During the Davos summit this week, leaders from some of America’s closest partners expressed concerns about navigating a global landscape reshaped by President Trump’s unpredictable foreign policy. These allies now view the U.S. as an unreliable ally, if not a potential adversary.

Canadian and French leaders, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, highlighted Trump’s controversial interest in acquiring Greenland as a pivotal moment. They argued that this situation underscores the urgency of establishing military and economic resilience independent of the United States.

In his Wednesday address, Trump retreated from the aggressive stance of acquiring Greenland by force, offering a measure of reassurance against the most extreme outcomes.

Nevertheless, a European diplomat confided to The Hill that Trump’s comments provided little comfort. His persistent antagonism toward NATO allies and the subtle threats laced throughout his confrontational speech left many uneasy.

“They have a choice. You can say ‘yes’ and we will be very appreciative, or you can say no, and we will remember,” Trump declared.

But just hours later, Trump posted on TruthSocial that he reached a “framework of a future deal” over Greenland with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, who has positioned himself as a main bridgebuilder between Europe and Washington. 

Trump also said he would withhold 10 percent tariffs he had earlier threatened on European countries that offered military support to Copenhagen and Nuuk. 

Jim Townsend, adjunct senior fellow in the Transatlantic Security Program with the Center for a New American Security, said Trump is too unpredictable for anyone to take the president at his word. 

“He may for some unknown reason change his mind,” he said.

Sweden’s deputy prime minister Ebba Busch said after Trump’s speech that Europe would not be “blackmailed into a position we’re not prepared to own for a long time.”

“My message to him is it’s time to calm down,” she told Sky News.

Jana Puglierin, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said Trump’s speech offered plenty of cause for continued concern related to NATO and U.S. support for Ukraine in defending itself against Russia’s nearly four-year war. 

“One of the most remarkable things President Trump said in the speech was that you only defend what you actually own. That raises even more questions here in Europe when you think about American security guarantees for Ukraine or even Article 5 of NATO. After all, those also concern territory that the United States does not own,” she told The Hill.

Sudha David-Wilp, a senior fellow and vice president of external relations with the German Marshall Fund, said Trump’s revocation of force against Greenland “probably calmed nerves” but the rest of his speech reinforced what Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney declared as a “rupture” in the global order. 

“We’re not going back to what once was, and Europe and maybe other countries, like Canada, have to find new coalitions, find new forms of cooperation,” she told The Hill. 

“I think Europeans definitely want to have a partnership with the United States and know that they can’t do certain things without the U.S., but they also realize that in certain instances, they need to be capable and stand on their own two feet in order to take care of their strategic interests.”

Carney, in a speech that drew a standing ovation among world leaders and top business executives at the Davos forum on Tuesday, called for a “third path” of middle powers banding together based on shared democratic values.

“We know the old order is not coming back. We shouldn’t mourn it. Nostalgia is not a strategy. But we believe that from the fracture, we can build something bigger, better, stronger, more just,” he said.

“This is the task of the middle powers, the countries that have the most to lose from a world of fortresses, and the most to gain from genuine cooperation.”

Trump lashed out at Carney in his own speech on Wednesday, saying: “Canada lives because of the United States, remember that Mark the next time you make your statements.”

But Carney was joined in his view by the President of the European Central Bank Christine Lagarde, who told CNN that Trump’s fixation on Greenland is “a wake up call, a bigger one than we ever had.”

“I think Europe is going to look at its strengths, look at its weaknesses, do a big SWOT analysis and decide: What do we need to do to be strong by ourselves,’ she said. “To be more independent, to rely on the internal trade that we do with each other, so that we can just – not ignore – but at least prepare another plan B just in case the normal relationship is not restored.” 

French President Emmanuel Macron said in his speech to the forum on Tuesday that “we do prefer respect to bullies… and we do prefer rule of law to brutality.” He further denounced “an endless accumulation of new tariffs.”

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer addressed Parliament on Wednesday saying he will “not yield” to Trump’s tariff pressures related to Greenland. 

He also criticized Trump as unleashing “words of chaos” in opposing the U.K.’s decision to transfer the Chagos Islands back to Mauritius, saying it was only a pressure tactic over Downing Street’s support for Greenland and Denmark. 

“He wants me to yield on my position and I’m not going to do so,” Starmer said. 

On the military front, Finnish President Alexander Stubb said that Europe can “unequivocally” defend itself, even without the Americans, speaking on a panel at the Davos forum. 

But he brought up that the U.S. still holds the keys to Europe’s airpower, acknowledging that Finland’s fleets of F-18 fighter jets, and its upcoming acquisition of F-35 fighter jets, require American support. 

“Do they fly without Americans? No, they don’t. But do we trust that they will continue to fly because it’s in the interest of America to do so? Yes,” he said. 

Stubb’s statement underlines the challenges Europe faces in breaking with the U.S. and becoming a formidable – and united – world power in its own right. 

“Europe is not a political union, it’s a huge market, it’s fragmented and it’s really hard for unity to happen among all 27 member states, let alone countries that are outside the European Union,” said David-Wilp.

“But because of the way the world is moving right now, I think Europeans know that for Europe to be a credible geopolitical actor and to protect their way of life, then they need to step up and there has to be some disruption as well.”

In one signal of disruption, the European Parliament on Wednesday suspended work on the European Union’s trade deal with the U.S., a direct protest to Trump’s demands on Greenland and tariff threats.  

And the world’s economic markets sent their own message this week on the importance of U.S.-Europe relations, with stocks plunging on Tuesday over fears of a trans-Atlantic trade war – and then rebounding on Wednesday as Trump backed off his threats. 

“That may well have been the reason he backed down,” former Vice President Al Gore said at the summit. “It may have also been a lot of people who were close to him, who are more tethered to reality, convinced him he made a mistake.”

Gore added, “To try to take a wrecking ball to these alliances, the way he took a wrecking ball to the East Wing, is literally insane.”