Even before President Trump set foot on Polish soil, the leader of the
country’s ruling right-wing Law and Justice Party, the former Prime
Minister Jarosław Kaczyński, declared Trump’s decision to visit Warsaw a
“new success” for Poland that made other countries jealous. Poland’s
defense minister, Antoni Macierewicz, said that his government is on the
same page as Trump when it comes to being attacked by “liberals,
postcommunists, lefties and genderists.” And, as a pro-government crowd
chanted Trump’s name on Thursday, Trump delivered an address in Warsaw
where he urged Russia to halt its meddling in Eastern Europe, and pledged
that the U.S. would defend its NATO allies. But he also painted “radical
Islamic terrorism,” unchecked immigration, and government overreach as
existential threats to Western civilization.

“The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will
to survive,” Trump said. “Do we have the confidence in our values to
defend them at any cost? Do we have enough respect for our citizens to
protect our borders? Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve
our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it?”

In Paris, Berlin, and Brussels, Trump’s challenge to Russia and defense
of NATO will be welcomed, but his rhetoric on the dangers of immigration and big government will likely be
seen as the latest example of the American President trying to sow
populist division in Europe. The current Polish government is
anti-immigration, skeptical of climate change, and pro-coal. Its
domestic opponents accuse it of eroding civil liberties as well as
undermining independent media outlets and the country’s judiciary.
Western Europe’s liberal leaders fear that Trump’s Poland visit, and his
policies in general, threaten to sow further discord throughout the continent.

The problems with European unity, and the continent’s deep economic,
social, and political divides, predate Trump’s Presidency and are so
vast that his visit to Poland is unlikely to significantly change them.
For now, a series of recent elections in Western Europe has averted an
immediate threat to European Union unity. The French nationalist Marine
Le Pen and her party, as well as anti-establishment parties in the
Netherlands and Austria, did not succeed in coming to power. Even in
Britain, whose unexpected vote in favor of exiting the E.U. seemed to
presage its collapse, Theresa May and her pro-Brexit
party fared poorly in the recent general election. A convincing victory
for Emmanuel Macron, in France, has further reassured those who were
preparing to mourn “the end of Europe.” And the German Chancellor, Angela
Merkel, who looked politically weakened only a few months ago, has
regained her stature.

Yet the optimism of Europe’s liberal order is not shared in Poland or
Hungary. For them, a stronger European Union means greater pressure from
Brussels, which they distrust and regard as overreaching. Poland has
been under harsh criticism for its anti-democratic practices. Earlier
this year, the E.U. Commissioner for Justice threatened to cut the
organization’s funding to Poland if it failed to uphold fundamental
European values. (Poland is the E.U.’s largest recipient of funds.)
Poland, in turn, has claimed that the E.U. is run by “German diktat.”
Even Polish opposition members who are harshly critical of the country’s
current government admit that Poland regards Germany “as a potential
security threat.”

In Warsaw, Trump also attended a meeting of the newly created “Three
Seas” initiative, which looks like an effort to form a counterweight to
the Franco-German-dominated E.U. The initiative includes a dozen
countries, but even they have precious little unity among them. The
Czech Republic and Slovakia are hardly friendly toward either Poland or
Hungary. (The Czech Republic President and its Prime Minister are not
attending the Warsaw meeting.) And Poland and Hungary differ strongly on
their relations with Russia. (Poland is radically anti-Russian, while
the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orban, is on good terms with the
Russian President, Vladimir Putin.) And while Poland takes a strongly
negative attitude toward the E.U., the three Baltic states are staunchly
pro-Brussels.

Hanging over all of this week’s speeches and meetings, from Warsaw to
Hamburg, is economics. For the poorer European nations, a European Union
strengthened by Macron’s victory and Merkel’s improved stature is hardly
a reason to rejoice. Many Central and Eastern Europeans fear the
prospect of a “two-tiered Europe where they are second-class citizens,”
Ivan Krastev, the chairman of the Center for Liberal Strategies, in
Sofia, Bulgaria, wrote in the Times last month. A “two-tiered” Europe
is an unappealing choice for poorer “second-tier” nations, Krastev
argued. In a European Union led by France and Germany, less wealthy
nations can either be marginalized or become more dependent on decisions
made elsewhere, by Merkel and Macron.

Macron’s calls for “harmonizing tax regimes” across Europe and
“penalizing for exporting cheap labor” would destroy the economic model
of post-Communist Central European nations, which is based on low taxes
and cheap labor, Krastev contends. And while individuals in Europe’s
poorer nations still have the ability to potentially find better-paying
jobs in Germany or elsewhere in Western Europe, their home countries
sink deeper into economic decline. It is this economic division between
the stronger and wealthier (Western) Europe and its weaker (Central and
Eastern) members that is a true threat to European unity, not
Trump’s brief visit to Poland.

One of the issues that Trump is expected to discuss in Poland is
expanding sales of U.S. liquefied natural gas to Europe, in particular to
members of the Three Seas group. (The first delivery of American gas to
Poland was made last month.) If American gas sales are significantly
expanded, this could deal an economic blow to Russia, which happens to
be Europe’s primary natural-gas supplier. But it might also antagonize
Germany, as it would undermine an ambitious Russian-German gas-pipeline
project, Nord Stream II, which also involves several major European
companies.

Whatever Trump’s rhetoric is regarding Europe, the economic forces
dividing the continent can hardly be slowed down or reversed. “The
divide in Europe is deep and complex and will hardly go away even after
Trump’s Presidency becomes history,” Krastev told me. As he has done in
the U.S., Trump will try to take political advantage of long-term
economic trends that existed before his political rise—and will continue
long after his power fades.