The alliance between Europe and America is deeply wounded 一 but it’s not dead yet.

Almost exactly a year ago, Vice President JD Vance railed against the continent’s values in a surprisingly abrasive speech at the Munich Security Conference. And Europe has taken a repeated battering since 一 from the Trump administration’s friendly outreach to far-right parties, to its punishing tariffs, threats to take Greenland by force and comments that minimized the contributions of European troops killed in Afghanistan and Iraq.

But even with the most severe fractures in the relationship’s 70-year history, the ties between Washington and NATO are not entirely broken. Interviews with more than a dozen diplomats and military leaders on the continent reveal skepticism that the alliance is falling apart. They expect it to remain, but likely in a very different form.

To start, European leaders are growing increasingly confident that they can tackle more on their own — and might need to if President Donald Trump decides to force a full rupture.

“They’re not abandoning us,” said a policy official from a NATO country. “But there has been a change in priorities.”

The annual Munich summit this week will serve as a gut check of that emerging self-assurance and of the long-standing transatlantic tie, notably frayed but still bound together.

Officials from both the U.S. and Europe note diplomacy and military-to-military contact at the working level proceed in a healthy and productive way. They point to the regular joint military exercises on the continent, the largely positive talks about keeping U.S. troops in Europe, and the well-respected American four-star general, Alexus Grynkewich, who leads NATO’s military forces.

The alliance has agreed to boost defense spending to 5 percent of GDP to meet a Trump demand, and countries are buying American weapons at a record pace.

But the questioning of European values and the insults hurled at its military by Trump have stung. In an unusual move, Washington and Warsaw — one of the U.S.’ staunchest allies — engaged in a spat earlier this month after the U.S. ambassador to Poland lambasted the Polish Parliament speaker.

“On Greenland, we were close to the point of no return,” said a European official, who like others interviewed, was granted anonymity to speak candidly about a close ally. “I hope in Munich they will really feel that Europe has changed. Yes, we need the U.S., we will cooperate as much as we can, but there is very little trust left.”

The Munich conference, which starts Friday and brings together U.S. and European policymakers, will showcase some of those larger changes in the relationship. And the American footprint there will look different than previous years. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will deliver a speech instead of the vice president, who traditionally appears to emphasize the bonds of the transatlantic alliance and the shared cultural history between the two continents.

Rubio will attend the forum with his deputy, Christopher Landau, who accused much of Europevia social meda in December of undermining “the security of the US itself through the (unelected, undemocratic, and unrepresentative) EU.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is also skipping the NATO defense ministers meeting in Brussels a day before Munich opens, another signal of the shifting relationship. He is sending the Pentagon’s top policy official, Elbridge Colby, who will be one of the few American defense officials to show up.

Vance’s decision to skip the Munich conference comes as a relief to those who are working to keep the transatlantic relationship on solid footing. Foreign diplomats do not expect Rubio to use the conference to pick a fight with Europe, said one foreign official, who saw Vance’s absence as a sign of the administration’s efforts to focus more on domestic politics ahead of the U.S. midterms.

European officials are focusing more on the common goals they can share with Washington, such as trade talks. That’s partly because the allies have been through so much together, including a grinding war in Afghanistan and a rapid military modernization after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Russian President Vladimir “Putin did not succeed in dividing us,” said a military officer from a NATO nation. “The contrary is the case. Even Sweden and Finland have become NATO members. … We are in a better state, and everybody is convinced that NATO is critical — not only Europeans, but also many of the Americans.”

But officials on the continent still recognize a profound shift. They understand “this administration prefers to work bilaterally, with governments and not with the European Union, which is a big change,” said Pablo Hispán from the Council of Europe, an intergovernmental organization. That’s a “180 degree change” from previous administrations.

European leaders are starting to make more moves independent of the U.S. Sweden, Norway, Germany and the Netherlands publicly confirmed last week they’re holding conversations about a European nuclear deterrent to complement America’s.

Many Europeans also took heart from a speech delivered at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who cited the “rupture” of the international rules-based global order.

One diplomat called it a “watershed moment” when Carney stood up for what he called “middle powers” who “must act together, because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”

The official said European countries must show resolve and not follow along blindly. “It is possible for Europe to stand up to Russia” on its own, the person said, noting Russia’s economy is only about the size of Italy’s. But, the person added, Europe still needs to stay close to the U.S. economically and militarily.

One of the biggest concerns revolves around how committed the U.S. is to keeping a robust presence on the continent, something that Trump and his allies have said could change.

Few expect to have major public disagreements with the Americans at Munich, but they appear more ready to stand their ground if challenged.

“It’s better to prepare ourselves internally beforehand and be stronger,” one diplomat said. “But we shouldn’t let ourselves be pushed around or intimated.”