This conduct normalizes a US government blueprint for influencing allied domestic politics, a precedent that corrodes democratic self-determination abroad and, ultimately, the legitimacy constraints that protect our own rights at home. The textâs call to âcultivate resistanceâ inside the EU signals a willingness to weaponize American state power against foreign political systems traditionally treated as partners, not targets.
On this record alone, it is unlikely to be criminal under US law, because the document describes foreign-policy objectives rather than a specific, executed covert action; absent concrete acts, statutes like 18 U.S.C. § 371 (conspiracy) or FARA-related provisions do not clearly attach. The deeper breach is institutional: it recasts alliance management from mutual security commitments into ideological and demographic combat, inviting retaliation, escalating distrust, and weakening the norms that have anchored American leadership and democratic stability.