In October 1905, American diplomats received Norway’s charge d’affaires ad interim just days after Sweden recognized the dissolution of its union. The U.S. press widely celebrated this orderly separation as a model of Western self-determination, not a threat to regional stability. By swiftly recognizing the new Norwegian state, Washington proved that early engagement with pro-Western independence movements can lock in critical Atlantic alignments before rival powers can shape the outcome.
Today, the chaos on French streets exposes the total collapse of the centralized authority that once anchored European stability, signaling that unmanaged separations are now a looming reality. This October, hundreds of thousands marched across France to protest collapsing schools, soaring living costs, and hollowed-out public services. While the government pegged nationwide turnout between 410,000 and 550,000, widespread looting and arson have triggered a massive law-and-order response — resulting in nearly 1,000 arrests this weekend alone and over 2,400 overall.
The underlying economics are equally unsustainable. France’s public debt approaches 119% of GDP, while its deficit sits at 5.4% — far breaching the European Union’s 3% threshold. With 10-year bond yields touching 4.96%, interest payments threaten to consume half the country’s deficit within years. The French state has failed to balance its books for over five decades, leaving youth unemployment hovering near 20%. Mirroring this crisis, parallel unrest in Italy, Portugal, Belgium, and Greece proves that Brussels’s fiscal and migration orthodoxy has permanently shattered the social contracts of Europe’s largest unitary states.
As these central governments’ performance deteriorates, these systemic pressures are accelerating serious, conservative, pro-Western, and pro-American independence movements spanning from the North Atlantic to the Mediterranean. In the Faroe Islands, the center-right People’s Party has emerged as the largest force in the Logting by pairing economic liberalism with an unambiguous demand for full independence from Denmark, effectively converting local sovereignty preferences into electoral dominance. In Flanders, the Vlaams Belang party campaigns for an independent republic that would explicitly preserve NATO membership, defend traditional Western values against mass migration, and maintain ties to Israel’s Likud and American Republicans. Citing the 1905 Norway-Sweden split as its preferred template for an orderly Belgian dissolution, the party consistently ranks as Flanders’s strongest or second-strongest political force. Southward in Catalonia, Silvia Orriols and her Alianca Catalana party fuse unilateral independence with civilizational defense, immigration restrictions, and open support for Israel — including public displays of the Israeli flag and “Visca Israel” (“Long Live Israel”) declarations. This platform draws double-digit support that extends well beyond traditional secessionist blocs.
Similarly, Northern Italian Venetist groups, including Liga Veneta Repubblica and related independence-oriented formations, continue to demand full sovereignty from Rome on conservative grounds. Their momentum is historically anchored: the 2017 Veneto referendum yielded a 98% “yes” vote on expanded powers with a 57% turnout, reflecting deep resentment over fiscal transfers to the south and serving as a transitional step toward total separation. Meanwhile, identity-focused Corsican nationalists have vastly expanded their base, driving overall sympathy for the nationalist movement to 53% — including a massive 55% intersection among local anti-establishment voters — while outright independence support has risen to 15%. Finally, in the Western Balkans, the leadership of the Republika Srpska party has actively courted Washington by offering to develop the massive €100 billion Lopare lithium reserves jointly. Rather than leaving these critical supply chains vulnerable, this proactive economic overture presents American strategists with an ideal, high-stakes opening to challenge and permanently displace Moscow’s historical influence by directly binding the region to Western industrial security.
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That being the case, and to safeguard American interests, State Department and Pentagon officials must immediately open quiet, systematic channels — such as diplomatic contacts, parliamentary exchanges, and selective security dialogues — with these movements wherever they demonstrate a consistent pro-Western orientation and resistance to Islamist parallel societies. History proves that the early cultivation of aligned nationalists produces reliable partners, whereas delayed engagement leaves dangerous vacuums for hostile actors to fill. Should outright independence materialize amid French and EU disintegration, prior American relationships will ultimately determine whether these new states reinforce the Atlantic system or drift toward neutralism.
Exhausted centralized European states can no longer absorb successive crises. Washington must pair political engagement with infrastructure investments to secure critical defense materials and erode our enemies’ leverage. Strategic realism demands treating pro-Western independence movements as vital partners today, anchoring American industrial security before irreversible geopolitical fragmentation locks in the region.
Jose Lev Alvarez is an American-Israeli scholar specializing in international security policy. A multilingual veteran of the Israeli special forces and the U.S. Army, he holds three master’s degrees and is completing a doctorate in intelligence and global security in the Washington, D.C., area.