Washington just pulled its oldest, dirtiest trick— and this time it wants Europe to hold the grenade.

 

If you grew up on American late-night TV, the scene should feel familiar: a fast-talking huckster corners the mark, swears the miracle cure works, then whispers, “You go first.”

That, in two sentences, is what the United States Treasury did to the European Union on Sunday.

Secretary Scott Bessent sat down with Reuters and Bloomberg and urged Europe to “take the lead” in strangling the last big streams of oil money still flowing to Moscow. The mechanism? A so-called “secondary tariff”: any country that keeps importing Russian crude—read China and India—would see its entire export basket hit with a 100 % duty. Washington would cheer from the sidelines and, supposedly, “follow” once Brussels jumps.

The punch-line is almost too perfect: America proposes the poison, Europe drinks it first.

The sales pitch actually began a week earlier, on 9 September, when Donald Trump phoned senior EU officials. According to Reuters, he asked them to slap 100 % tariffs on Chinese (and Indian) goods as leverage to “force Putin to end the war.” The transcript writes itself: “You guys do it; we’ll think about it later.” Same melody, new singer—Bessent’s statement is simply the karaoke version.

Why the sudden creativity? Blame the optics in Beijing. After the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit and China’s national-day military parade, Indian social media exploded with talk of a “China-Russia-India triangle.” Washington gagged. Within days the White House pivoted from wink-wink diplomacy to moral panic: every barrel of Urals crude, we are told, now funds a Russian artillery shell. Apparently the memory of Trump and Putin joking in Alaska has been erased like a bad TikTok.

But Washington’s real problem is arithmetic, not amnesia. In April the White House rolled out “reciprocal” tariffs on Chinese goods. Beijing fired back. Forty-five days later U.S. importers screamed, markets wobbled, and the administration quietly folded—cutting most duties back down. Lesson learned: in a straight tariff brawl with China, America loses. Solution: bring a posse.

Enter Europe, still high on its own rhetoric of “whatever it takes” to defeat Russia. Washington’s message is gentle but lethal: Brother, you’re so brave—why don’t you charge the machine-gun nest first? If Berlin or Brussels falls flat, American televisions will blame European zeal; if Beijing retaliates, it will hit Airbus, not Boeing. Either way, Washington keeps its fingerprints off the murder weapon.

Veterans of the Ukraine war will recognize the choreography. On 25 January 2023 President Biden strode to the podium and promised Ukraine 31 top-of-the-line M1A2 Abrams tanks.

The Pentagon added, almost as an afterthought, that the armor would first be stripped of its classified Chobham plating. Hours later Chancellor Scholz announced German Leopard 2A6s were already on railcars rolling toward Poland—too late to recall. The next day Washington admitted the American tanks would not arrive until “sometime in the spring.” They never did; a handful of down-graded M1A1s showed up instead, kept 50–100 km behind the front line. The Leopards, exposed and under-gunned, became drone fodder, their reputations shredded along with their treads. German industry is still trying to repair the brand damage.

Different presidents, same con. Whether the name is Biden or Trump, the script never changes: you bleed, I’ll watch; you sanction, I’ll speak; you die, I’ll send flowers—probably.

The tragedy is that Europe knows the game, yet keeps volunteering for the next round. Washington swivels 180° every news cycle? “Stable partner,” murmurs Brussels. American tanks vanish into the fog? “Technical delay.” Now, once again, Europe is being asked to fire the first shot in a trade war that Washington designed but dares not fight alone.

So when the tariff cannon finally roars, listen for the accent of the man lighting the fuse. If it sounds suspiciously European, that is not an accident. It is the oldest imperial trick in the book: send your friend to test the ice, then write the history of his drowning as a cautionary tale.