I disagree with Trump, but we can't afford to ignore him

Yahoo

20-02-2025

'I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical a---hole ... or that he's America's Hitler.'
Before you faint, that's not me thinking that, but J D Vance in 2016. The vice president who only this week scolded President Zelensky for 'bad mouthing the president' has a long track record of bad mouthing his own boss.
Yet he still made it to number two in the White House. That says a lot about Donald Trump's style and his propensity to govern in the moment rather than in a more traditional way.
Trump's style seems to be based on a view that presidential power is absolute. He can forgive J D Vance or even Peter Mandelson's comments because they don't really matter.
What really matters to him is one thing, himself. It is important we understand that because it drives and motivates his agenda. The art of a deal is more important than the outcome of it.
Trump's desire to be centre of attention means that anyone who doesn't pay homage at the court of the new king deserves to be condemned.
I believe that his anger at Zelensky is not driven by the rights or wrongs of the war. In my view it is driven by the fact that Zelensky won't be supine to him. The opening salvo of team Trump in trying to stop the war – and claim a Nobel peace prize, it is rumoured – has failed badly.
As soon as Trump refused to let Ukraine or Europe into the room for peace talks he unwittingly risked looking impotent. This is not something he will ever want to look like.
When the president of the United States took any US assistance off the table in advance of the talks – boots on the ground, aid and security guarantees – while at the same time handing Putin everything he wanted, Donald Trump lost nearly all leverage.
The Ukrainians saw little point in engagement and realised that their long-term future lay with Britain and Europe.
This is because true leadership is generous not selfish. The motto of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst is 'serve to lead' – you put skin in the game to have the right to lead.
And now, within a week, as a result of a self-inflicted diplomatic mess, we see this president reduced to spouting Kremlin talking points and fake news.
It is time for us in Europe to really put our money where our mouths are. To be outraged by Donald Trump but to do nothing about it is to prove Trump's point – that we are all talk.
Next week Sir Keir goes to Washington DC. He will try and be the 'bridge' between Europe and the United States, No 10 claims.
But I hope when he goes, he does actually make it clear to Donald Trump that we reject in the strongest terms his claims about Ukraine. I hope he is clear on tariffs, on Greenland and Nato.
But if Sir Keir is to be listened to he will also need to show that he too has listened to the message from successive Whitehouse administrations that we must take a greater responsibility for our own security. We need to recognise that the USA has asked us to change our priorities for more than a decade.
And we must act on it by pushing defence to the top and making some tough spending decisions elsewhere to fund it. In the Trump Oval office, money talks.
There are many people inside and outside government who fear to say what we really think. They worry about what impact arguing with Donald Trump would have on our special relationship. In fact, I notice many of them are the same people who were afraid to stand up to Putin when I was in the Cabinet.
As one of the United States's closest allies, we don't have to be reckless or aggressive in our messaging to Trump, but we can be honest.
We do speak the same language. There is still more that unites us than divides us.
We should not forget that our special relationship goes a lot deeper than which 'here today , gone tomorrow' politician occupies no 10 or the Oval office.
Trump mark 2 is definitely different from Trump mark 1, but in the end his main policy goals are domestic not foreign. If he can forgive J D Vance he can forgive anyone.
Rt Hon Sir Ben Wallace served as defence secretary
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