Carney’s Davos speech diagnosed the problem. His EU speech lays out the cure

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Prime Minister Mark Carney emphasized that a proposed new alliance with Europe is not an attempt to create a new bloc to rival the great powers. Yet it was a bit of a stretch to assert, as he did in a press conference in Strasbourg, France, on Thursday, that it wasn’t a reaction to others.

The speech he had made earlier in the day to the European Parliament outlining his case for an alliance wouldn’t have been made if it weren’t for Donald Trump.

Now we know that the U.S. President is eyeing the Canada-Europe dynamic warily, declaring that he might consider the formation of a deeper alliance a “hostile act,” as if Europe had no right to offer associate memberships – whatever that is – in his hemisphere.

If anything, that underscored Mr. Carney’s point. His pitch to the European Union was for an alliance that would build up the bloc’s capabilities, and its independence, so that great powers can’t exploit its vulnerabilities.

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Mr. Carney proposed Canada and Europe pool sovereign data and compute, and combine to build independent payment systems, defence industries and energy and critical mineral supplies – to ensure that great powers couldn’t use their dominance over those areas to coerce them. Mr. Carney didn’t name the United States, but he didn’t need to.

Mr. Trump may well view that as hostile. In January, he snapped at Mr. Carney after the Prime Minister’s speech in Davos, Switzerland, when Mr. Carney warned that hegemonic powers were starting to weaponize their dominance.

If Davos was Mr. Carney’s diagnosis that middle powers had to work together to protect themselves against the hegemons, this speech in Strasbourg sketched out some of his prescription for how Canada and Europe can do that.

Europe isn’t a middle power, of course. It is a bloc of various countries with a combined population of 450 million. And it is a natural target for Mr. Carney’s effort to diversify export markets. But it has also faced a reckoning over its dependence on the U.S., notably for security, but also in key areas of technology.

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Mr. Carney’s speech wasn’t just about trade.

He spoke about Canada and Europe working together to build up broadband connections – and the implication is that it will help ensure that Canadian and European data don’t have to be piped through the U.S. He talked about joining forces on artificial intelligence so it isn’t all handled by U.S. models, and so that Europe and Canada can set their own standards. And he spoke about building an independent payments system so transactions don’t have to go through a system under U.S. control.

“Sovereignty goes beyond being able to feed, fuel and defend ourselves. It now requires secure access to AI, semiconductors, critical minerals, payment systems, clean energy technologies, vaccines and space-based communications,” Mr. Carney told the European Parliament.

“We all have important gaps in these strategic capabilities, and we each rely on individual nations or companies to fill them. This creates vulnerabilities, particularly when supposedly ‘global’ companies prove national in the breach.”

His prescription for what a new alliance might be wasn’t full of details, and it certainly didn’t clarify whether Canada will actually become an associate member of the EU or what such a status would mean.

It still sparked rounds of applause from most of the assembled members of the European Parliament – but not from the benches of far-right factions, from which one MEP shouted, “USA, USA,” as Mr. Carney rose to speak.

And it isn’t likely to leave Mr. Trump and the U.S. unmoved – if he’s listening.

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Mr. Carney is making the case for allying to build structures that reduce the means by which the U.S. applies leverage over others. Or, as Mr. Carney put it in his speech, “an alliance so strong that no one can dictate our choices.”

But Mr. Trump delights in employing leverage over others and dictating choices. There’s every chance he will see it as a challenge to U.S. power.

At his press conference before he left Strasbourg, Mr. Carney responded to questions about Mr. Trump’s “hostile act” remark by arguing that the Europe-Canada initiative would make Canada stronger and thus a better partner for the U.S. and suggested it’s not up to Mr. Trump.

“No one is going to dictate our culture or with whom we can strike agreements,” he said.