Thank you for the interesting comment.
I think that determining a leader is usually far more clear cut. The EU and its bureaucratic-media apparatus love to find abstractions and subjective ways to discuss and measure things, but in reality you can measure production in objective terms. The EU is about 3-5% of global shipbuilding tonnage vs. China's 50-70%. Similarly, China produces 54% of the world's steel and 59% of the world's aluminum; the EU produces 7 and 4% respectively. China has 72% of the wind capacity installed and 4 of the 5 top turbine manufacturers. They similarly dominate numbers for trains (track laid, total HSR track, rolling stock built) and electric motors (market share of drone motors, motor components, EV traction motors, for industrial electric motors the EU and US are at about a quarter of the world market vs. China at 35-40%.)
There are a few areas where things are more subjective. Medical equipment, pharma and high-voltage, I could see a case for current EU ties and I appreciate your perspective.
Aircraft is certainly for the US, though. The EU really only has Airbus and Leonardo. Nobody would disagree that the US wins by far for: fighters, stealth, UAVs, transport, business jets, experimental, VTOL, long range bombers, and yes, helicopters. You cannot compare the US (over 2,000 Black Hawks in the Army alone) to the EU (100 Black Hawks) - the EU has a lot of lightly armed utility helicopters, the US has a massive array of everything from stealth, attack, logistical etc. Yes, sure, Leonardo can design a cool light utility copter, but that is infinitely easier and far less significant than an attack or stealth helicopter. The EU's attempts at serious helicopters (NH90, Airbus Tiger) are mostly a joke. Unless you want to count the AW129? War breaks out, how many of those can Italy send? ...4?
The picture with submarines is similar. The US has an expeditionary nuclear submarine force that can operate around the globe. The EU can do minor regional things, poorly. The Gotlands are cool, but they are small and the Swedes made three (3) of them - thirty years ago.
>Oil is a commodity. You don't really gain anything technologically from producing it yourself
The benefits in peacetime may be limited to dollars, sure; in wartime it is life or death. I am no huge fan of oil but in 2026 it still makes up most of our energy and most of the things around us. I also don't see anyone seriously accusing the US economy of Dutch disease.
>As a Dane, I'm unwilling to call anything related to AnsaldoBreda "world-class"
Hah, +1 for the chuckle :) I am Dutch... ask us what we think of AnsaldoBreda!