Lawrence Wilkerson: How the U.S. Created Europe’s Political Class — and Its Love of War

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, the former Chief of Staff to the Secretary of State, reflects on his time in the White House. Colonel Wilkerson, argues that United States spent decades deliberately shaping Europe’s political environment so that European leaders would be receptive to Washington’s strategic priorities. He describes a sustained effort involving American intelligence agencies, allied intelligence services and organizations operating under the broader umbrella of American foreign policy.

In Wilkerson’s account, the objective was not simply to persuade European governments on individual issues. It was to cultivate a political class that would reliably support the United States and its geopolitical interests. He portrays this as a long-term project reaching deeply into European political and social institutions.

As he puts it, the Americans did not merely influence politicians through conventional diplomacy. “They bought newspaper editors. They bought labor-union heads. They bought parliamentarians.” He argues that these networks of influence helped create a political environment in which policies favorable to Washington could become embedded within European institutions.

Wilkerson extends the argument beyond individual politicians. “They bought whole countries in terms of their political apparatus.” His point is that American influence, as he describes it, operated at the level of political systems rather than being limited to isolated individuals.

Stoltenberg as an Example

Wilkerson presents Jens Stoltenberg as one of the clearest examples of this process. He argues that Stoltenberg was cultivated within the transatlantic political system and eventually became NATO secretary general, giving him a central role in determining the alliance’s political direction.

For Wilkerson, Stoltenberg’s rise demonstrates how Washington could identify European politicians who were compatible with American strategic objectives and subsequently help elevate them within institutions of importance to U.S. foreign policy.

He characterizes this relationship particularly bluntly: “They bought two NATO Secretaries General: Jens Stoltenberg and Mark Rutte.”

The significance of Stoltenberg, in Wilkerson’s argument, is therefore not simply his individual political outlook. His appointment to NATO represented the culmination of a broader process through which Washington cultivated European leaders who could be relied upon to preserve the alliance’s strategic orientation.

Mark Rutte and the Continuation of the System

Wilkerson places Mark Rutte in the same pattern. Rutte’s rise to NATO secretary general, he argues, should be understood as part of the continuity of this American-created political class.

The central requirement, in Wilkerson’s account, was political reliability: European leaders who wanted to rise within the transatlantic system needed to understand Washington’s priorities and demonstrate that they could be trusted to advance them.

Rutte therefore represents, for Wilkerson, another example of how European political leadership is connected to the wider American strategic establishment. His selection as NATO secretary general did not fundamentally change the direction of the alliance but continued the same pattern.

A Political Apparatus Shaped From Outside

Wilkerson’s broader argument is that American influence in Europe became so extensive that it helped determine who could successfully rise through European political institutions.

The process he describes involved newspapers, labor organizations, parliamentarians and national political structures. By cultivating these different parts of European society, Washington could shape the political environment in which leaders emerged and operated.

The result, in Wilkerson’s view, was a European political class whose careers and institutions were deeply intertwined with American power. This is why he places Stoltenberg and Rutte alongside the broader network of editors, union leaders and parliamentarians he says were bought or cultivated.

His argument ultimately goes beyond NATO. The United States, he maintains, did not simply persuade European governments; it helped construct the political apparatus through which European governments were governed. The elevation of Stoltenberg and Rutte to the leadership of NATO is presented as one of the clearest manifestations of that longer process.

(The article has been written with the assistance of AI)