spending goes on improving technology and more efficient production, this could leave France behind. As it is, infighting between Dassault (a French aircraft-maker) and the German division of Airbus over the joint Future Combat Air System—a pet project of Mr Macron’s which includes a next- generation fighter jet—threatens the project’s survival. For France, any future imbalance in conventional forces will be countered by its nuclear deterrent. In March Mr Macron proposed a new doctrine of “forward deterrence”, an arrangement with other European countries in which Germany will be the “key” partner. The idea is that European conventional forces should help “shoulder” the French deterrent, in exercises or deployments of France’s nuclear-capable fighter jets. Indeed, Michel Duclos, of the Institut Montaigne, a think-tank, suggests that “forward deterrence” could be seen as a further way to bind an expanding German conventional force into a broader European project. In the short run the political consequences of the spending gap may be limited, argues François Heisbourg of the Foundation for Strategic Research in Paris, notably because of France’s deterrent. But were France to elect the populist-right National Rally (RN) in next year’s presidential election, this would bring fresh tension. Jordan Bardella, a possible RN candidate, says France’s nuclear deterrent should be extended only to allies who buy French, not American, fighter jets. Other European nationalists also want to attach strings: Poland’s want German rearmament to be accompanied by war reparations. For now, German leadership within the EU is likely to continue to lean heavily on its economic clout. Its strategic credibility remains to be earned. Yet General Mandon argues that France cannot be complacent even on this point. “In five years’ time, the argument that we have operational experience and a certain culture will no longer hold,” he told the Senate. “For the Americans, Germany is little by little becoming the European benchmark.” ■ To stay on top of the biggest European stories, sign up to Café Europa, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//europe/2026/06/03/why-france-is-uneasy-about-german- rearmament
How long can Pedro Sánchez last? The Socialists’ mounting scandals threaten to bring down Spain’s prime minister June 4th 2026 Eight years ago this week Pedro Sánchez became Spain’s prime minister after he organised and won a parliamentary censure motion against Mariano Rajoy, the conservative incumbent. The prompt was the conviction for corruption of former officials in Mr Rajoy’s centre-right People’s Party (PP). Now Spanish politics has come almost full circle. Having promised to regenerate Spanish democracy, Mr Sánchez finds himself weakened by scandals involving leading figures in his own Socialist Party. He faces calls for a general election that polls suggest the right would win. But he insists that his left-of-centre government will carry on until the end of the current parliament’s term in July 2027 “and beyond”.
Two of Mr Sánchez’s closest aides in the party, José Luis Ábalos and Santos Cerdán, were indicted in 2024 and 2025 respectively for rigging public contracts. The prime minister claimed betrayal, apologised and vowed to carry on. But if anything, the latest blows are even more severe. Last month a high-court judge named José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, a former Socialist prime minister praised by some as the guardian of the party’s current values, as the suspected leader of an influence-peddling racket. The judicial probe centres on Mr Zapatero’s controversial ties to the dictatorship in Venezuela, and in particular on a €53m ($62m) bail-out by Mr Sánchez’s government of Plus Ultra, a Venezuelan-Spanish airline, during the pandemic. The judge claims that payments of around €2m to Mr Zapatero and his daughters for consultancy work were mainly a commission for arranging the rescue. Mr Zapatero, like the other Socialists targeted in judicial investigations, denies wrongdoing. Mr Sánchez has never clearly explained why Plus Ultra, which had only four planes, received a bail-out designed for Spanish companies of strategic economic importance. Days later another high-court judge ordered police to search the Socialist Party’s headquarters in Madrid. This was part of his investigation into an alleged plot by Mr Cerdán and others to smear or bribe police and prosecutors involved in other probes. Mr Sánchez has admitted that the party has made mistakes. But several of his aides claim that the investigations are a co-ordinated attempt to bring down the government by unfair means. They complain of persecution and a double standard in which cases against the Socialists proceed more quickly than those involving the PP. They have half a point. Mr Sánchez’s brother and his wife face criminal charges in lower courts over conduct that looks merely unethical, not illegal: accepting an apparent sinecure in a regional government and raising funds for a university chair respectively. In contrast, a case involving alleged abuse of power by a former interior minister in Mr Rajoy’s government in 2013 has only now come to trial. But both of the high-court judges leading the latest probes have unimpeachable reputations. The investigation into Mr Zapatero began with French and Swiss prosecutors. And the claims of persecution have diminishing returns. An unpublished poll suggests that only around half of
Socialist voters believe them, notes Ignacio Urquizu, a sociologist and former Socialist MP. The latest scandals have prompted two of the government’s parliamentary allies, the Basque and Catalan nationalist parties, to call for an early general election. But they are not willing to bring this about by supporting a censure motion, since that would mean voting with Vox, a hard-right party. In private many Socialist mayors and regional officials say that Mr Sánchez’s plan to ride out his term through July 2027 will undermine their chances in local elections, which are due next May. But few dare say so in public. Contrary to appearances, Spain is not a particularly corrupt country. Graft is largely restricted to public contracting and party financing. Still, despite his promises, Mr Sánchez has done little to stop this. The cost of the political stalemate is mounting public cynicism towards Spanish democracy and its institutions. The sooner the country holds an election, the better. ■ To stay on top of the biggest European stories, sign up to Café Europa, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//europe/2026/06/04/how-long-can-pedro-sanchez-last
Italy has tracked down Cosa Nostra’s riches A €200m seizure from the Corleone Mafia that once terrorised the country June 4th 2026 It began with a suspicious bank employee in Andorra, a mini-state between France and Spain. She wanted to know more about the €12m ($14m) in the accounts of a client, an Italian woman whose son claimed she had inherited it from her late husband. A tip-off reached an officer at the Italian embassy in Madrid, sparking a global investigation that lasted almost three years. On May 28th it culminated in the arrest of the woman, her son and her ex- husband, Giacomo Tamburello, who was very much alive and living under house arrest in Sicily, following a conviction for drug-trafficking. It also led to one of the biggest seizures ever co-ordinated by Italian law enforcement: at least €200m spread across nine jurisdictions.
According to the 226-page warrant, the assets represented more than just the fortune of an international drug baron. It claims that 65-year-old Mr Tamburello, his ex-wife and their son, Luca, were the custodians of the liquid assets amassed by a Mafia faction that in the 1990s declared war on the Italian state. Originating in the Sicilian town of Corleone and led by Salvatore “Totò” Riina, the corleonesi assassinated two anti-Mafia prosecutors, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, and brought terror to mainland Italy, planting bombs in Rome, Florence and Milan. Italy’s chief anti-Mafia prosecutor, Giovanni Melillo, linked the latest arrests and seizures to an attempt by the Sicilian Mafia, Cosa Nostra, to stage a comeback. Since the capture of Riina in 1993 (he died in jail in 2017), Cosa Nostra has been losing ground to the Calabrian ’Ndrangheta, the Neapolitan Camorra and foreign crime syndicates. Besides seizing the group’s ill-gotten gains, Mr Melillo said, “we have also thwarted an attempt by Cosa Nostra to re-equip itself” with a unified organisation. That was an apparent reference to an outfit known as Cupola, which co-ordinated Cosa Nostra’s activities and is believed to have been chaired by Riina. All this has yet to be proved in court; the three suspects deny wrongdoing. The prosecution relies in part on pentiti (penitents), the Italian term for witnesses who turn state’s evidence. According to one, Mr Tamburello had been in business since 1983 with the corleonesi’s leading associate, Matteo Messina Denaro, who was captured in 2023 and died later that year. The warrant also includes a fragment of a conversation in a prison yard between Riina and another inmate in which he said he had entrusted his wealth to Messina Denaro, thought by some to have been Riina’s successor as “Boss of All Bosses”. Messina Denaro had investments in renewable energy, supermarkets, construction and tourism. Investigators say that by the time of his death he was worth around €4bn. The assets seized from the Tamburello family included cash in more than 40 accounts scattered from the Caribbean to the Mediterranean, 12kg of gold ingots, a stake in a Lebanese bank held through a company registered in the Cayman Islands, six cars and 22 properties in and around Marbella in Spain, where Mr Tamburello’s son, Luca, was a respected businessman. After a career in finance working for, among others, Société Générale in New York and Morgan Stanley in London, Luca had settled on the Costa del Sol. Until
recently he was the managing partner of the Marbella branch of Berkshire Hathaway Home Services (BHHS), the property arm of the investment firm founded by Warren Buffett. A BHHS spokesman said he had not worked there since 2024. But as of last October Luca was described by the company as “our Costa del Sol CEO”. His father’s arrangements were sketchier. A pentito said 10% of the profits were earmarked for Messina Denaro: “Otherwise he [would have] killed them.” ■ To stay on top of the biggest European stories, sign up to Café Europa, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//europe/2026/06/04/italy-has-tracked-down-cosa-nostras- riches