Sir Keir Starmer’s hopes of a new year reset focused on domestic issues and helping voters with rising costs were quickly dashed. Instead, over the weekend, Donald Trump upended the world order in place since the end of the Cold War by embarking on a rampage, kidnapping Venezuela’s president and threatening Cuba and Greenland. It’s the latter that worries the British most.
Once Trump’s special forces snatched former Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro from his bed and spirited him from Caracas to New York to face terrorism and narcotics charges, all bets were off.
Until now, the UK and its Nato allies had allowed the US President’s covetous comments about Greenland to fall into the category of “things Trump says”. They can no longer make that assumption.
However little Maduro will be missed for his swaggering self-promotion, economic incompetence and ruthless repression of his own people, enforced regime change is illegal under international law. Not that you would know it by Starmer’s strategic ambiguity in refusing to condemn Trump for his actions.
The Prime Minister supports international law, but his Government privately says this isn’t the UK’s fight, that it was a solo US move, and Trump must account for it. As far as they are able, Starmer and his ministers will therefore avoid giving an opinion. He has refused to follow France, Spain and Canada in saying the US had violated international law.
But with Greenland, the UK’s relationship with the US is about to be stretched to breaking point. Trump, previously ambivalent at best about Nato, has stepped up a gear and is threatening a fellow member of the alliance.
The President said on Sunday: “We do need Greenland”, arguing the Danish territory is “surrounded by Russian and Chinese ships”. Trump has previously said Denmark hasn’t spent enough defending this strategic country, which straddles the North Atlantic and the Arctic, sitting on vast stores of critical minerals and fossil fuels.
The faster melting of Greenland’s ice sheet, caused by climate change, may make those deposits more reachable while also creating shorter shipping routes for trade between North America, Europe, and Asia. Trump has made no secret that he is eyeing Venezuela’s vast reserves of crude oil. Ditto Greenland.
He tried to buy Greenland during his first term in the White House but was rebuffed. Now he says he needs it for security. After this weekend, Trump’s remarks on Greenland are no longer viewed as merely posturing. Mette Frederiksen, the Danish Prime Minister, has told him to “stop the threats”.
Starmer was in Reading on Monday ostensibly to talk up how the Government is keeping the rising cost of rail fares in check. But there was one issue dominating the news.
Asked whether he would tell Trump to keep his “hands off Greenland”, Starmer’s response was definitive. “Yes,” he replied. “Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark must decide the future of Greenland and only Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark.”
Starmer could hardly have said any less. He is heading to Paris on Tuesday for a meeting of the “coalition of the willing” – the European nations that will support Ukraine if a peace deal is signed.
The agenda is likely to be dominated by Trump’s colonialist jamboree, amid European jitters about further US military operations in the Western Hemisphere, which the White House views as part of its sphere of influence.
This current instability is about more than just one regime’s fall; it’s a wider decline in worldwide order. Expediency, and an eye to the resources of another nation, are being put ahead of the system of international rules the UK had relied upon.
Future crises seem more, not less likely, after the weekend’s events. Critics of the President suggest that the Trump model might inspire China to reclaim Taiwan, which Beijing considers a renegade province, or encourage Russia to restart its attempts to remove Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The coalition of the willing will have a lot to talk about, not least in terms of how it can possibly ally with a US that has thrown off the rules-based international order without accusations of its own hypocrisy.
Meanwhile, Trump might have done the Danes a favour. Frederiksen may find a greater willingness from Nordic and European allies to step up funding to defend Greenland from the China-Russia axis.
And even if Trump doesn’t invade Greenland, he has alternative methods at his disposal and could use trade sanctions and tariffs to reach his goals. There are different ways to upend the world order, without kidnapping leaders.
Trump’s advisers, especially Vice President JD Vance, have signalled they support European opposition parties, believing these right-wing alternatives would be better at running the continent.
Trump took action in Venezuela without consulting allies or planning properly for what happens next. Allies who saw the devastation left by the US-led invasion of Iraq can only grimace at the hands-off approach the US is taking to the aftermath of Maduro’s capture.
Meanwhile, Starmer, who has made a virtue of being a Trump favourite, cannot escape from being within the US’s sphere of influence.
If, as expected, Starmer speaks to Trump later this week, it’s far from certain he can exert any rule-abiding influence over the US in return.
Your next read
square JONN ELLEDGE Who broke Britain?Why are trains so bad in Britain? The answer begins with Ernest Marples
square IAN BIRRELLTrump is echoing Putin’s justification for invading Ukraine
square JENNIE BONDHarry’s feet-stamping may end a spiteful order. Here’s what Meghan should do
square PATRICK COCKBURNNo country is safe after Trump’s anarchy in Venezuela – global order has collapsed
Hence then, the article about trump and starmer s special relationship is under its greatest strain was published today ( ) and is available on inews ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Trump and Starmer’s special relationship is under its greatest strain )
Also on site :
- ‘He broke’: 93-year-old Fremont man told police he spent month planning to kill wife, docs say
- Man dies after stabbing in Denver’s Sunnyside neighborhood
- Nordstrom Rack Has a 'Gorgeous' 5-Piece Tennis Bracelet Set on Sale for Just $20: 'The Sparkle Is Unreal'