Global Risks to the EU in 2026: What are the main conflict threats for Europe

501 experts responded to the survey. All respondents are academics, policymakers, think tankers or journalists. They are members of the principal European studies and analysis networks, and self-identified as having EU expertise, with close to 40% identifying as EU foreign policy experts. 96% hold at least a master's degree, and over 50% hold a PhD. At the end of November 2025, we asked them to rank the likelihood and expected impact of 30 predefined risks affecting EU security in 2026. These are the main threats they identified for the year ahead.

The top risks identified by experts are a disruptive attack on EU critical infrastructure, Russia's continued aggression in Europe and against its neighbours, US withdrawal of its security guarantees to European allies, and a military conflict between China and Taiwan.

Compared to the 2025 edition of the survey, experts assessed the risk of two events to have increased. A China-Taiwan armed conflict has moved from Medium to High Risk, while political violence in the United States has risen from Low to Medium Risk for the EU. Experts note the growing relevance of events happening outside Europe for EU security.

On the other hand, experts observe that five risks have been downgraded: four in the Middle East (renewed wars in Gaza and between Israel and Iran, state collapse in Lebanon, and mass migration from the Middle East and North Africa), and one in the Eastern neighbourhood (Georgia's full submission to Russia).  This shift may simply reflect a short-term easing of escalation risks in the Middle East after a violent 2025 - driven by deterrence, military strikes, and high-tempo crisis management - rather than genuine stabilisation of the region.

Hybrid attacks top the chart

Europe's top risk in 2026 is not a tank column crossing into EU territory - it is a disruptive hybrid strike on critical infrastructure. Experts rate this as both the most likely scenario and one of the most impactful. Such an attack would not aim to defeat Europe militarily but to divide and weaken political resolve: subsea cable sabotage, a prolonged power-grid shutdown, or coordinated disruption across digital and transport systems could paralyse daily life, rattle markets, and trigger a crisis of governability.

Hostile states, primarily Russia, and their proxies are already probing Europe's cables, pipelines, and networks. The experts' message is clear: deterrence in 2026 will depend as much on ensuring redundancy and rapid repair of critical infrastructure, cross-continental coordination and societal preparedness as on traditional military instruments.

Russia is betting on erosion

Russia remains at the centre of Europe's threat picture in 2026 - although experts do not expect a direct NATO-Russia war. Instead, the greatest risk lies in slow-burn actions that steadily degrade Europe's security environment while remaining below NATO's Article 5 threshold.

The most acute risk is a ceasefire in Ukraine on Russia's terms, which experts rate as a top-tier risk in terms of both likelihood and impact. The concern here is not simply territorial loss. It is setting a strategic precedent: a settlement that locks in gains achieved through force, rewards aggression, and leaves Ukraine structurally vulnerable would signal that Europe cannot shape its own security environment. In such a scenario, deterrence would erode, and the EU would inherit a permanently unstable frontier.

Second, experts expect a new Russian military action in non-NATO neighbouring states, rating it as a high risk and more likely than a direct NATO-Russia clash. Moscow's preferred tactic remains the use of pressure, coercion, and military moves against softer targets where the costs are lower and the ambiguity is higher. The survey also flags the possibility of Georgia fully submitting to a Russia-directed agenda, reinforcing the picture of a neighbourhood being reshaped through intimidation, capture and opportunistic escalation.

Overall, the picture emerging for 2026 is rather bleak: Europe faces a drawn-out contest of attrition, not a single decisive showdown.

US withdrawal would have a nuclear impact

Despite the new 5% defence spending pledge, one year of Trump 2.0 has not assuaged fears of a US pullback from security guarantees to European allies. This scenario remains strategically seismic and plausibly imminent for experts, as was the case in 2025. Experts perceive that such a development would have as severe a political impact on Europe's security as Russia's use of a nuclear weapon, while being significantly more likely than the latter. Europe's main military alliance is now a preeminent source of risk.

This does not mean that Washington's presence would vanish overnight. But Europe is being forced to confront a harsher reality: deterrence depends on credibility, and credibility depends on political commitment. If US commitment is less certain, the deterrence edifice becomes shakier: adversaries start believing they can probe, sabotage and escalate without triggering a unified response. Renewed US threats to annex Greenland only deepen this strategic predicament.

A US-backed NATO still has deterrent power (making a NATO-Russia direct war an unlikely risk for 2026), but the EU is nowhere near able to replace US guarantees in the short term.

Cross-theatre risks

Going beyond the Euro-Atlantic theatre, the risk of a cross-strait military conflict between China and Taiwan has increased this year compared to 2025 results, moving into the high-risk tier and reflecting both Beijing's growing assertiveness and the significant impact that a blockade of Taiwan would have for Europe. Still, experts see a US-China military conflict over Taiwan as the lowest-likelihood scenario among the 30 risks assessed. This is a further signal of reduced US credibility as the defender of last resort.

In 2025, experts correctly identified a direct confrontation between Israel and Iran as a high-risk event. A renewed escalation is assessed as a mid-tier risk for 2026, reflecting perhaps Iran's reduced military capabilities following US strikes and protests demanding regime change. By contrast, a resumption of hostilities between Israel and Hamas is seen as a high-likelihood event, albeit with a limited impact on the EU. Other moderate risks include renewed fighting in the Red Sea, destabilising armed conflict in Libya and aggressive Chinese action in the South China Sea.

Comparing the results shows real alignment across the transatlantic expert community on the big picture: Russia's threats and the war in Ukraine remain central concerns, disruptions of critical infrastructure are no longer seen as niche risks, and China's coercion of Taiwan is an increasingly plausible scenario. The US survey also places the Middle East high on the agenda, even higher than the Global Risks survey: US experts anticipate renewed fighting in Gaza and the wider risk of escalation feeding regional instability, including spillover in a renewed Israel-Iran war.

But the US outlook (☆) is also becoming more inward - and more neighbourhood-focused. CFR experts elevate US political violence - growing unrest and domestic instability - as a top risk, whereas domestic violence in Europe is a remote risk for EU experts (○). The CFR survey also expected direct US strikes in Venezuela to change the Maduro regime to be a high-impact event for the US, whereas in the Global Risks survey this is rated as a low-impact event for European security.

The convergence in risk perceptions is striking: both sides fear coercion, disruption and escalation by major powers. Yet the survey results also show that the United States is increasingly focused on a more domestic and distinct risk landscape in which Europe is just one theatre among several.