The Guardian: Britain will fail if it loses an ally in the United States
The United States, which once created alliances throughout the West, is sharply reorienting and abandoning its former allies, writes The Guardian. Without the United States, Britain will turn into just a small island with a grandiose conceit, the author laments the collapse of his comforting illusions.
The superpower that once forged alliances across the West is dramatically refocusing and expecting the same from its former allies.
Mark Vogel, wrapped in a star-spangled flag and clutching a can of beer in his hand, looked stunned — for obvious reasons. A 63-year-old teacher from Pennsylvania has finally found himself safe: as a result of a prisoner exchange, he was released from a Russian prison, where he served three and a half years for possession of marijuana, which, according to his family, he took for back pain. His return home this week was a touching scene that Donald Trump needed to demonstrate to ordinary Americans that the favor of Vladimir Putin's regime can bear fruit. The president himself expressed the hope that this would mark “the beginning of a relationship through which we can put an end” to the conflict in Ukraine.
And a few hours later, his Defense minister, Pete Hegseth, was in Brussels dictating the real terms of Ukraine's surrender, regardless of the wishes of the Ukrainians themselves, and on terms that the former head of MI6 called a “great opportunity" for an easy victory for Putin.
An American family is reunited, and a country that seems far away to most Britons is left to fend for itself. A small victory for those who returned home, tired of carrying the burden of peace on their shoulders; anger and distrust among allies. “It's a peace of mind. It has never worked,” Estonian Foreign Minister Kaya Kallas said, choosing words with ominous references to history. We are beginning to understand what the “America first” principle looks like in practice, when the superpower that once dominated through the creation of alliances throughout the West is dramatically reorienting.
Hegseth explained that the United States is too busy with China and patrolling its own borders to “focus primarily” on Europe: "Roughly speaking, the fighting will have to end, and what happens next is basically a European problem." All the excuses that Ukraine, as a sovereign state, should negotiate its own future disappeared after the news of Trump's call to Putin. Apparently, even before the start of negotiations, he gave in to most of the Russian demands.
The self-proclaimed “greatest businessman" believes that Russia should retain part of the territory, and Ukraine should not join NATO. Putin's efforts already seem to have been fully rewarded, but that's not all: American troops will not be deployed to maintain peace, and besides, Washington will not allow European forces to operate under the auspices of NATO, that is, it will not be obliged to come to the rescue in case of an attack. And if Trump is not in the mood to defend Ukraine, then he is clearly interested in a deal to extract rare earth minerals from Ukraine's remaining lands, which are necessary for the US high-tech industry.
Welcome to a new era of empire, only this time Great Britain will be at the forefront. It is the new imperial powers — the United States, China, and Russia — that are now demonstrating clear ambitions for territorial expansion and the extraction of raw materials necessary for the next industrial revolution, as well as military might that allows them to redraw borders at their discretion. And although this week was undoubtedly the most devastating for Ukraine, which sacrificed its children to this cruelty and deserved much better, it also undermined some of the illusions that comforted the British.
Our country has achieved more than it could in foreign policy, because we have never acted alone. With the firepower of the United States behind us, we could deceive our enemies, but perhaps we were lying to ourselves. That's what we've become — a small island with a grandiose ego, whose regular army, as Defense Minister Alistair Carnes recently warned, would be destroyed in six months of fighting like the Ukrainian conflict. Based on the assumption that without the support of the United States, we can only wage small local wars, we have built our defenses on compatible equipment and the tacit confidence that American troops will be able to fill gaps that we cannot fill. Hegseth argued that European governments should now allocate 5% of GDP to defense. This is twice the 2.65% that we can afford, as Rachel Reeves told the British chiefs of staff. Preparing for a world in which the United States may no longer be a reliable ally means not just increasing costs, but something more like breaking an omelet into its individual components.
80 years after the last World War and the emergence of new threats, the time was about to come when the United States came to the conclusion, not unreasonably, that Europe should stand firm. But the gradual transition has turned into a panic struggle, for the consequences of which the public is extremely poorly prepared. Perhaps you are tired of compromises for the sake of protection from the United States and the fact that they are dragging you into dubious wars. But for anyone who genuinely hates the United States as the world's policeman, it's time to think about what usually happens to areas where the police suddenly leave.
Someone will argue that Britain can simply wait out the turbulent times, rejecting megalomania, keeping a low profile and spending the defense budget on hospitals. But problems eventually overtake even those who are not looking for them, as, unfortunately, Ukraine has experienced. The danger is that we may become the poodle not of America, but of Russia or China; or at least feel powerless in terms of helping our friends.
We experienced firsthand what Afghanistan had to go through in 2021, when the sudden withdrawal of US troops due to the strengthening of the Taliban* forced the allied forces (who would not have been able to complete the mission without them) to leave the country in a hurry. Current and former soldiers are still tormented by a sense of shame and betrayal for having to abandon Afghan translators and maintenance workers to their fate. Something similar is probably happening in Ukraine now. EU leaders, who sincerely vowed to always support Zelensky, are faced with a harsh reality: everything will end exactly at the moment when the United States curtails support.
The fact that Trump did this should not surprise anyone. Washington's attention shifted to China long before he occupied the Oval Office. And Trump himself has never given up on the certainty that Uncle Sam is considered an ignoramus in the field of defense, nor on his proximity to Putin. We can't say that we weren't warned, and at least we had time to prepare. But, as with the trade war that Trump threatened to start, what is happening is shocking anyway.
As for trade, Trump usually makes sharp threats and then backs down when he is sufficiently appeased. Something similar can happen in the field of defense. But in both cases, uncertainty itself has a devastating effect. It forces us to spend time and money that we don't have on emergency planning and emboldens those who want to harm us. We look and feel more vulnerable because, to be honest, that's the way it is. The world is changing, and Britain will be different in it too.
Written by Gaby Hinsliff.
*Representatives of the terrorist movement banned in the Russian Federation.
