Folks, what you hear in the background is the political equivalent of sobbing into your pillow.

America and Europe just broke up, and that means a late Thursday night for EU leaders at their emergency summit here in Brussels,

as they toss and turn and try to figure out how, just how, to live without

the United States.

European Commission President Ursula Fonder Lyon, standing shoulder to shoulder with Ukraine's

President Volodymyr Zelensky, laid out the stakes and Europe's ambitions.

This is a watershed moment for Europe. And Ukraine as part of our European family, it's also

watershed moment for Ukraine. Europe faces a clear and present danger. And therefore, Europe has

to be able to protect itself, to defend itself, as we have to put Ukraine in a position to protect itself and to push for lasting and just peace.

We want a peaceful strength.

Peace through strength. We'll come back to that one.

Yeah, we couldn't miss this moment. So we left our cozy studio and headed down the road to the Europa building,

where the continent is scrambling to prove it can defend itself after Donald Trump abruptly halted U.S. military aid to Ukraine.

So can Europe hold its ground at this high-stakes summit?

And what kind of peace is actually on the table for Ukraine?

Because beyond those headlines, the bigger question is, what does peace actually mean?

I'm Sarah Wheaton, host of EU Confidential, and today we're covering a lot of ground.

We'll give you a quick and dirty update on this summit, of course.

But like, we've been hearing a lot of shouting and arguing about the best way to stop the fighting.

As we saw in the Oval Office last week, there's a lot of genuine anger and shock.

So we're going to take some steps back and talk to someone who literally makes peace for a living about how it's actually done.

And let's be clear here, the EU still has its own internal controversies.

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