Europe.
A land of wine, ruins, and strategic amnesia.
For a continent that gave the world Machiavelli, it’s almost charming how its leaders consistently fail to think more than one election cycle ahead.
After a decade of sanctimonious speeches, hashtags, and open-border declarations, something remarkable has happened. Europe’s political class finally discovered that migration has consequences.
Stop the presses.
Someone please tell the Hungarian government and a few politicians of 2015, that it can come out of the diplomatic doghouse. Viktor Orbán, Marine Le Pen, and Nigel Farage — your “xenophobia” has been retroactively upgraded to “premature realism.”
Let’s rewind the tape.
Back in 2015, if one so much as whispered that Europe’s asylum system might be unsustainable, that person was labeled a bigot, a populist, or worse: someone who read Demographics Weekly.
Journalists cheered Merkel’s “Wir schaffen das” like it was a Beatles reunion. Sweden became a moral superpower. Spain? Please. Everyone was busy writing op-eds about “refugees revitalizing rural communities”.
Fast forward to May 2025, and suddenly the party’s over. The keg is dry, the guests won’t leave, and the neighbors are complaining.
And now — only now — Europe’s leaders have decided to grow a spine. Or at least rent one.
Enter Sir Keir Starmer, Britain’s new Labour Prime Minister, now doing his best Theresa May cosplay. In May, his government dropped an ‘Immigration White Paper’ that would make Enoch Powell blush.
No more foreign care workers.
Students, get out after 18 months.
Citizenship? That’ll take 10 years now, thanks.
Meanwhile, the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill is being forged to tighten border enforcement.
A decade ago, these policies would have gotten you cancelled. Now they’re mainstream.
Apparently, “taking back control” was just unfashionable until the hotel bills for asylum seekers hit £5.5 million a day.
Portugal — yes, the country famous for relaxed vibes and Cristiano Ronaldo — has decided it’s had enough.
On May 4, its caretaker government announced a mass expulsion campaign targeting 18,000 undocumented migrants. “Voluntary departure” letters went out like spam emails, and officials promised more to come. The sunny country, once known for its liberal migration laws, is now practicing border realism with an Iberian twist: smiling politely while escorting you to the exit.
Critics called it an “election-year stunt”. The government called it “fixing the broken deportation system.” Tomato, tomato.
And behold, Germany, ‘willkommenskultur’ is not only ignored. It’s been pronounced dead. Though Merkel’s ghost still haunts the Bundestag — but it’s been exorcised.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz, backed by a CDU/SPD coalition that seems to have read a map of Saxony recently, has reversed the 2015 open-border policy. On May 7, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt ordered border police to turn away undocumented migrants, including asylum-seekers. Deportations to Syria? Back on the table. Family reunifications? Paused.
Asylum numbers have already plummeted by 37 percent.
The message is clear: if you’re undocumented and hoping for sanctuary, try another continent.
Who would’ve thought that the country that handed out teddy bears in 2015 would be handing out rejection notices in 2025?
Or look, Sweden — IKEA, meatballs, and moral superiority — is now channeling its inner bouncer.
PM Ulf Kristersson and Migration Minister Johan Forssell introduced a bill requiring migrants to demonstrate an “honest living” — otherwise, out you go. Rejected asylum seekers now face a 5-year re-entry ban, and switching from asylum status to a work permit? That loophole is closed tighter than a Stockholm coffee shop after 6 p.m.
Kristersson helpfully reminded the world that “people who commit crimes or behave badly… should not be here.” A radical insight, apparently.
While the rest of Europe pulls up the drawbridge, Spain is busy greasing the hinges.
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez remains the last great romantic of European politics, insisting that “migrants are needed for our economy.”
Spain plans to legalize up to 900,000 undocumented migrants over three years and just passed a new Law on Foreigners to promote “regular, orderly and safe” migration. Which is noble.
But also risky — because if Europe’s voters have made anything clear, it’s that the political shelf life of pro-migration idealism is now about six weeks.
So, why now? Why, after 10 years of media dogpiles, bureaucratic denial, and NGO open letters, is Europe finally acting?
Because it always takes a crisis to reveal what realism tried to prevent.
Because voters are angry. Integration failed. Crime headlines piled up. Social services buckled. And that beautiful idea — of a humane, open, borderless Europe — ran aground on the jagged rocks of policy-free idealism.
Now the same politicians who wagged their fingers at skeptics are busy copying their homework.
It didn’t have to be this way.
If Europe had taken a measured, strategic approach in 2015 — balancing compassion with control — we wouldn’t be here. But instead, leaders chose optics over outcomes. And now, predictably, they’re stuck managing the fallout they swore would never come.
So here we are.
A little older, a little wiser, and surrounded by walls we spent a decade mocking.
We cannot expect politicians to say out loud “Sorry, we miscalculated this”, but can hope that the lesson was learned and the next strategic path will be reviewed with higher concern.
And that it won’t be based on the daily Facebook mood or headline analysis — but on actual long-term strategic thinking, and financial and economic planning.
