I spoke last week at SAHA, Türkiye’s defense tech expo, about the defense challenges facing Europe and how to address these. I thought it perhaps useful to write up my notes, especially notable given that the NATO summit is looming in July in Turkiye. First, things first, Europe needs a reality check, and it needs to recognize the revolution in terms of the European strategic security landscape it now faces.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. In that respect, I think Europe must get real and understand that Russia is the number one existential threat to peace, security, stability and prosperity across the continent, and beyond. Russia has revealed this threat not only in the totally unprovoked invasion of Ukraine but also through its continuous malign actions against Europe whether that is through cyberattacks against European interests, drone activity against European airports, sabotage against defense European establishments, threats to critical infrastructure, using WMD on NATO soil (Litvinenko and Salsbery), backing extremist far right and far left political movements across Europe, and intervening in elections (Romania, Brexit), et al. Putin has a problem with the European model - he is intervening to engineer regime change in Europe, and its rules-based and democratic order, as he sees that as a threat to his rule at home, as Russians likely want the same things. That must be accepted, that Putin is at war not only with Ukraine but also with Europe. It should be a read my lips kind of moment.