‘Unapologetic pursuit of national power’: Marco Rubio reveals Trump’s strategy in Athens

WASHINGTON, DC: Secretary of State Marco Rubio said President Trump is pursuing an “unapologetic” strategy to rebuild American defenses, manufacturing and critical supply chains and restore national power.

Rubio said weakened borders, outsourced industry, declining militaries and decisions shifted to global bureaucracies had created a vacuum that adversaries filled.

He delivered the remarks at the Acropolis, Athens in Greece on Wednesday, October 7, during a four-day European tour to Iceland, Greece and Portugal.

Rubio ties Trump’s strategy to rebuilding Western power

“Under President Trump, the United States has made its choice,” Rubio said. “We choose the unapologetic pursuit of national power.”

He linked that approach to taking back control of critical supply chains, reindustrializing the economy, rebuilding defense and seeking dominance in emerging technologies. 

He cited advanced manufacturing, super intelligence, drones, weapons, chips, minerals and cyber capabilities, along with energy production and space exploration.

Rubio said the West had become “ashamed of the very things that made us exceptional” and allowed prosperity, military strength and sovereignty to erode. 

He said “adversaries and its rivals” filled the vacuum by building their own wealth and power.

The secretary said the United States now faces a choice between maintaining “its place at the head of the world” and accepting “atrophy, and servitude, and decline.”

He said the Trump administration’s strategy reflects what he described as the classical Greek understanding of politics and statecraft: nations have interests, diplomacy requires prudence, and governments need the ability to use force when diplomacy fails.

Marco Rubio calls for Europe to strengthen its defenses

Rubio said Europe could “awaken from its long slumber” and pointed to signs of a broader shift, including rising defense spending, new partnerships and programs, and expanded manufacturing and production.

He singled out Greece as a “model ally” for the United States and Europe on energy, migration and defense. 

Rubio said Washington wants Europe to follow Greece’s example while maintaining the transatlantic alliance.

“Together, we must strengthen an alliance capable of confronting the threats of our age,” Rubio said, arguing that the United States and Europe should seek an alliance whose strength is “greater than the sum of its parts.” 

He also cited an agreement involving the United States, Denmark and Greenland that he said would reshape the Arctic and strengthen NATO.

Rubio said Europe, NATO and the United States were safer and stronger as a result.

National loyalty is part of Western tradition, Rubio says

Rubio also used ancient Greek examples to defend national loyalty, saying there was “nothing selfish or wrong about loyalty to your nation” or fighting to defend its interests.

He pointed to Socrates, the 300 Spartans and Achilles as examples of figures who accepted sacrifice for a cause, while contrasting that tradition with what he called the “cult of death” of Iran’s “radical mullahs.”

“Our heroes may be willing to die for their cause, but our heroes do not worship death,” Rubio said, arguing that Western heroism is tied to valuing life and sacrificing it rather than betraying principles.

He said the West’s ideas of “heroism, honor, duty” were not universal but emerged from a distinct character that shaped Western civilization. 

Rubio traced that tradition from ancient Greece and Rome through European Christendom and into American history, saying the West must “rediscover that spirit.”

He closed by describing the present as “an inflection point” for both the United States and the wider civilization, saying national interests, competition over resources and power, and war had not disappeared despite international institutions.