January 22, 2026 — 8:43am

Brussels: European leaders can choose from a dozen Mexican restaurants in Brussels if they want to celebrate their TACO moment in the stoush with Donald Trump over Greenland.

But they may want to skip the tequila shots after the meal because this is only a brief reprieve in a long argument.

Yes, the US president’s sudden retreat on tariffs fits the TACO theory that Trump Always Chickens Out. He said he would slug eight nations with escalating tariffs unless they backed his claim to Greenland. Confronted with a furious backlash, he dropped the threat four days later.

Confronted with a furious backlash, Donald Trump dropped his Greenland tariff threat.Getty Images

The acrobatics from Saturday to Wednesday now look like a record performance even by Trump’s standard of abrupt threats and rapid pullbacks.

Then there’s the fact that the White House briefed the media just two weeks ago on military force being an option for the president because he was so intent on adding Greenland to the United States. Trump ruled that out as well.

Two retreats in a day. The mountain air at the Davos summit has done wonders for the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

In reality, of course, NATO is already weakened by this conflict. And Trump is not giving up his pursuit of Greenland. His talk of a new “framework” is incredibly vague and means he can make a new demand at any time to place more strain on the military alliance.

This is now a constant danger in relations with Trump – and, most likely, any MAGA leader who follows in his wake.

European Union leaders know this. They will proceed with a meeting in Brussels on Thursday night (early Friday AEDT) to discuss this crisis, even though the tariffs have been dropped.

Credit for the compromise – if that is the right word; we cannot really be sure at this point – goes to NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who spoke to Trump about the new framework. This cements Rutte’s reputation as the “Trump whisperer” in Europe.

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, left, has cemented his reputation as the “Trump whisperer” in Europe.AP

But this only happened because leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and others pushed back hard at Trump. They were joined by Finnish President Alexander Stubb, a keen golfer who gets on famously with Trump most of the time.

The reaction was powerful and generally unified. Macron, in particular, led the calls for a drastic EU retaliation – known as the “trade bazooka” – to punish US exporters.

It looked easy for California Governor Gavin Newsom to turn up at Davos and joke about the Europeans needing kneepads because they were genuflecting before Trump. In fact, the EU reaction was already under way at that point. Newsom’s remarks showed (again) how Trump can divide opponents by making them argue among themselves about who is being toughest.

The lesson is that Trump only respects hard power. Britain and the EU attempted a softer approach last year, when they compromised with him on tariffs, but they had mixed success. The world is seeing a daily experiment in which approach works best.

Leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron pushed back hard at Trump.AP

We do not know where the “framework” for Greenland might lead, so it is too early to be definitive about whether this outcome will shore up NATO. One of Trump’s statements has always been absolutely correct: the US needs Greenland for missile defence. The rational solution is a pact that gives the Americans certainty and the Greenlanders sovereignty.

With his obsessive quest for ownership of the icy north, Trump has raised even more doubts about his age, instability, neurotic nature and fitness for office. The judgment that matters most is the verdict of the American people at the midterm elections in November. Will the voters build him up or mark him down? Will he tower over Congress, or risk impeachment? The most important election for Europe this year will be in America.

Whether this is a TACO moment or not, the outcome for the Europeans is clear in one respect. Trump believes that might is right, and everyone else has to play by that rule if they are to have any hope of surviving him.

This was the message from Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney in his address at Davos the day before Trump landed. This was the most honest, lucid and thoughtful analysis of the state of the world from a political leader in some time. It forecast a future in which smaller nations would have to work together, and work much harder, to prevent big states from abusing their power.

“Middle powers must act together because if you are not at the table, you are on the menu,” he said. Trump chipped him about the speech the next day, calling him “ungrateful” for US support. But Carney’s words sum up the way Britain and the EU pushed back at Trump. There will be times when Australia has to take the same approach.

There was a lot more to Carney’s address, and it is worth watching or reading to consider his full argument about the world of coercion by major powers that will act without the guardrails of what we used to call the rules-based order.

“When the rules no longer protect you, you must protect yourself,” he said. “But let us be clear-eyed about where this leads. A world of fortresses will be poorer, more fragile and less sustainable.”

This may be a TACO moment. Even so, pause with the celebrations.

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