Politico has a very good column by Garry Kasparov and Gabrielius Landsbergis looking at the problems the European Union has in trying to deal with aggressive adversaries. Based on cooperation and consensus, the EU finds itself hobbled in dealing with adversaries whose basic model is confrontation.
Though the column doesn't deal with it, the EU was designed to keep the nations of Europe from going to war against each other. A very real problem the EU did in fact solve.
Now the threat is external (Russia, China, Iran) and Trump has sent the message the EU needs to pull its own weight in defense. A system based on consensus doesn't deal well with confrontation, and Russia's war against Ukraine is exactly that.
Kasparov and Landsbergis make the point that leaders who excelled at compromise are temperamentally unsuited to confront Putin's Russia. The authors don't excel at proposing solutions to this dilemma. They imply, without stating it, no feasible solution exists.