They say it is the definition of stupidity: to do the same thing again and again and keep on expecting different results. Unfortunately, the official British policy over how to handle Donald Trump still fails to recognise that he is an enemy of every decent value this country stands for. Such short-sightedness cannot possibly end well.
On the face of it, there were some seemingly quite good reasons for Keir Starmer to try and deal with Donald Trump by flattering his ego and offering him chances to show off on an unprecedented second State visit. After all this is our largest and most powerful ally, and you don’t dump your longstanding friends lightly. Nor do you pick an argument with one of your biggest trading partners if you can avoid it.
Since Donald Trump likes nothing better than having his ego massaged, it seemed sensible to many for Keir Starmer to launch a charm offensive in the hope that Trump would moderate the worst of his behaviour when it came to dealing with us. Getting David Lammy to back this up by trying to strike up a very public friendship with JD Vance was all part of the strategy. Playing nice, it was hoped, would result in the bullies becoming more reasonable and responsible.
Appeasement is not working
It should now be clear to anyone who is not desperately determined to stick to party loyalty that the British government has got it badly wrong. The bullying isn’t being moderated. It is getting worse. It is widening its scope. It is getting deeper, harder and nastier.
Trump took all the publicity gains associated with the State visit and preened himself in front of our shamed nation and the world. He then paused his tariff attack on us only briefly before returning to his worst instincts and deciding that bullying works just fine and a bit more of it was called for. Only to pause those tariffs once again while he proceeded to try and replace co-operation with former allies with a Board of Peace containing some of the nastiest war mongers and executioners on the planet.
Britain is now in a really difficult situation. Starmer has uttered some fine and strong words about Greenlandand helped to achieve a temporary pause in Trump’s ambitions. Yet he is still determined to avoid a break with the US President despite all the evidence that this cannot be avoided.
In a world where the President and his inner circle are convinced that might is right and seem to think they have all the might they need to invade whatever country they choose, Britain either becomes their complicit ally in some very dangerous and morally unjustifiable actions or we break with the US until this changes.
Time for a clean break
What is happening inside the US is chillingly reminiscent of the actions of some of the worst global dictators. Innocent US citizens get arrested at home in their underwear for the simple crime of looking a touch too ‘foreign’ for the liking of a state hired vigilante group called ICE. When an unarmed woman protests she gets shot dead and JD Vance blames her for the crime and deliberately distorts the facts. The President of a foreign country is kidnapped and instead of appointing the woman who won the election and the Nobel peace prize, Trump appoints the utterly corrupt deputy of the previous president because she is more likely to compliantly do his bidding. Greenland is threatened and attempts are made to punish the economies of anyone who dares to stand in the way. And don’t forget that Canada is also on the shopping list of a man who is so arrogant that he thinks not getting the Nobel Peace prize is a justification for resorting to war to get what he wants.
In such circumstances no further appeasement is appropriate and a clean break is necessary, however difficult that might be. There is no getting away from the fact that a break with the US will be seriously painful to Britain and require a serious rethink of our defence and economic strategy.
Rethinking the UK defence strategy
One of the most challenging aspects of this is that it is going to be necessary to ensure that we are in a position to defend ourselves without US assistance. Or, more accurately, against threats that also include those coming from the US government. It is unlikely to be possible financially or practically to do this by relying on a nuclear deterrent and on large naval ships. UK defence equipment is incredibly vulnerable to supply sanctions from the US. Much of it is also too clumsy and outdated to be much use in a real conflict.
The only quick, affordable and efficient way of tackling the imminent defence crisis is to invest heavily in home-produced drone technology and in nimble, smaller equipment which can be deployed at speed and at lower risk. The Russians have proved unable to deploy any of their very expensively assembled battle fleet in the Black Sea because the Ukrainians developed some cheap and effective undersea drones. So, we need to stop spending heavily on outdated technology and entirely rethink our defence strategy. It is necessary to remove all reliance on the United States, to adapt to the realities of the modern warfare, and to act flexibly within our own economic limitations.
Britain alone is vulnerable
We also need some friends we can rely on. The obvious places to look for those friends are the EU and Canada. The economic benefits of cutting our nation off from free and easy access to our main trading partners in Europe have proved to be completely illusory. Now that we have no rational choice other than to become closer allies in defending ourselves against a shared threat from the American government, all logic suggests that we should move as rapidly as possible to repair the damage with Europe and to rejoin.
The objective reality of Britain’s current situation is that we are at risk of being alone and friendless in a dangerous world. We have reliable friends available to us in Canada and the EU, and we need now to join them in a trade and miliary alliance. We have a dangerous and unreliable enemy in charge of the United States. The time has come to order its troops to leave UK soil.
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