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    Tuesday briefing: What last night’s meeting between Trump, Zelenskyy and Europe means for the war in Ukraine

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    Good morning. Last night, Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited the White House flanked by a dream team of hastily assembled European heavyweights. Their aim: to coax Donald Trump out of pro-Russian positions he adopted after his Alaska meeting with Vladimir Putin last Friday.The meeting was a sign of both panic and resolve from Europe. The fact Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron and more cleared their diaries at such short notice to fly to Washington is an indication of how alarmed they are by Trump’s desire to move straight to a peace deal without a ceasefire – and his insistence that Zelenskyy give up Ukrainian territory.Progress was made on US security guarantees, and Trump and Zelenskyy have said they will both be holding face-to-face talks with Putin – although the Russian and Ukrainian leaders still appear worlds apart in their demands. Macron said he had “serious doubts” about Putin’s desire for peace.For this morning’s newsletters, I had a chat with our senior international correspondent Luke Harding about the key points agreed in Washington last night, what it means for international diplomacy, and what is next for Ukraine. That’s after the headlines.Five big stories

    Tax | Rachel Reeves is considering replacing stamp duty with a new property tax that would apply to the sale of homes worth more than £500,000, the Guardian has been told.

    UK news | Exposure to pornography has increased since the introduction of UK rules to protect the public online, with children as young as six seeing it by accident, research by the children’s commissioner for England has found.

    Conservatives | Leaked WhatsApp messages show Conservative MPs are worried that their party’s “piss-poor” messaging over asylum-seeker hotels is making the party look silly. It follows the release of an advert by Conservative campaign headquarters last week, making claims that have since been challenged as exaggerations, such as that asylum seekers receive free driving lessons and free PlayStation consoles.

    Bolivia | Bolivia’s presidential election will go to a runoff, with two rightwing candidates seemingly the top runners. It’s an unprecedented scenario after nearly two decades of leftist rule by the Movimiento al Socialismo (Mas).

    Environment | Relentless heat and disastrous wildfires continue to ravage southern Europe, with one-quarter of weather stations in Spain recording 40C temperatures and above, the latest in a series of disasters exacerbated by climate breakdown amid a continental rollback of green policies.
    In depth: ‘The meeting was significantly better than their pretty awful encounter in February’View image in fullscreenThe aim of this rare and sweeping show of diplomatic force was to safeguard Ukraine, and Europe more broadly, from any widening aggression from Moscow. It was probably also a reminder to Trump of Europe’s combined importance as an economic giant compared with Russia’s much smaller economy.The European delegation included leaders of Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Finland, the European Union and Nato. By arriving as a group they avoided another debacle like Zelenskyy’s February visit to the Oval Office, where Trump and JD Vance chastised him as not showing enough gratitude for American military aid. Here is video of that meeting in case you’d like to remind yourself of the horrific blow-up that Trump thought was “great television”.“The meeting with Zelenskyy and Trump was significantly better than their pretty awful encounter in February of this year,” says Luke Harding. “I think Zelenskyy was well prepared this time: he expressed gratitude to Trump on many occasions, handed a letter from his wife to Melania the first lady.” There was a fair amount of “sucking up to Donald Trump”, says Luke, and of European leaders not trying to offend him.Key European demands are that all decisions must be made with Ukraine present, and that a ceasefire is a pre-condition before further peace talks. They were looking to understand what security guarantees the US is willing to offer in the event of a settlement.Overall, the atmosphere was good, says Luke. “Zelenskyy was even funny on occasions. When Brian Glenn – the reporter who mocked him for not wearing a suit in February – asked a question, Zelenskyy pointed out that Glenn was still wearing the same suit and Zelenskyy had changed his. So overall, the atmosphere was OK.”Did they get through to Trump?Rather than concessions from Ukraine, the summit focused on arranging security guarantees in the event of a peace deal. Trump said the guarantees “would be provided by the various European countries [in] coordination with the United States of America”.The Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, described the development as “a breakthrough”. Membership of Nato is not on the table, but the US and European leaders are discussing “Article 5 kind of security guarantees for Ukraine”, Rutte said.“What is important is that Trump said the US would play a role in providing security to Ukraine in the event of a settlement. You might consider that to be progress, but we don’t know what it means,” says Luke. “As ever with Trump there is a huge gap between what he says and what he does.“I suspect at the end of the day the White House will not want to do very much, but at least this was something tangible. The Kremlin appears to be quite annoyed – that is modest progress for Ukraine, depending on what the US is prepared to commit.”Trump is still saying there is no need for a ceasefire – because he says he has stopped a number of wars without one. There appears to have been less movement on this issue. “The European position was that a ceasefire must come before any trilateral talks – that is common sense when Ukrainians are being killed every day,” says Luke.How did the meetings go for Zelenskyy?Like Europe, Zelenskyy wants a ceasefire before any peace deal and is unwilling to make any territorial concessions. Kyiv wants Nato-like security guarantees sufficient to deter Russia from attacking again. As a reminder, Russia took Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014 and launched a full invasion in 2022, attacking four Ukrainian regions: Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia.Ahead of the meeting, Trump had pushed Ukraine to give up Crimea and abandon its goal of joining Nato – both key demands made by Putin. But Zelenskyy stressed he had been able to present a clearer picture of the battle lines to Trump, whom he met in a one-on-one in the Oval Office.“This was the best of our meetings,” Zelenskyy said, according to a statement put out by his office. “I was able to show many things, even on the map, to all American colleagues regarding the situation on the battlefield.”Luke says: “On the substantive issue – which is how to get a peace deal – he correctly and deftly dodged a question on whether Ukraine was ready to swap land in return for peace.” This is Trump’s preferred peace plan after his meeting with Putin in Alaska over the weekend.Speaking to reporters after the Washington talks, Zelenskyy said “we had a truly warm, good and substantial conversation”. The next steps in the negotiations turn back to Putin, and the Ukrainian president said he was ready for what would be their first face-to-face since Moscow’s invasion nearly three and a half years ago. “I confirmed – and all European leaders supported me – that we are ready for a bilateral meeting with Putin.”What did Trump get out of the meeting?View image in fullscreenTrump previously bragged on numerous occasions that he could settle Russia’s war in Ukraine in a day, but on Monday he said repeatedly that it was far more complicated than he ever thought it would be.Trump previously favoured Kyiv’s proposal for an immediate ceasefire to conduct deeper peace talks. However, he reversed course after the summit and indicated support for Russia’s approach of negotiating a comprehensive deal while fighting continues (for a reminder of how bad things are on the ground in Ukraine, take a look at yesterday’s newsletter).After the Washington talks, Trump said on social media that he called Putin and began the arrangements for a meeting between the leaders of Russia and Ukraine, at a location to be determined. “This was a very good, early step for a war that has been going on for almost four years,” Trump said.Ukraine’s president said he was ready to meet with Russia in “any format” and that territorial issues were “something we will leave between me and Putin”.What next for the war in Ukraine and peace negotiations?Much remains unresolved, including red lines that are incompatible – like whether Ukraine will cede any land to Russia, the future of Ukraine’s army, and whether the country will ultimately have lasting and meaningful security guarantees.“I think where it will go from here,” says Luke, “is that when a deal fails to come together and Zelenskyy fails to give away his land, Trump will start blaming Zelenskyy again, saying he’s the problem.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“Ultimately as things stand, there isn’t really a meaningful way forward to a peace agreement. I mean Putin’s demands are as maximalist as ever – he wants Ukraine to give up a large chunk in the east of the country, in the Donbas region.”Although this seems to be Trump’s preferred route to ending the conflict, it is unlikely to work for Zelenskyy – were he to make this huge concession, Luke says, he would be swept away by popular protest.“I think it’s entirely possible that in the next month or so, the Americans will comprehensively exit from supporting Ukraine. Already they’ve stopped delivering weapons. I can see a pull-out from Trump,” says Luke.“What I find so strange is the way Trump defends Putin, wants to include him, talks about calling him imminently, says he had a great meeting in Alaska. It seems ultimately that is where his sympathies lie – with Russia.”What else we’ve been readingView image in fullscreen

    The New York Times describes 64-year-old Betsy Lerner as a TikTok star, for the following she’s amassed since she started reading out diary entries that she wrote in her twenties. In a new start after 60, Lerner explains she doesn’t see herself that way. But a generation of 20-year-olds who find solace in her entries today may disagree. Poppy Noor, deputy editor, newsletters

    This is the remarkable (and shocking) story of Windrush victim George Lee who has come back to the UK after 28 years of exile in Poland. “I’m past the stage where I can feel angry,” he says. His observations of how life has changed in London during that period are depressing – notably people looking more stressed with “tiredness etched on their faces”. Phoebe

    Nesrine Malik’s tender piece about the dogged reporting of journalists in Gaza sheds a light on a potential reason so many have been killed: their commitment, professionalism and talent causes a real legitimacy problem for the Israeli government. “What the Israeli government is trying to do with these killings is not just stop the stream of damning reports and footage, but annihilate the very image of Palestinians that these media professionals convey,” she says. Poppy

    A fascinating piece by John Harris on the future of outdoor work in the age of extreme heat, with alarming stories of people being forced to work in inhumane conditions. Particularly timely given the relentless heat currently barrelling its ways across Europe. Phoebe

    Perhaps we’d all like to be green-fingered influencers, working leisurely through our homegrown vegetables at the dinner table. But Nicola Slawson’s piece on giving up her allotment after realising that’s just not who she is will speak to the many of us who aren’t. Poppy
    SportView image in fullscreenFootball | Lukas Nmecha’s 84th-minute penalty gave Leeds a 1-0 win over Everton on their return to the Premier League.Tennis | Carlos Alcaraz has won the Cincinnati Open for the first time in his career after his great rival, world No 1, Jannik Sinner was forced to retire from their highly anticipated final with illness while trailing 0-5 in the opening set.Tennis | Jack Draper and Emma Raducanu will face each other in the first round of the revamped US Open mixed doubles.The front pagesView image in fullscreen“Trump: no need for ceasefire to secure Ukraine peace deal” is the Guardian’s takeaway from events in Washington. The Telegraph announces “US military to protect Ukraine” while the Express has “Trump: US will ensure any deal works” and the Times reports “Trump offers ‘very good’ Kyiv security guarantee”. The Daily Mail assesses the meeting: “It was electric with jeopardy, a chess match with live grenades” while the Mirror pessimises that it was a “Stalemate” with Trump’s peacemaking efforts unlikely to work. “Trump’s White House welcome: we can still do a deal with Putin” says the i paper. Give us your topline, Financial Times: “Trump floats prospect of US security guarantee in bid to end Ukraine war”. Main story in the Metro is “UK’s 5,000 fake online pharmacies”.Today in FocusView image in fullscreenHow far-right rhetoric on migration went mainstreamAcademic and author Dr Maya Goodfellow discusses how UK politicians have adopted far-right language on asylum and immigration.Cartoon of the day | Ben JenningsView image in fullscreenThe UpsideA bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all badView image in fullscreenA new report shows just how impactful a raft of groundbreaking welfare policies by former Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador have been. Obrador’s policies, which included a tripling of the minimum wage, and a system of cash transfers for vulnerable groups, made a measurable impact on the lives of millions of everyday Mexicans, according to a dispatch by reporter Oscar Lopez.When Obrador took office in 2018, there were nearly 52 million people living below the poverty line. Six years later, that number had dropped by 13.4 million, an unparalleled reduction of nearly 26%.There has never been a single six-year term in which poverty has been reduced or decreased so significantly,” said Viri Ríos, a public policy expert and director of Mexico Decoded. “This is a watershed moment for the Mexican economy.”Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every SundayBored at work?And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow.

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      I can’t believe I need to spell this out – but Trump is not your daddy | Arwa Mahdawi

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      Is your name Barron, Donald Jr, Eric, Ivanka or Tiffany Trump? No? Then I regret to inform you that President Donald John Trump is almost certainly not your daddy. I say “almost certainly” because narcissistic billionaires do have a nasty habit of spawning willy-nilly. Just look at Elon Musk and Pavel Durov – the latter is the Telegram founder, who has more than 100 children in 12 countries via sperm donation.Still, unless you are a very high-IQ individual, with an orange glow, an insatiable appetite for money-making schemes, and a weird belief that you invented the word “caravan”, I think it’s safe to say that you’re probably not Trump’s offspring.Why am I taking great pains to spell this out? Because a disturbing condition called Trump daddy derangement syndrome (TDDS) is sweeping the world – the main symptom of which is an irresistible urge to call the president of the United States “Daddy”.Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson bears some blame for the spread of this ailment. While speaking at a Trump rally last October, Carlson delivered an unusual speech in which he compared the US under Trump to a patriarch giving his naughty teenage daughter a “vigorous spanking”. Rather than immediately losing the contents of their stomach because of this imagery, the Maga-loving crowd lapped it up. When Trump came on stage later they yelled “Daddy’s home!” and “Daddy Don!” Which, of course, plays right into Trump’s self-mythologising as a hypermasculine strongman who will be a protector of women “whether they like it or not”.While TDDS remained fairly dormant for a few months after that, it seems we are suffering a new outbreak. Last week, Nato secretary general Mark Rutte addressed Trump’s comments about Israel and Iran not knowing “what the fuck they’re doing” by helpfully explaining that: “Sometimes Daddy needs to use strong language.”And sometimes a Nato chief needs to watch their language. After his comments caused a social media storm, Rutte rapidly back-pedalled. “The daddy thing, I didn’t call him ‘Daddy,’” Rutte told reporters later that day, despite being on the record saying just that. “Sometimes, in Europe, I hear … countries saying: ‘Hey, Mark, will the US stay with us?’ And I said that sounds a little bit like a small child asking his daddy: ‘Hey, are you still staying with the family?’ So in that sense, I used ‘daddy’ – not that I was calling President Trump Daddy.”Nice try, Mark, but I’m not sure that makes things better. Rutte, a Dutchman, is basically calling Europe a helpless child who needs Trump’s approval.Whatever Rutte meant, Trump and his followers seem to have taken “daddy” as a compliment. Last week Jonathan Lindsey, a Republican lawmaker, told fellow Michigan senate members that a lot of Americans see Trump as a father figure and more people should start referring to him as “Daddy”. Gay Democratic Michigan senator Jeremy Moss then replied: “You don’t want to know what daddy means in my community.” Just to spell it out, “daddy” has been gay slang for an older man, often monied, who is sexually involved with a younger man for almost as long as Trump has been alive.Meanwhile, Trump spoke approvingly of Rutte’s comments, saying: “I think he likes me.” He added: “If he doesn’t, I’ll let you know. I’ll come back and I’ll hit him hard, OK? He did it very affectionately. Daddy, you’re my daddy.” Trump’s fundraising operation is also flogging T-shirts with his mugshot and the word “DADDY” on them for just $35. Sigmund Freud, sadly, could not be reached for comment on all this. But if he were available, I think even he might have said: “Mummy, please make this stop.” More

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      The Donald laps it up as Nato leaders compete to shower him with sycophancy | John Crace

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      Sometimes it pays to be a narcissist. To bend reality to your own worldview. To live almost entirely in the present. Where contradicting yourself is not a problem because two opposing statements can both be true. On the way to Nato you can question article 5. On the way back you can give all the other Nato leaders a patronising pat on the head. And everyone is grateful for it.There again it also helps if you are the most powerful man in the world. Donald Trump is not just tolerated, he is actively indulged. Prime ministers from other countries go out of their way to compete with one another in outright sycophancy. Flattery that started off as contrived now sounds dangerously sincere. Almost as if they genuinely believe it. Thank you Agent Orange for all you have done. We don’t know where we would be without you.And The Donald just laps it up. Feeds on it. At the recent Nato summit he looked like a pig in shit. Living his best life. Whatever sunbed regime he’s on, it’s working for him. If he lost any sleep over his decision to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities, it doesn’t show. Just repeat after Donald: The mission was a complete and utter success and Iran’s programme has been put back decades. If the Pentagon says otherwise, it’s just fake news. Yet again, reality can be what you want it to be.Even when Trump temporarily loses it, he wins. Swearing is generally a no-no for any leader. A sign that you’ve lost control. But when Donald said Israel and Iran didn’t know what the fuck they were doing, he came out of it smelling of roses. Praised for his authenticity. Applauded for saying what the rest of the world is thinking. The Donald can do no wrong. He looks relaxed. God stand up for narcissists.Keir Starmer is no narcissist. And breathe a sigh of relief for that. The UK tried the narcissist route with Boris Johnson and that didn’t end well. Maybe we just aren’t a powerful enough country to get away with a sociopath in charge. Or, heaven forbid, maybe it was a matter of timing. Boris was the right man at the wrong time. That’s a horrible thought. Most of us would quite happily settle for a period of fairly boring politics. Where the government is serving the country rather than the ego of the person in charge. Where even when they are getting things wrong, they are at least trying to do the right thing.But that level of decency comes with a cost. Your psyche does not reward itself with a free pass. You worry about the consequences of your actions. Your toadying to The Donald. You worry about the people dying in Ukraine, Gaza, Israel and Iran. You worry when your domestic policies look like they are falling apart. Wish you had spent more time reassuring backbenchers. Had explained better the trade-offs you were making. Had not been so quick to take a quick cash-saving win by removing benefits from people who can’t wash themselves before going to work.Keir has tried to keep a lid on all this as leaders always do. Pretend that he’s fully in charge of the situation. That everything is going according to plan. But always the tell-tale signs leak out. Starmer’s eyes betray him. They have a deadness to them, the life squeezed out. His face pasty and pallid. A man desperate for a breather, a moment to relax away from the treadmill.Yet always there is one thing more. Another summit, another speech, another bilat, another crisis at home. This wasn’t how he imagined his first year in Downing Street. The pressure and the pace is relentless. The treadmill going ever faster and there’s no getting off. He aches in the places where he used to play.Just hours after returning from The Hague, Keir was giving a keynote speech to the British Chambers of Commerce. It was one that he and they will quickly forget. A routine, box-ticking affair. An annual date, along with the CBI, in any prime minister’s diary. It wasn’t meant to be this way, mind. Starmer knows better than anyone that Labour has to work twice as hard to show that it is the party of business. But this time he couldn’t fake it to make it. He’s no visionary. He can’t access people’s hearts. Only their reason. And that only intermittently.Keir began by thanking the BCC for all it had done for the country. He knew it had been a tough year and he had asked a lot of business, but the good times were round the corner. Possibly. There was the new infrastructure strategy. Now there was also a new trade strategy which sounded very much like the old one. Which was to keep on doing the trade deals we can, as with the partial deals with the EU, US and India, and try to do some new smaller deals with other nations. The applause from the audience was barely audible. They didn’t sound desperately impressed. They can tell when a speaker is out on his feet and is phoning it in.Just over an hour later and Starmer was in the Commons for a statement on the G7 and Nato summits. Here he was much more like his chipper self. Not so much in his opening remarks about how the west was making a dangerous world safer, but in his reply to Kemi Badenoch.The Tory leader just gets worse and worse. Half-witted, sulky and tone deaf. Kemikaze seemed to think the UK should no longer bother to send its prime minister to these international meetings. That Keir had only gone for the craic and to avoid her at prime minister’s questions. As if. Facing Kemi over the dispatch box was his half an hour of R&R in the week.Starmer dismissed her with barely concealed contempt as neither serious nor credible. An am-dram politician. Even the Tories were aghast. Mark Pritchard openly criticised his leader. He spoke for many on his own benches.Kemi had achieved the seemingly impossible. She had revivified a tired prime minister and united both Labour and opposition MPs against her. There is only one politician who looks a genuine leader in the Commons and it is still Starmer. He may have his hands full with a rebellion over the welfare bill, but as long as Kemi remains the leader of the opposition, he has nothing to fear from the Tories. More

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      Trump news at a glance: ‘Daddy’ Trump showered with praise on triumphant lap through Nato summit

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      On the back of hailing US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities as a “victory for everybody”, president Trump has claimed success at the Nato summit in The Hague, praising the commitment by Nato allies to boost defence spending to 5% of GDP.The US president described the summit as “a very historic milestone”. It was, he said, “something that no one really thought possible. And they said: ‘You did it, sir, you did it’. Well, I don’t know if I did it … but I think I did.”The US president also received sycophantic praise from Nato secretary general Mark Rutte who, referring to Trump’s foul mouthed outburst about Iran and Israel a day earlier, said rather remarkably: “Daddy sometimes has to use strong language”.Here are the key stories at a glance:Trump hails ‘big win’ as Nato raises defense spendingA relaxed Donald Trump said Nato’s decision to increase defence spending to 5% of GDP was a “big win” for western civilisation in a digressive press conference at a summit in The Hague where he reaffirmed the US’s commitment to the military alliance.Read the full storyTrump and Hegseth admit doubts about damage levels in IranDonald Trump and the US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, have admitted to some doubt over the scale of the damage inflicted on Iran’s nuclear sites by the US bombing at the weekend, after a leaked Pentagon assessment said the Iranian programme had been set back by only a few months.Read the full storyVOA aired Trump’s message to Iran during US bombingsVoice of America (VOA) may have been used to broadcast Donald Trump’s message to Iranians in Farsi during weekend military strikes, the president’s senior adviser told Congress on Wednesday, revealing how the crumbling, traditionally independent news service is possibly functioning as a conduit for presidential messaging.Read the full storyBondi denies knowing Ice agents wear masks despite evidenceThe attorney general, Pam Bondi, professed ignorance of reports of immigration officials hiding their faces with masks during round-ups of undocumented people, despite widespread video evidence and reports that they are instilling pervasive fear and panic.Read the full storyCosta Rican court orders migrants deported by US to be freedA court in Costa Rica has ordered authorities to release foreign migrants who were locked up in a shelter after being deported by the US. About 200 people from Afghanistan, Iran, Russia as well as from Africa and some other Asian countries, including 80 children, were brought to the Central American nation in February under an agreement with the US administration of Donald Trump, a move criticized by human rights organizations.Read the full storyPlan to open California’s largest immigration jail sparks outragePlans to open a massive federal immigration processing center in a California desert community has sparked outrage among advocacy groups who argue it will come at a “long-term cost” and “fuel harm”.Read the full storyFirst meeting of new CDC vaccine panel reveals policy chaos sown by RFK JrThe first meeting of a critical federal vaccine panel was a high-profile display of how the US health secretary and vaccine skeptic Robert F Kennedy Jr has injected chaos into vaccine policy infrastructure.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      Donald Trump and CBS could settle their legal battle over a contested interview with Kamala Harris for $20m as the dispute continues to shadow a major media merger.

      The New Jersey Democratic representative who is facing felony charges after a recent incident during a visit to an Ice detention facility pleaded not guilty in federal court.

      The vice-mayor of a small California city is under fire after appearing to call on street gangs to organize in the face of immigration sweeps by federal agents in Los Angeles.

      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 24 June 2025. More

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      The Guardian view on UK military strategy: prepare for a US retreat – or be left gravely exposed | Editorial

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      With the prime minister’s Churchillian claims that “the front line is here”, the public might expect a military posture that meets the drama of the moment. Yet the promised rise in defence spending – from 2.3% to 2.5% of gross domestic product by 2027 – suggests something less than full-scale mobilisation. The strategic defence review is systematic and detailed, but it remains an exercise in tightly bounded ambition. It speaks of daily cyber-attacks and undersea sabotage, but proposes no systemic institutional overhaul or acute surge in resilience. Given the developing dangers, it is surprising not to spell out a robust home-front framework.Instead, it is a cautious budget hike in the costume of crisis – signalling emergency while deferring real commitment for military financing. The review suggests that the more ambitious spending target of 3% of GDP, still shy of Nato’s 3.5% goal, is delayed to the next parliament. The plan is not to revive Keynesianism in fatigues. It is a post-austerity military modernisation that is technocratic and geopolitically anxious. It borrows the urgency of the past without inheriting its economic boldness.The review marks a real shift: it warns of “multiple, direct threats” for the first time since the cold war and vows to reverse the “hollowing out” of Britain’s armed forces. But in an age of climate emergencies and democratic drift, UK leadership should rest on multilateralism, not pure militarism. Declaring Russian “nuclear coercion” the central challenge, and that the “future of strategic arms control … does not look promising”, while sinking £15bn into warheads, risks fuelling escalation instead of pursuing arms control.Given the war in Ukraine, there is an ominous warning about changing US “security priorities”. This calls into question the wisdom of being overly reliant on America, which is now internally unstable and dismantling global public goods – such as the atmospheric data that drones rely on for navigation. Left unsaid but clearly underlying the report is the idea that the old defence model is no longer sufficient – for example, when maritime adversaries can weaponise infrastructure by sabotaging undersea cables, or where critical data systems are in commercial hands. It cannot be right that Ukraine’s sovereignty depends on the goodwill of the world’s richest man. But the private satellite network Starlink keeps Ukrainian hospitals, bases and drones online, leaving Kyiv hostage to the whims of its volatile owner, Elon Musk.The menace of hybrid warfare – including disinformation, cyber-attacks, economic pressure, deployment of irregular armed groups and use of regular forces – intensified in the last decade. This should see Britain forge deeper institutional ties with European partners, not just military but in infrastructure and information technologies. This would allow for a sovereign digital strategy for European nations to free them from dependency on mercurial actors.Though the review gestures toward greater societal involvement, it stops short of articulating a whole-of-society doctrine like Norway’s. This, when some analysts say the third world war has already begun with a slow, global breakdown of the post-1945 institutional order. The defence review should be about more than missiles and missions. It must also be about whether the country can keep the lights on, the gas flowing, the internet up and the truth intact. This review sees the threats, but not yet the system needed to confront them. In that gap lies the peril. More

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      Trump says he ‘doesn’t rule out’ using military force to control Greenland

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      Donald Trump would not rule out using military force to gain control of Greenland, the world’s largest island and an autonomous territory within Denmark, a fellow Nato member with the US.Since taking office, the US president has repeatedly expressed the idea of US expansion into Greenland, triggering widespread condemnation and unease both on the island itself and in the global diplomatic community. Greenland is seen as strategically important both for defense and as a future source of mineral wealth.In an interview on NBC’s Meet The Press on Sunday, Trump was asked whether he would rule out using force against the territory.“I don’t rule it out. I don’t say I’m going to do it, but I don’t rule out anything. No, not there. We need Greenland very badly. Greenland is a very small amount of people, which we’ll take care of, and we’ll cherish them, and all of that. But we need that for international security,” Trump said.The exchange came as part of wide-ranging interview following Trump’s first 100-days in office last week and he was also asked about the idea of using military force against Canada – an idea once unthinkable but now a subject of speculation amid Trump’s repeated assertion he would like to make Canada the US’s 51st state.“It’s highly unlikely. I don’t see it with Canada. I just don’t see it, I have to be honest with you,” Trump said.Trump said he had spoke with Canada’s new prime minister, Mark Carney, and confirmed that the pair had not spoken about making his country part of the US.But he said they could discuss the topic when Carney visits Washington DC “this week or next week”. Carney, along with around 90% of Canadians, oppose the idea of folding Canada into the US. But Trump said he was open to a discussion.“I’ll always talk about that. You know why? We subsidize Canada to the tune of $200bn a year,” Trump said. “We don’t need their cars. In fact, we don’t want their cars. We don’t need their energy. We don’t even want their energy. We have more than they do. We don’t want their lumber. We have great lumber. All I have to do is free it up from the environmental lunatics.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump said that if “Canada was part of the US it wouldn’t cost us. It would be great … it would be a cherished state. And, if you look at our map, if you look at the geography – I’m a real estate guy at heart. When I look down at that without that artificial line that was drawn with a ruler many years ago – was just an artificial line, goes straight across. You don’t even realize.”“What a beautiful country it would be,” he added.A poll published last month found that 68% of Americans believe Trump is serious about the US trying to take over Greenland, and 53% think Trump is serious when he talks about the US trying to take control of Canada.But the survey, commissioned by ABC News found that respondents didn’t think either annexation would be a good idea. About 86% said they opposed the US trying to take control of Canada, and 76% opposed trying to take control of Greenland. More

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      Trump 100 days: ‘unpredictable’ US alienates allies and disrupts global trade

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      For US foreign policy, Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office were the weeks when decades happened.In just over three months, the US president has frayed alliances that stood since the second world war and alienated the US’s closest friends, cut off aid to Ukrainians on the frontlines against Vladimir Putin, emboldened US rivals around the world, brokered and then lost a crucial ceasefire in Gaza, launched strikes on the Houthis in Yemen and seesawed on key foreign policy and economic questions to the point where the US has been termed the “unpredictable ally”.The tariffs Trump has unleashed will, if effected, disrupt global trade and lead to supply chain shocks in the United States, with China’s Xi Jinping seeking to recruit US trade allies in the region.The pace of the developments in the past 100 days makes them difficult to list. Operating mainly through executive action, the Trump administration has affected nearly all facets of US foreign policy: from military might to soft power, from trade to immigration, reimagining the US’s place in the world according to an isolationist America First program.“The shake-up has been revolutionary, extraordinary. It’s upended 80-some years of American foreign policy,” said Ivo Daalder, president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and a former ambassador to Nato.The Trump presidency has ended the relative peace in the western hemisphere since the end of the second world war underwritten by US economic, military and diplomatic influence, Daalder said.“The foundation of the Pax Americana was trust, and once you break trust, it’s extraordinarily difficult to restore,” he said. “And restoring trust – trust in America, trust in American institutions, trust in American voters – it takes a long time to rebuild.”The US’s key foreign policy and national security making institutions are in crisis. The Pentagon is mid-meltdown under the leadership of Pete Hegseth, whose erratic and unsteady leadership has been reflected in score-settling among his senior staff, while a leaked Signal chat embroiled the national security adviser, Mike Waltz, and others in scandal. The state department under Marco Rubio is undergoing a vast shake-up, and the US’s diplomats are being sidelined in favour of envoys such as Steve Witkoff with little background in foreign policy. Critics say the gutting of USAID will cut back on US soft power for generations.“There’s no better way to get us into a war, perhaps a catastrophic war, than essentially poking out your eyes and numbing your brain, and you’re left with Donald Trump and a few people sitting in the White House winging it, and they’re not competent to wing it,” said Steven Cash, a former intelligence officer for the CIA and Department of Homeland Security, and the executive director of the Steady State, an advocacy group of former national security professionals. “And so we’ve seen that with the tariffs. We’ve seen that with Nato. We’ve seen that with Ukraine, and we’re gonna see a lot more of it.”After assuming office in 2021, Joe Biden declared: “America is back.”“The world now knows America is not back,” Daalder said. “America is gone again.”In a recent interview with the Zeit newspaper, Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, expressed similar sentiments, saying: “The west as we knew it no longer exists.”View image in fullscreenIn Munich, JD Vance delivered a landmark speech openly pandering to Europe’s far right, accusing European leaders of “running from their own voters” and saying: “America can do nothing to help you.”A backlash has begun. Last month the EU presented an €800bn ($913bn) plan on the future of European defense, a putative step in what would be a herculean task to overcome internal divisions and onshore European defense manufacturing. The UK and other US allies have considered other efforts, such as limiting intelligence-sharing with the US. “We still need America now, but there is a vision [of a time] when we won’t any more,” said one European diplomat.Meanwhile, the Trump effect is beginning to sway elections as well – though not as he might hope.In the western hemisphere, Trump has terrorised US neighbours and tacitly declared what some have compared to a new Monroe doctrine, saying the White House planned to “take back” the Panama canal and annex Greenland, while regularly calling Canada the future 51st state.In an extraordinary bit of election-day meddling, Trump wrote a social media post suggesting that he was on the ballot in Canada’s vote, repeating that Canada should become the 51st state in order to avoid tariffs and reap economic awards.Canadians responded by duly electing the liberal candidate Mark Carney, completing a 30% swing in polling that has largely been explained by opposition to Trump’s tariff war and territorial menaces.In Europe, populist parties seen as Trump’s ideological allies are also on the defensive. While Trump was popular in terms of his ideological and anti-woke agenda, the trade war has made him “quite toxic, just in the last month or two, with a lot of the populist voting bases”, said Jeremy Shapiro, the research director of the European Council on Foreign Relations and a former special adviser to the assistant secretary of state for Europe and Eurasia.Nowhere has the shift in US foreign policy been felt more acutely than in Ukraine, where the sudden cutoff in US military and intelligence sharing confirmed the Trump administration’s goals of pressuring Ukraine to accept a deal with the Kremlin, rather than the other way around. Those frustrations boiled over into an Oval Office meltdown fueled by Vice-President JD Vance that one former US official close to the talks called “disgraceful”.Trump has swung wildly on the war, on certain days targeting Volodymyr Zelenskyy as a “dictator” and then quickly pivoting to call out Putin for continuing to rain down missiles on Ukrainian cities. His theatrics have produced symbolic moments, including a sudden recognition that “maybe [Putin] doesn’t want to stop the war” after speaking with Zelenskyy this weekend in the baptistry of St Peter’s Basilica. But in terms of hard results, Trump has not fulfilled a promise to end the war within 24 hours or produced a clear path to peace many months later.View image in fullscreenThe Russians have said they largely tune out what he says in public.“We hear many things coming from President Trump,” said Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, during a television appearance this weekend. “We concentrate, as I said, on the real negotiations which President Trump supports and instructed his people to continue to engage in these negotiations.”Key among those people is Witkoff, a neophyte diplomat who has spent hours in conversation with Putin, often with no other adviser present. One person close to the Kremlin said that Witkoff was viewed as a reliable negotiator in Moscow with “a chance to make an agreement”, but added: “There is a chance it will pass by.”Much of the burden of international diplomacy now rests on Witkoff, who is also running point on other key negotiations. Trump has tasked him with reaching a deal to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, in effect renegotiating the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that he scuttled in 2018. Both the US and Iran have played up the talks, although “differences still exist both on major issues and on the details”, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, told state television this week.And then there is the Middle East, where the Trump administration scored its greatest early success by negotiating a ceasefire in Gaza but then failed to prevent its collapse, with Israel cutting off new aid to Gaza as the fighting continues.“There now seems to be less focus on ending the devastating conflict,” wrote Stefanie Hausheer Ali, a non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs. “Trump’s threat in February to Hamas to release the hostages or ‘all hell is going to break out’ has, in practice, meant Israel restarting the war and blocking humanitarian aid from entering Gaza. Without an alternative to Hamas rule, the militant group may hang on and continue to fight as an insurgency, replenishing its ranks by recruiting desperate people.”Trump’s most extreme remarks have turned out to be bluster: he stunned the world when he claimed that he would turn the Gaza Strip into beachfront condos and said that the local Palestinian population would be forcibly removed. Months later, the initiative is largely forgotten.While attempting to close three landmark negotiations at once, the Trump administration has also launched a trade war with the entire world, establishing sweeping tariffs on all foreign imports before abruptly reversing course and cutting tariffs to 10% save for those against China.With so many major efforts ongoing, observers say that the government is largely paralysed to deal with smaller but still crucial issues in foreign policy and national security. As part of a blanket ban on refugees, tens of thousands of Afghans who assisted US troops against the Taliban are left waiting for relocation to the United States, a promise that was extended by previous administrations.“The lack of clarity and the chaos are the things that are causing so much pain,” said Shawn VanDiver, the founder and president of #AfghanEvac, a group that works with the state department to help resettle Afghans.He said he was critical of both the Biden and Trump administrations for failing to relocate the tens of thousands of Afghans who were far enough along in the vetting program to be relocated before Trump came into office.“The truth is, is that when America makes a promise, you should be able to trust our word,” he said. “If our flag waving over an embassy in Tunisia or Baghdad or Kabul, or Kyiv doesn’t mean this is the place where there’s truth, where there’s justice … well, then what are we even doing here?” More

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      Trump is creating a selfish, miserable world. Here’s what we can do | Michael Plant

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      In case you hadn’t noticed, things have not been going well for the west.In just three months, Donald Trump has started trade wars, crippled Nato, dismantled USAID and humiliated an invaded democracy while praising its aggressor, among other things. We still have 45 months to go. Through his antics, the US president is normalizing, even encouraging, intense selfishness and disregard for others. The clearest example is USAID: if the richest, most powerful country in the world thinks it’s a waste to give a tiny fraction of its income to the poorest, worst off people in the world, you must be a real sucker if you care for others.This comes on top of a longer trend of declining western happiness and disconnection. In 2012, the United States ranked 11th in the World Happiness Report. This year, it was 24th. In 2023, one in four Americans reported eating all their meals alone. That figure has risen 53% in just two decades.These short- and long-term trends are no coincidence. New research shows that unhappy people vote for populists, those who promise to rip the system apart. Importantly, it also finds that trust explains which type of populists unhappy people support: low-trust people vote for far-right parties, whereas high-trust people go far left. Therefore, we should see Trumpism as both a symptom of a lower-trust, lower-happiness society and a cause of further misery and mistrust.But what should you do if you don’t like the way the world is going? Is there anything you can do?The obvious answer is to rage, doomscroll and hope for the next election. But the obvious answer is no longer an option once we realize the antidote to Trump is to build a happier, higher trust society. Drawing on my dual experience as a moral philosopher and happiness researcher, I’d like to suggest some alternative ways you can fight back.Trumpism is built on pettiness and self-interest, so resisting means embodying the opposite virtues. To paraphrase a much better president: do not ask what the world can do for your happiness – ask what you can do for the happiness of the world. You commit yourself to making the biggest difference you can – even when others do not.It starts internally. Epictetus, the Stoic philosopher born a Roman slave, wrote: “We cannot choose our external circumstances, but we can always choose how we respond to them.” That idea, now a pillar of modern psychotherapy, is especially relevant in moments like this. Trump and co want to make you feel helpless and furious. Keeping your composure and finding joy are acts of resistance.It continues locally. Make an effort to build social connections where you live. Research shows when we share meals with others, volunteer or strike up friendly conversations with strangers, we’re not just making ourselves and others happier. We’re rebuilding the social fabric that authoritarian politics tears apart and reducing the distrust that fuels politicians like Trump. Higher trust and happiness make us less susceptible to the politics of fear and resentment; the data backs this up.Some good news is that our perceptions of mistrust are misplaced. There have been global studies in which researchers drop wallets to see what percentage is returned. A 40-country study found actual wallet return rates are about twice as high as people expected. In the US, two-thirds were returned – against the view that one-third would be. Simply recognizing we can trust others more than we thought is a helpful step forward. You could join a local Action for Happiness group. Recent research even shows prosocial activity is reliably linked to fewer “deaths of despair”. Your kindness could save lives.At the national level, we need to see politicians taking social connection – not just the economy – more seriously. If it seems fluffy or unimportant, look at where ignoring them has got us: he’s in the Oval Office. Academics are starting to assess policies by their “bang for buck” at improving wellbeing: economists at the London School of Economics published a first, milestone review in 2024. Policy nerds should take notice.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIt ends globally. My colleagues and I at the Happier Lives Institute recently published the first global analysis of how much happiness different charities produce per dollar. We found a striking result. The most effective charities – often tackling issues such as depression or malnutrition in low-income countries – have about 150 times the impact of the average rich-country charity. If someone gave $150,000 to charity, you would consider them a hero. It turns out you can do as much good by giving $1,000 – if you follow the evidence and pick wisely. Giving 1% of your income to these organizations is a quiet act of moral clarity in a noisy, self-interested world.Fighting back doesn’t have to mean shouting louder. Another option is gracious, determined decency. Choose kindness over cruelty, generosity over selfishness, and evidence over bluster. Today, these quiet choices are acts of radical courage – ones that help build a better tomorrow. They might even make you happier, too.What’s giving me hopeTrumpism is the symptom of a less happy, less trusting society. But we are far from powerless to change this. There are several ways we can each make a difference – starting with our own minds and local communities and finishing with helping others around the world. What gives me hope is realizing we have the potential to understand what’s going wrong in our society and do our part to improve it.

      Michael Plant is the founder and research director of the Happier Lives Institute. He is a global happiness researcher and post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Oxford’s Wellbeing Research Centre, which publishes the annual World Happiness Report More

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      Now is not the time for the US or Europe to go it alone, warns Nato chief

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      Nato’s secretary general has told the US and Europe it is “not the time to go it alone” amid reports that Washington and some European leaders want to weaken their commitments to the transatlantic military alliance.Mark Rutte said in a speech in Warsaw that the US needed to be told that European countries would “step up” and lift their defence spending – while they needed to hear that Washington would not abandon them.“Let me be absolutely clear, this is not the time to go it alone. Not for Europe or North America,” said the Dutch head of the alliance. “The global security challenges are too great for any of us to face on our own. When it comes to keeping Europe and North America safe, there is no alternative to Nato.”Europe “needs to know that Uncle Sam still has our back”, Rutte continued, but in turn “America also needs to know that its Nato allies will step up. Without restrictions and without capability gaps” because “reassurance is a two-way street”.The 76-year-old alliance has come under intense pressure following the election of Donald Trump, most recently with key administration members complaining about European defence “free-loading” in a confidential chat on the Signal app that leaked when a journalist from the Atlantic was added to the group by mistake.On his first trip to Europe earlier this year, Pete Hegseth, the new defence secretary, said the US was no longer “primarily focused” on European security and signalled that cuts to the number of American troops in Europe were a possibility.Since then, some reports had suggested that the US was willing to relinquish its hold on the position of Nato’s top military commander, the supreme allied commander Europe (Saceur), a position first held by Dwight Eisenhower and currently held by Gen Christopher Cavoli, whose tour expires in the summer.One Nato source said that idea had been dropped. A second said the UK was particularly keen to ensure the US remains inside the alliance at a time when any sustained end to the fighting in Ukraine could allow Russia to distribute 600,000 troops elsewhere along member states’ eastern flank.On Friday last week, Trump himself appeared to dismiss the speculation. When asked directly about the US being prepared to give up the top military command, he replied that the alliance was “gone until I came along” before praising Rutte, his predecessor and European members for increasing defence spending.“Nato is solid, is strong but they have to treat us fairly,” the US president added.Another report suggested Europe’s leading military powers wanted to devise a plan to shift the financial and military burden to European capitals over the next five to 10 years and present it to the US, amid worries about whether Washington would come to the defence of Europe in a crisis.However, this idea was dismissed by British sources who argued that the idea that the US contribution to European security could be replaced in five years or so was “living in cloud cuckoo land”.Rutte said he recognised that “the US commitment to Nato comes with a clear expectation” and “that European allies and Canada take more responsibility for our shared security”. He said he would work towards developing this at the next leaders’ summit in The Hague in June.Nato members have begun to announce some increases in defence spending, with the UK promising to lift its budget from 2.33% of GDP to 2.5% by 2027, starting with an extra £2.2bn next year. Germany has agreed to loosen its debt rules to allow for additional spending on defence under the incoming chancellor, Friedrich Merz. More