Good day from Munich, the place your State of affairs Report coauthors are simply barely hanging on after an arduous journey affected by flight cancellations because of the Lufthansa strike. We’ll be on the bottom on the Bayerischer Hof Lodge for this yr’s Munich Safety Convention (say hi there in case you are, too, particularly should you’re NATO Secretary-Normal Mark Rutte) with particular each day pop-up editions of SitRep by Sunday.
Alright, right here’s what’s on faucet for at present. Europe performs protection as Washington waffles, a Munich check-in on the state of cyber, and a few bizarre issues occurring in El Paso.
Trans-Atlantic Trepidation
At this time’s SitRep lead creator is attempting to not learn an excessive amount of into the primary commercial he noticed as he exited Munich Airport this morning championing “EUROPEAN DEFENSE” in all caps and selling a brand new autonomous drone partnership between German protection tech corporations Helsing and Hensoldt. The businesses’ joint announcement is much more on the nostril, touting “sovereign German and European know-how structure” that may “sustainably strengthen the protection capabilities and technological management of a democratic Europe by purely nationwide know-how and provide chains.”
Self-reliance is clearly on European minds heading into this week’s convention—precisely one yr after U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance shocked convention attendees in Munich with a lecture on sovereignty and protection burdens, and weeks after U.S. President Donald Trump shocked a lot of those self same attendees in Davos, Switzerland, with a speech calling for the U.S. takeover of Greenland (earlier than NATO Secretary-Normal Mark Rutte engineered a détente).
Trump’s risk to the territorial integrity of a NATO ally (Denmark, which controls Greenland) is the “last nail within the coffin” for the alliance, mentioned retired Gen. Richard Shirreff, who served as NATO’s deputy supreme allied commander Europe from 2011 to 2014. “By doing that, Trump has blown a gap by the idea of collective protection,” Shirreff mentioned, “and in doing so it forces Canada and Europe to successfully say to America: ‘We wish to preserve hyperlinks with you, however we’ve to Europeanize and Canadianize the NATO alliance.’” (Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has made it clear that he shares at the very least a model of that sentiment.)
Officers in Munich on Thursday didn’t fairly go that far, however self-sufficiency was the secret. “We should be united,” Andrius Kubilius, the European commissioner for protection and house, informed the Munich Safety Breakfast—a convention occasion that goals to attach European protection start-ups with traders. “We now have continental scale, a European scale,” Kubilius added. “We have to discover ways to use this scale for enormous innovation in protection.”
“Major duty.” The shift can be being spurred on actively by Washington, as evidenced by a speech by U.S. Undersecretary of Protection Elbridge Colby—standing in for Secretary of Protection Pete Hegseth—at a NATO protection ministers’ assembly in Brussels on Thursday. “Europe should assume main duty for its personal standard protection,” Colby mentioned, including that the US will “proceed to press, respectfully however firmly and insistently, for a rebalancing of roles and burdens” throughout the alliance. (He did, nonetheless, clarify that the U.S. nuclear umbrella over Europe would stay intact.)
A few of that rebalancing is already occurring, with NATO saying earlier this week that the UK and Italy will take over the joint drive instructions in Norfolk, Virginia, and Naples, Italy, respectively, from the US.
Nevertheless it’s exceedingly clear that the trans-Atlantic relationship is in a state of flux, and the following three days in Munich are prone to produce a mixture of lamenting what’s misplaced and determining what comes subsequent. The 2026 Munich Safety Report—a customary precursor to the convention—leans closely into that theme, writing that “the world has entered a interval of wrecking-ball politics.”
“Essentially the most highly effective of those that take the axe to present guidelines and establishments is US President Donald Trump,” the report says, including that in some instances reminiscent of heightened NATO protection spending targets, that upheaval has produced vital outcomes. “But, it’s unclear whether or not destruction is actually clearing the bottom for insurance policies that may improve the safety, prosperity, and freedom of the individuals.”
Let’s Get Personnel
A U.S. federal courtroom has sided with Sen. Mark Kelly in his struggle in opposition to Hegseth, who had sought to demote Kelly from his rank as Navy captain and minimize his retirement pay in retaliation for Kelly showing in a video with a number of different lawmakers urging U.S. troops to not observe illegal orders. Hegseth and the Pentagon “have trampled on Senator Kelly’s First Modification freedoms and threatened the constitutional liberties of thousands and thousands of army retirees,” the decide mentioned in a Thursday ruling that briefly blocked Hegseth from taking motion in opposition to Kelly.
On the Button
What must be excessive in your radar, if it isn’t already.
El Paso fiasco. One thing unusual occurred within the metropolis of El Paso, Texas, this week—we’re simply not precisely certain why.
Right here’s what we do know: Late on Tuesday, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) abruptly introduced El Paso’s airspace could be closed for 10 days. The extremely uncommon transfer raised alarm bells, and never simply due to the implications for business and emergency air journey within the space. The FAA reportedly made this choice unilaterally, with out warning different components of the federal authorities or native authorities officers. On Wednesday morning, the pause was lifted on the urging of the White Home.
However the explanations which have emerged since are everywhere, and don’t precisely paint an image of a authorities that’s in sync.
The Trump administration introduced that the non permanent closure was because of a Mexican drug cartel drone incursion. “The risk has been neutralized, and there’s no hazard to business journey within the area,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy mentioned in a put up on X on Wednesday morning, including that standard flights would resume. It’s commonplace for cartel drones to fly into U.S. airspace, however different accounts have undermined the Trump administration’s public claims about what occurred.
Some reviews recommend that the airspace closure was a results of U.S. Customs and Border Safety (CBP) officers firing an anti-drone laser that was loaned by the Pentagon with out giving the FAA a correct heads-up. What’s extra, these reviews say that CBP officers fired the laser at a celebration balloon they mistook for a drone. Throwing additional doubt on the Trump administration’s official account, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum at a press convention on Wednesday mentioned her authorities had no data concerning drone exercise on the border.
As issues stand, it’s onerous to know exactly what occurred—and lawmakers in Washington are pushing for extra solutions. “The conflicting accounts coming from completely different components of the federal authorities solely deepen public concern and lift critical questions on coordination and decision-making,” Democratic Sen. Jack Reed, the rating member on the Senate Armed Providers Committee, mentioned in a press release.
Snapshot
Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych participates in males’s coaching warmth 3 on day 4 of the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, on Feb. 10. Heraskevych was disqualified over his plan to put on a helmet honoring Ukrainians killed within the nation’s struggle with Russia, which the Worldwide Olympic Committee mentioned would violate the Video games’ guidelines in opposition to political speech.Al Bello / Getty Photographs
Cyber Considerations
One other MSC aspect occasion SitRep discovered itself at on Thursday was the Munich Cyber Safety Convention (MCSC), which gathered cyber officers and executives from either side of the Atlantic and past—together with delegations from Kenya and Japan.
However all eyes remained on Washington, and the opening statements by U.S. Nationwide Cyber Director Sean Cairncross. As Rishi reported in FP’s newest print difficulty final month, allies world wide have been frightened about U.S. engagement in collective cyberdefense, and the gaps it leaves for adversaries reminiscent of China and Russia to use.
Cairncross sought to supply some reassurance—kind of. “I must be clear that ‘America First’ shouldn’t be America alone. We’re in search of partnership, we worth partnership,” he mentioned. “However there are conversations that we have to have that deal with onerous selections.”
Cairncross as an alternative put the onus on U.S. allies. “We wish that partnership and we wish that to proceed, however that’s not our alternative,” he mentioned. “America would do it alone, however that’s not the selection that we’d make.”
One former U.S. cyber official did sound a word of warning about pulling again. “In the US, two pleasant nations to our north and south, two giant oceans to our east and west don’t shield us from the malware, the assaults, the area of our on-line world at present,” retired Gen. Paul Nakasone, the previous head of the Nationwide Safety Company and the U.S. army’s Cyber Command, mentioned on one other panel later within the day. “So if our nations are going to decouple, we accomplish that at our personal danger. We’re a lot better working collectively, and so the concept of decoupling know-how, decoupling data sharing—for somebody that had achieved this within the public sector—is one thing I’m very involved about.”
Placed on Your Radar
Sunday, Feb. 15: U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio departs the Munich Safety Convention for a two-day journey to Slovakia and Hungary.
Tuesday, Feb. 17: French President Emmanuel Macron is about to go to India, the place he’ll maintain talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and take part within the AI Affect Summit.
Wednesday, Feb. 18: Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is scheduled to reach in India for a state go to, throughout which he may even meet with Modi and attend the AI Affect Summit.
Quote of the Week
“I feel for the American individuals, that is the worst factor that may occur.”
—Vance whereas talking to reporters on Wednesday, referring to the tip of the New START U.S.-Russia nuclear treaty that the Trump administration allowed to lapse final week. Vance added that the administration is “partaking with the Russians” on subsequent steps.
