defence exists until the United Nations Security Council decides on further or different measures. This provision is currently almost obsolete because the Security Council cannot function. The aggressor has a right of veto in this Security Council.

Ladies and gentlemen!

The articles of the UN Charter quoted are the basis of what we today call the rules-based order or international law. This rule-based order is on a global level what we call the rule of law on a national level. It is the clear opposite of what is called the rule of the strongest. Or perhaps we should rather speak of the rule of the brutal, even if it has nothing to do with law.

Here we are now: democratic, constitutional Europe, the democratic, constitutional free West, the Western community of values, is faced with the question of whether this rule-based order still applies and should continue to apply. The community of tyrants from Pyongyang to Beijing and Moscow and their other allies is not faced with this question.

Because for the tyrants, the rule – or rather the violence – of the brutal, applies.

Incidentally, that is their greatest weakness. Because every such alliance of major criminals is based on the blood-soaked potential for aggression. The fact that they do not attack each other is solely due to an ideology of terror in which each of these tyrants knows that the other is just as prepared to shed blood on a massive scale without batting an eyelid.

Human beings, in the dignity we are familiar with, count only as potential cannon fodder and as producers of more cannon fodder.

Ladies and gentlemen, please do not take offense at the somewhat more drastic language I have chosen here.

We must face the challenges, we must recognise them and set clear guidelines to overcome these challenges.

We must know where we stand and we must ask ourselves the very simple question: do we want to maintain the rules-based order? Then we must defend it. Or do we not care? Then we can do as Chamberlain did in 1938 or as Scholz – and many others – have done from 2022 up to today.

But the right lessons from history were not only learned in 1945 with the prohibition of aggression and the right to self-defence, but also in 1989 after the fall of the Iron Curtain.

European unification, which began in Western Europe with six states and became a community of twelve by 1990, was now able to be extended to Central Europe for the first time. First the three states Austria, Sweden and Finland joined, then in 2004 eight states that were controlled by Moscow until 1989, as well as Cyprus and Malta. Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia followed over the next decade.

As late as 2003, the intention was to continue this enlargement process and the so-called Western Balkan states were promised that the path to the European Union would be open to them. But after 2004, enlargement fatigue set in, from which Europe still suffers today.

Yet enlargement policy is one of the most successful projects of European unification. Ultimately, it is about extending democracy, freedom, the market economy and the rule of law to a larger area. The sentence „the further east we push the boundaries of freedom, the safer the centre becomes“, which came from my father’s mouth and thereby underlined the essential component of enlargement, is still valid today.

However, shortly after the collapse of the Iron Curtain, a dangerous mistake was made by misinterpreting events. In 1991, the Soviet Union was dissolved. In the West, people spoke of the end of the Cold War, the end of history, the final victory of Western values, of liberal democracy over totalitarianism.

But in Moscow, history was interpreted differently. There, particularly in KGB circles, but also among many officials of the USSR, the end of the Soviet Union was not seen as the end of the Cold War, but only as a lost battle in that war.

When Putin came to power, it was finally clear that Moscow’s old goal of expanding the empire westward, across Europe, had not been forgotten, but was experiencing a renaissance. Even under Yeltsin, this goal had not disappeared, even if Moscow’s internal weakness at the time did not allow for such advances.

The Central Europeans who were under Moscow’s rule from 1945 to 1989 knew that Moscow would only be able to control its thirst for conquest for a while. The desire to join NATO and thus have security against renewed aggression from Moscow is therefore more than understandable.

It was not a strategic policy of the United States or NATO to expand eastwards, but rather the justified desire of the now truly free countries to be able to find security and economic development in the free West.

Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends!

We humans tend to be comfortable. We have become accustomed to a certain lifestyle, to a comfort that our earned prosperity offers us. But we must also be aware that this prosperity must be earned again and again, that life in freedom and security is based on a political, economic and social framework.

Now I repeat myself: none of this can be taken for granted. The rule of law is certainly threatened by polarisation and ideological delusions. The rules-based order is under a very real threat from totalitarian and dictatorial states that openly threaten aggression against neighbouring countries and that also implement this aggression with military and hybrid attacks.

We are at a crucial turning point. More than ten years after the start of Moscow’s war against Ukraine, almost three years after the start of the annihilating invasion, we are faced with the question of how we can end this war by enforcing the rules-based order.

In a few days, a new, and at the same time old, President of the United States will be sworn-in in Washington. We Europeans cannot decide who the citizens of America elect as their President by a majority. We can only influence how we in Europe align our policies so that we as a continent still play a role on the stage of world politics and are not dominated by non-European powers.

There is a lot of speculation about what Donald Trump will do as US President. We all know his sayings, from ending the war against Ukraine within 24 hours to his famous deals or the statement that the wars would never have happened if he were the president. Let’s put it kindly: he does not lack self-confidence.

I would like to address one speculation, and also a very concrete threat to Europe from President Trump. You all know his statements about NATO, and that countries that spend too little on defence would not be protected by the United States, right up to the threat that the United States would leave NATO.

He cannot leave NATO that easily, of course, and if the United States’ nuclear umbrella no longer applies to European partners, then the question is also what that would mean for further nuclear armament, which is not necessarily in the United States’ interest.

But President Trump could go to the White House immediately after his swearing-in and sign a decree dismissing NATO’s military command structure in Europe. It is led by an American who the President can de facto dismiss.

What then? Are we in Europe prepared for this? Are there any scenarios for how a new military commander for NATO in Europe could be appointed within the next few hours? Above all: who would that be, which country would he come from? From Germany, which has capable soldiers but is politically incapable of acting? From France, which sees itself as Europe’s leading power anyway, but only wants to have friends? Now, apart from the fact that France is very rhetorically present in its support for Ukraine through its President, but the actual assistance provided is surpassed by many other European states. Or from Poland, which of the European NATO countries is currently investing the most in its defence capabilities?

As I said, we do not know whether Trump has already prepared such a decree and will then sign it. At least I don’t know if there are plans for such a scenario. But I do know that responsible politics must be prepared for precisely such possibilities!

What we must assume, however, is a new tariff war. Trump threatened us with this during his first term in office. But the Biden administration has also taken measures that do not exactly fall under the heading of free and fair trade. Back then, in Donald Trump’s first term in office, a tariff war was still prevented because the EU acted united. The then Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, as representative of the entire EU, was able to make it clear to the boss in the White House that the united EU is already an economic power with which one should not necessarily start a real trade war.

The EU is still an economic power, even if there are major challenges to maintaining this position. When it comes to bureaucracy, we are already world champions, but we should not attach any importance to this title.

Protectionist forces are also constantly disrupting trade agreements. The wrangling over the trade agreement with the Mercosur states, which has now lasted a quarter of a century, is just one example. Responsible politics does not fear free trade, but rather uses its opportunities. Small-minded prejudices, which are also presented with false figures and in a very sensationalist manner, are not the base on which we can build our European future.

Here, we in the EU need a return to a sensible regulatory policy, which clearly includes a massive reduction in bureaucracy. The fact that no government politician had the courage to stop the supply chain law for example, does not exactly demonstrate a great understanding of economic, political and social contexts.

Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends, anyone who thinks that appeasing an aggressor will work has absolutely no understanding of political context and facts. I have already given some historical examples of this, and we have seen it practically every day since Russia’s annihilating invasion of Ukraine.

There is only one country in this war that is constantly escalating, and that country is Russia. This ranges from attacks on children’s nurseries and hospitals to civilian infrastructure and the deployment of soldiers from North Korea, from child abductions to other war crimes.

Europe, on the other hand, is constantly pursuing an appeasement strategy, even though Europe is the one affected by this war. I do not mean to call for martial language; gentle words can be quite useful if used correctly. I am reminded of an old saying that former US President Theodore Roosevelt liked to quote: „Speak softly and carry a big stick, you will go far.“ 

Europe – the European Union – simply has to re-learn the principles of power politics. But we don’t have much time for that. We shouldn’t be afraid of power either. Because power in itself is not a bad thing. It can be used badly or abused, but that is precisely not the aim of European unification.

Diplomatic protest that is not accompanied by measures only leads to further escalation on the part of the aggressor.

Yes, it is true that Russia is a focus in this speech. I do not mean to neglect the other problems that affect our future. But the things are connected.

In mid-December, a small conference of the „Post War Russia Forum“ took place in Vienna, in which the Pan-European movement also participated. A participant from Ukraine said: big Russia brings big problems, small Russia causes small problems. To be precise, he was talking about the Moscow colonial empire.

Today’s Russia is actually a very classic colonial empire, ruled by Moscow. This begins with the economic exploitation of the colonies and continues with the oppression of the peoples of this colonial empire, even to the attempt to use their men as cannon fodder in the colonial war against Ukraine.

A Europe that is interested in the security of its citizens should begin developing scenarios for a crumbling Moscow colonial empire as soon as possible.

OK, now you can tell me: pull yourself together, there really are no signs of that.

To be honest: I don’t see these signs at the moment either. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t have to deal with this question anyway.

If someone had told me on St. Andrew’s Day last year that less than 14 days later the Syrian dictator Assad would have fled into exile in Moscow, I would probably have had some doubts about this scenario.

This brings me back to what I said earlier: it’s all connected.

You remember that in 2015 Assad already had his back to the wall. Russia, which has military bases in the country, including a port, intervened on his side. Putin has, to put it bluntly, bombed his way back onto the stage of world politics. The situation at the time meant there was no solution to the conflicts in the Middle East without Russia. A clever politician would have used his role in the situation, to have done good business with the Western world using his country’s raw materials, and made sure that nobody was taking interest in the human rights in his country.

But the imperialist was striving to further expand his colonial empire. A step that triggered or at least enabled dynamics in other regions of the world that he probably did not consider. If Moscow were to lose its military bases in Syria, it would be a bitter, even devastating blow, even if it might not look like it at first glance. But consider the entire logistics for Putin’s intervention troops in Africa.

As I said, it’s all connected. China has set up an inter-agency group to closely examine the effect of the EU and other states‘ sanctions on Russia. We can interpret this as a clear signal that China is reviewing its plans to annex Taiwan, among other things, in light of developments in Russia, specifically the outcome of Russia’s war of annihilation against Ukraine. If Russia succeeds in its plans, this would encourage China to invade Taiwan.

This is in neither the EU nor the United States’ interest.

Incidentally, China is also considering scenarios for how to secure certain areas in today’s Russian Federation if this empire falls apart.

The biggest threat from Moscow against Europe at the moment is the disinformation war. This is nothing new. Even during the Cold War and before that in the Tsarist era, Moscow ran massive disinformation campaigns to undermine Europe. Moscow has improved and expanded this expertise and also combined it with the new technical possibilities of social media.

But we can’t just look at social media. We have political parties that openly propagate Putin’s propaganda. Journalists and commentators also regularly write in various established media whose support for Moscow is unmistakable. This fifth column of Moscow extends into the academic world.

The real aim of disinformation is not to make people believe something specific, but to make them ultimately not want to believe anything at all. Anyone who has reached this point becomes a welcome victim of any tyrannical rule.

Hanna Arendt, the well-known fighter against National Socialism and other totalitarian systems such as Communism, once put it this way: „The ideal subject of a totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction and the distinction between true and false no longer exists.“

I would like to make one final comment on Russia. People often say that we must support the “other Russia”. Yes, we must. At the same time, we must be fair enough to acknowledge that we can no longer find the “other Russia” in Russia itself. The war to conquer Ukraine is not just Putin’s war.

This is also shown by recent polls, according to which, on the one hand, there is a majority in Russia in favor of a ceasefire or even peace with Ukraine. That sounds very good. On the other hand, as soon as one asks whether this could also mean giving up the occupied or annexed territories, this approval disappears to a small group. Imperialism is therefore not just a character trait of Putin, but is deeply rooted in Russian society.

Even if I view the theory of collective guilt with skepticism, we should take the words of the Soviet prosecution at the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal to heart and apply them to the Moscow colonial empire. „All Germans are to blame for the crimes of Germans, on a level with the leadership of the country – because it was they who chose and did not stop their government when it committed a crime against humanity.”

Ladies and gentlemen, the question naturally arises as to how we can achieve peace in this war. At the beginning of this speech I spoke of the rule of law, of regulatory policy and of rules-based order in world politics, in combination with the UN Charter.

This means that all those who want to see Europe as a continent of freedom and who want to preserve the Western community of values for future generations have a clear duty to give Ukraine what it needs to defeat the Russian military and its allies. And we must also allow the Ukrainians to use these weapons without restrictions.

In connection with the Iranian missile attack on Israel, someone commented: We spent billions to shoot at the arrows and not at the archers.

Ukraine must be given the opportunity to destroy the bases from which the tyrant in Moscow is attacking the civilian infrastructure. Regimes like Putin’s only understand strength and determination, with clear meaning. Soft tones without a big stick only encourage these regimes – and I don’t just mean the one in Moscow – to carry out further aggression.

A few days ago, ladies and gentlemen, dear friends, we celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of Austria’s accession to the EU. Much has happened since then, and some of what is considered EU policy today can and must be criticised, from time to time.

But despite all the criticism of too much bureaucracy and other mistakes with ideology, we should not forget that European unification was motivated by a desire for security. Given the geopolitical situation and the challenges we are facing, it is time for the European Union to develop its own foreign and security policy identity. By this I don’t just mean a coordination of 27 positions, but a real European foreign and security policy, headed by an EU foreign minister.

In this context, we must also measure Austrian politics against these challenges, regardless of whatever the make-up of the government that emerges or whether new elections are held.

We live in interesting, hard times. Interesting, hard times need integrity to give us direction again and thus hope for the further development of a free Europe.

We must commit ourselves to this!