US President Donald Trump will hold bilateral talks with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly to be held in New York City on September 23, 2025.
Brendan Smialowski AFP | Getty Images
Europe has become a “total bystander” on the world stage as “wrecking ball” politics becomes the norm, the chairman of the continent’s largest security forum has said.
The organization’s president, Wolfgang Issinger, told CNBC’s Annette Weisbach ahead of the Munich Security Conference (MSC) that Europe’s declining influence on the world stage was “its own fault.”
“Europe has failed to speak with one voice to and about China, and has failed to come up with a clear vision for the future of the Middle East, including how to deal with the Iranian nuclear issue,” said Issinger, a former German ambassador to the United States.
Earlier this week, the MSC released its 2026 report, for which Issinger wrote the foreword. The paper warned that “the world has entered an era of wrecking ball politics” and that “total destruction…is the order of the day.”
The report said that US President Donald Trump “is at the vanguard of those who promise to free their country from the constraints of the existing order and rebuild it stronger and more prosperous,” and argued that he is just one of a movement “driven by resentment and regret at the liberal trajectory on which our society has embarked.”
Issinger told CNBC that European countries are “totally on the sidelines” in negotiations around Gaza and Ukraine.
“We have no role to play. Things are decided by others,” he said. “If you look at the Ukraine war, it has no place in Europe,” he said, adding that the United States and Russia were leading the talks.
U.S. delegations have been leading peace talks with Ukrainian and Russian officials since late 2025, with European officials desperate to maintain a say in how the four-year war between the two countries ends.
“Why on earth don’t we have a seat at the table? This is our continent. This is our future,” Issinger said Friday. “Of course, the answer is not that Donald Trump is making mistakes. The answer is…that we are failing to speak with one voice.”
Issinger added that he rejected a “blame game about the United States” but not areas where Europe has “obviously failed” to establish its strategic position.
Friday’s Munich Security Conference draws delegates from all over the world. The event will run until Sunday.
Issinger told CNBC that in addition to President Trump, the “wrecking ball” is “used by many people,” including right-wing extremist parties across Europe and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
But he said Trump was “the most prominent example” of someone “questioning existing arrangements and seeking to replace them.” “For a country like Germany, which has relied heavily on existing international rules, this is a worrying development,” he added.
CNBC has reached out to both the White House and the Kremlin for responses to MSC’s commentary.
Issinger said Trump’s push for U.S. annexation of Greenland had also eroded transatlantic trust.
After weeks of talk about bringing the Danish Arctic island under Washington’s control, President Trump threatened to impose tariffs on European allies who stood in his way before announcing that a “deal” had been reached on Greenland.
Since Trump returned to the White House, European leaders have promised significant increases in security spending. Last summer, European NATO members agreed to raise defense spending to 5% of their GDP, a measure long promoted by President Trump.
The spending plan has strengthened Europe’s defense companies, with some companies’ stock prices more than doubling and order backlogs reaching record levels.
Issinger told CNBC that Europe needs to “create a defense industry that is more integrated, more competitive and more unified.”
