Challenges and threats to the security of the Visegrad Group countries: intensification of relations with the United States as a means to overcome risks?

Abstract

Since January 2017, when Donald Trump assumed the post of US president, there has been a visible intensification of relations between the United States and the countries from Central Europe, aimed at, for example, counteracting challenges and threats faced by the allies. The objective of the article is to analyze challenges and threats to Central Europe, identified by Donald Trump. He points to the necessity: 1) to strengthen NATO and increase the engagement of European allies; 2) to ensure energy security; 3) to counteract threats from two superpowers – Russia and China. The text addresses how important the challenges and threats identified by the American president have been for individual Visegrad states. The article begins by presenting characteristic features of the foreign policy conducted by Donald Trump’s administration which influence relations between the US and the Visegrad countries. It then analyzes the relations between the US and individual states regarding the previously presented challenges and threats. The article’s thesis is that Poland is the only Visegrad country to perceive all three challenges and threats in a way similar to the US, and thus cooperates with the US in this matter. The work is a comparative analysis based on content and narrative analysis.