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      There are many ways Trump could trigger a global collapse. Here’s how to survive if that happens | George Monbiot

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      Though we might find it hard to imagine, we cannot now rule it out: the possibility of systemic collapse in the United States. The degradation of federal government by Donald Trump and Elon Musk could trigger a series of converging and compounding crises, leading to social, financial and industrial failure.There are several possible mechanisms. Let’s start with an obvious one: their assault on financial regulation. Trump’s appointee to the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Russell Vought, has suspended all the agency’s activity, slashed its budget and could be pursuing Musk’s ambition to “delete” the bureau. The CFPB was established by Congress after the 2008 financial crisis, to protect people from the predatory activity that helped trigger the crash. The signal to the financial sector could not be clearer: “Fill your boots, boys.” A financial crisis in the US would immediately become a global crisis.But the hazards extend much further. Musk, calling for a “wholesale removal of regulations”, sends his child soldiers to attack government departments stabilising the entire US system. Regulations, though endlessly maligned by corporate and oligarchic propaganda, are all that protect us from multiple disasters. In its initial impacts, deregulation is class war, hitting the poorest and the middle classes at the behest of the rich. As the effects proliferate, it becomes an assault on everyone’s wellbeing.To give a couple of examples, the fires in Los Angeles this year are expected to cost, on various estimates, between $28bn and $75bn in insured losses alone. Estimates of total losses range from $160bn to $275bn. These immense costs are likely to be dwarfed by future climate disasters. As Trump rips down environmental protections and trashes federal responsiveness, the impacts will spiral. They could include non-linear shocks to either the insurance sector or homeowners, escalating into US-wide economic and social crisis.If (or when) another pandemic strikes, which could involve a pathogen more transmissible and even more deadly than Covid-19 (which has so far killed 1.2 million people in the US), it will hit a nation whose defences have been stood down. Basic public health measures, such as vaccination and quarantine, might be inaccessible to most. A pandemic in these circumstances could end millions of lives and cause spontaneous economic shutdown.Because there is little public understanding of how complex systems operate, collapse tends to take almost everyone by surprise. Complex systems (such as economies and human societies) have characteristics that make them either resilient or fragile. A system that loses its diversity, redundancy, modularity (the degree of compartmentalisation), its “circuit breakers” (such as government regulations) and backup strategies (alternative means of achieving a goal) is less resilient than one which retains these features. So is a system whose processes become synchronised. In a fragile system, shocks can amplify more rapidly and become more transmissible: a disruption in one place proliferates into disaster everywhere. This, as Andy Haldane, former chief economist at the Bank of England, has deftly explained, is what happened to the financial system in 2008.A consistent feature of globalised capitalism is an unintentional assault on systemic resilience. As corporations pursue similar profit-making strategies, and financialisation and digitisation permeate every enterprise, the economic system loses its diversity and starts to synchronise. As they consolidate, and the biggest conglomerates become hubs to which many other enterprises are connected (think of Amazon or the food and farming giant Cargill), major failures could cascade at astonishing speed.As every enterprise seeks efficiencies, the system loses its redundancy. As trading rules and physical infrastructure are standardised (think of those identical container terminals, shipping and trucking networks), the system loses both modularity and backup strategies. When a system has lost its resilience, a small external shock can trigger cascading collapse.Paradoxically, with his trade wars and assault on global standards, Trump could help to desynchronise the system and reintroduce some modularity. But, as he simultaneously rips down circuit breakers, undermines preparedness and treats Earth systems as an enemy to be crushed, the net effect is likely to make human systems more prone to collapse.At least in the short term, the far right tends to benefit from chaos and disruption: this is another of the feedback loops that can turn a crisis into a catastrophe. Trump presents himself as the hero who will save the nation from the ruptures he has caused, while deflecting the blame on to scapegoats.Alternatively, if collapse appears imminent, Trump and his team might not wish to respond. Like many of the ultra-rich, key figures in or around the administration entertain the kind of psychopathic fantasies indulged by Ayn Rand in her novels Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead, in which plutocrats leave the proles to die in the inferno they’ve created, while they migrate to their New Zealand bunkers, Mars or the ocean floor (forgetting, as they always do, that their wealth, power and survival is entirely dependent on other people). Or they yearn for a different apocalypse, in which the rest of us roast while they party with Jesus in his restored kingdom.Every government should hope for the best and prepare for the worst. But, as they do with climate and ecological breakdown, freshwater depletion, the possibility of food system collapse, antibiotic resistance and nuclear proliferation, most governments, including the UK’s, now seem to hope for the best and leave it there. So, though there is no substitute for effective government, we must seek to create our own backup systems.Start with this principle: don’t face your fears alone. Make friends, meet your neighbours, set up support networks, help those who are struggling. Since the dawn of humankind, those with robust social networks have been more resilient than those without.Discuss what we confront, explore the means by which we might respond. Through neighbourhood networks, start building a deliberative, participatory democracy, to resolve at least some of the issues that can be fixed at the local level. If you can, secure local resources for the community (in England this will be made easier with the forthcoming community right to buy, like Scotland’s).From democratised neighbourhoods, we might seek to develop a new politics, along the lines proposed by Murray Bookchin, in which decisions are passed upwards, not downwards, with the aim of creating a political system not only more democratic than those we currently suffer, but which also permits more diversity, redundancy and modularity.Yes, we also – and urgently – need national and global action, brokered by governments. But it’s beginning to look as if no one has our backs. Prepare for the worst.

      George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist More

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      UK marketplace sellers face ‘second Brexit’ hit from Trump’s US import rules

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      Many UK-based independent sellers on marketplaces such as eBay and Amazon could suffer a significant hit to US sales from planned changes to import rules under Donald Trump, with experts comparing the impact to a second Brexit.The new rules, which mean all parcels originating or made in China and being sold into the US must pay import duty – of as much as 15% on fashion items – and an additional 10% tariff, are also expected to impact bigger online clothing retailers such as Asos and Boohoo.The changes were introduced at the start of February in an attempt to protect US retailers from a surge in competition from the likes of Chinese online marketplaces Shein and Temu, but were indefinitely paused after the US customs service struggled to cope with the massive increase in parcels requiring checks last week.However, they are expected to be implemented within the coming months, potentially driving up prices for US consumers and hitting sales for online retailers.Before the change, parcels with a value of less than $800 (£635) shipped to individuals in the US were exempt from import tax and did not pass through the usual customs checks. That scheme, originally designed to help smooth online shopping, is being revoked after it emerged that the number of shipments under the “de minimis” rules had ballooned to more than 1bn, valued at $54.5bn by 2023 – most of them from China or Hong Kong via firms including Shein and Temu.“You are looking at an increase of $30 to $50 per consignment [group of parcels],” said Brad Ashton at the advisory firm RSM. “It is creating a perfect storm for online retailers putting goods into the US market. It has a lot of the hallmarks of Brexit in terms of its potential impact on small traders.“Businesses will see their margins eroded because costs will increase. We may get to a point where the changes make a UK business uncompetitive in selling to the US.”The widespread use of Chinese factories for many British brands, particularly in fashion, means businesses such as Asos and Boohoo will be drawn in, as well as many UK independent marketplace sellers.It will not just affect goods made in China and then sent from the UK, but potentially a much wider array, as any package containing even one product made in China may have to pay import tax and pass through customs checks, further increasing costs, according to experts.There is also an expectation that the de minimis rules will eventually be scrapped for all imports, no matter their origin.About $5bn worth of parcels were exported to the US from the UK under de minimis rules in 2021, according to a Congressional Research Service analysis of data from US Customs and Border Protection. About 80% of that was estimated to be related to online retail, with fashion likely to be a large proportion of it.Chris White, at the logistics company Fulfilmentcrowd, said that during the brief period when the rules were in place in early February, one-third of the parcels it shipped to the US from the UK were found to be of Chinese origin and subject to the new taxes.Fast-fashion specialists Asos and Boohoo sell about £300m of clothing a year to the US. Both are already struggling to compete with the rise of Shein and high street retailers, which have revived after the Covid pandemic. John Stevenson, a retail analyst at Peel Hunt, said Asos and Boohoo would have to “adjust prices or take a view on [the] profitability of operating in the US”.As well as the higher tax charges, customs checks required after the rule change will add as much as two days to the processing of orders, making UK retailers less competitive with US-based operators on the speed of delivery.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionStevenson said the hit to Asos and Boohoo was “not business-critical” in the way it could be for Shein or Temu, which he believed were heavily reliant on the tax benefit, but that it would have an impact.In the short term, online sellers will probably have lower sales because of uncertainty among US shoppers over possible taxes. White said that during the period when the new rules were in place, similar parcels were loaded with different levels of duty as local customs officers made different decisions.He said a further element of the rule change might be to expose brands that were “trading on an image of being British or European” as being “made in China and not Savile Row”, potentially damaging their appeal.There would be “lots of crossed fingers and puzzled faces” over the changes in legislation, with retailers potentially opening more US warehousing or, longer term, to switch sources of supply, White added.Boohoo closed its US warehouse earlier this year, and Asos is scheduled to close its facility there in November. However, a reversal could be on the cards if the de minimis rules are confirmed. Many fast-fashion companies have already diversified their supply chains – making more in India, Bangladesh or Turkey. Trump’s tax changes could accelerate this further.Shein is reportedly incentivising Chinese suppliers to set up in Vietnam, according to a report by Bloomberg.It is not clear when the new rules might be implemented as the US tries to put the technology and workforce in place to handle the new system. Experts say it could take weeks or months.While there is a chance that Trump will change his mind, as he has done on tariffs with Canada and Mexico, no business can bet on which way the US might jump. More

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      As the US retreats, Europe must look out for itself – so is Macron’s nuclear offer the answer? | Simon Tisdall

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      The startling contempt for Europe’s intensifying security concerns displayed by Donald Trump and his henchmen has brought an old, controversial question back to the fore: should Britain and France pool their nuclear weapons capabilities and create a Europe-wide defensive nuclear shield to deter Vladimir Putin’s Russia, if the US reduces or withdraws its support?Trump has not so far explicitly threatened to cut US nuclear forces based in Europe. But speaking last week, the president said he wanted to halve the US’s defence spending, especially on nuclear weapons. Trump often denigrates Nato, keystone of European security. Last year, he encouraged Russia “to do whatever the hell they want” to member states that, in his view, spend too little on defence.Pete Hegseth, the US defence secretary, warned Nato defence ministers in Brussels that defending Europe was no longer a strategic priority, and raised the prospect of US troop withdrawals. In an insulting speech at the Munich security conference, he minimised the threat posed by Russia. Americans would not be taken for “suckers” by Europeans, he said.These unprecedented assaults on US-Europe ties have raised real fears of a damaging, possibly permanent rupture with Washington. It is against this volatile background that France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, has called an emergency summit in Paris of European leaders, including Keir Starmer. The meeting is expected to focus on Ukraine, its future defence, and Europe’s anticipated exclusion from US “peace talks” with Russia due later this week.Yet an even bigger issue overshadows the summit: how to better organise Europe’s collective defences in the context of reduced, unreliable or nonexistent US support and overt nuclear threats from an emboldened Russia. Boris Pistorius, Germany’s defence minister, has predicted that Putin could attack at least one Nato country within the next five years. Frontline Poland and the Baltic republics voice similar fears.Nato’s chief, Mark Rutte, has urged all 32 member states to expand defence spending. Many, including Britain, appear poised to do so. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s president, dismayed by what looks to many in Kyiv like US betrayal, told the Munich conference it was time to create an “army of Europe”. That reflects ideas long promoted by Macron, a passionate champion of more integrated, expanded, self-reliant European defence – and reduced US dependence.It is Macron who is leading the debate about a pan-European nuclear shield. The French leader gave new prominence to the idea in a 2020 speech at the École de Guerre in Paris, when he suggested a “strategic dialogue with our European partners … on the role played by France’s nuclear deterrence in our collective security”. Macron repeated the offer in 2022 and again last year.France is not proposing to place its independent deterrent, the force de frappe, which comprises about 290 warheads and operates separately from Nato, under the control of other countries – or the EU. What Macron is saying, like François Hollande and other French leaders before him, is that there exists a “European dimension” to France’s nuclear defence planning. If, for example, Berlin were threatened with nuclear destruction, that would be seen as a threat to Paris, too.“French leaders have three main worries,” an analysis published by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) stated. “Firstly, there is a high risk that Trump could withdraw from Nato, or at least significantly reduce US conventional forces in Europe … Secondly, he may also reduce the number of US nuclear weapons currently deployed in Europe, though not much evidence currently supports that prospect.“Thirdly, and most importantly, a US president who loathes or dismisses many European countries is unlikely to risk American lives for Europe.” This latter argument has circulated in France since the days of Gen Charles de Gaulle, who created the force de frappe: namely that, if push came to shove, the US would go nuclear to save Boston but not Boulogne, Bratislava or Bognor Regis.Macron’s proposal raises numerous, complex questions. Among them, who could order the actual use of “Europeanised” nuclear weapons? Who would pay for such a force, especially if necessarily modernised and enlarged? Would such a move make matters worse, by accelerating US disengagement?The view from Germany, a necessary partner in any such project, is mixed. The chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and anti-nuclear parties such as the Greens strongly dislike the idea (as do French leftwing and far-right parties). But Friedrich Merz, Scholz’s likely successor, is reportedly interested. Manfred Weber, a leading German conservative, told the Guardian last year that doubts about Trump meant it was time to take up Macron’s offer. Weber also urged the opening of a “new chapter” with London.The need for British involvement has also been raised by Christian Lindner, another senior German politician. “The question is: under what political and financial conditions would Paris and London be prepared to maintain or expand their own strategic capabilities for collective security?” Lindner wrote last year. “When it comes to peace and freedom in Europe, we must not shy away from these difficult questions.”The IISS study raised similar issues. “As the only other nuclear power in Europe, Britain is a natural partner for France in any exploration of how to strengthen European deterrence … [They] regularly exchange data about nuclear safety and security … The British and French nuclear arsenals combined come to around 520 warheads, numerically equivalent to China’s current deterrent force. This alone could send a stronger message to Russia.”Development of a joint UK-French nuclear umbrella, under the auspices of the European Nato allies and sidelining the US, is politically explosive for Starmer. It would raise questions about sovereign control, not least from the Eurosceptic right. It could be seen by many in Labour as fuelling nuclear weapons proliferation, bringing nuclear war closer. Putin, who has threatened to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, would view it as a provocation. So, too, for different reasons, might Trump. It would be a good test of how independent of the US the UK deterrent really is.But as the defence analyst Joseph de Weck argues in Internationale Politik Quarterly, times are changing fast. Governments urgently need solutions to Europe’s rapidly deepening security crisis. “Europeans may simply not have the time for gradualism in security integration any more,” De Weck wrote. Extending French and UK nuclear guarantees to the whole of Europe, including Ukraine, is an idea whose time has come.

      Simon Tisdall is the Observer’s foreign affairs commentator More

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      Badenoch and Farage to vie for attention of Trump allies at London summit

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      Influential rightwingers from around the world are to gather in London from Monday at a major conference to network and build connections with senior US Republicans linked to the Trump administration.The UK opposition leader, the Conservatives’ Kemi Badenoch, and Nigel Farage of the Reform UK party, her hard-right anti-immigration rival, will compete to present themselves as the torchbearer of British conservatism.Conservatives from Britain, continental Europe and Australia attending the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) conference will seize on the opportunity to meet and hear counterparts from the US, including those with links to the new Trump administration. The House speaker, the Republican Mike Johnson, had been due to attend in person but will now give a keynote address remotely on Monday.Other Republicans due to speak include the US Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Vivek Ramaswamy – who has worked with Elon Musk on moves to radically reshape the US government – and Kevin Roberts, the president of the US Heritage Foundation, the thinktank behind the controversial “Project 2025” blueprint for Trump’s second term.View image in fullscreenThe conference, which is intended to be a gathering of influential intellectuals shaping global rightwing thinking, has a distinctly anti-environmental and socially conservative theme. It pledges to build on “our growing movement and continue the vital work of relaying the foundations of our civilisation”.ARC was co-founded in 2023 by the Canadian psychologist and self-help author Jordan Peterson and the Tory peer Philippa Stroud. Financial backers include Paul Marshall, one of the owners of GB News, and the Legatum Institute libertarian thinktank.After last year’s first event at the O2 Arena, it has moved to a larger venue this year at the ExCel centre. About 4,000 people from 96 countries are due to attend this year, compared with 1,500 last year.Badenoch returns to the lavish three-day event as leader of her party after last year using an appearance to launch a “culture war” attack on the LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall. But while she will give a welcome address to the conference on Monday morning ahead of a keynote speech by Johnson, there is no escape from the challenge her party faces from the hard-right anti-immigration Reform UK.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreenFarage, the party’s leader, will be interviewed on stage on Tuesday by Peterson while Reform’s chair, Zia Yusuf, is expected to later take part in a panel for a session called “The choices we face: unilateral economic disarmament or a pro-human way?”Figures on the advisory board of ARC include the former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott, the Tory MP Danny Kruger, the self-styled “sceptical environmentalist” Bjørn Lomborg and the Tory peer and financier Helena Morrissey.It also includes Maurice Glasman, the Labour peer associated with the socially conservative “Blue Labour” strand of thinking, who recently appeared on a podcast hosted by Steve Bannon, the US Republican strategist and on-and-off Trump ally.Peterson will also interview Peter Thiel, the US Republican donor and Silicon Valley billionaire known for controversial views such as asserting that democracy is not compatible with freedom and that he has “little hope that voting will make things better”.A list of attenders seen by Guardian Australia showed more than 50 Australians, including figures from rightwing thinktanks and churches, were intending to go to the gathering. Among those travelling are Bridget McKenzie, a senator for the National party, along with key figures from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp.Those involved in ARC are keen to promote the gathering as more about the formulation of big ideas than political policy or campaigning and point to conference’s inclusion of scientists and figures from the arts.While religious faith does not explicitly feature in promotional material for the event, there is a strong religious influence on its direction from Peterson, who draws on the Bible in his work, and Stroud, a committed Christian credited with shaping many of the policies of the Conservative party during the 2000s. More

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      JD Vance and those threats from within | Letters

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      Among the justified furore around America’s new position in the world, one part at least triggers a bit of nostalgia (JD Vance stuns Munich conference with blistering attack on Europe’s leaders, 14 February). JD Vance’s description of the “threat from within” brings back memories of Margaret Thatcher’s designation of those who disagreed with her as “the enemy within”. I still have a badge with that somewhere. Maybe it’s time I dusted it off.Steve TownsleyCowbridge, Vale of Glamorgan As JD Vance lectures European leaders about freedom of speech, Louisiana is banning health officials from promoting vaccinations and libraries across the US are having to purge their shelves of any books that make mention of subjects that Republicans dislike. No hypocrisy there, then?Tony GreenIpswich, Suffolk Britain thought it had a special relationship with the US. Seems we got dumped on Valentine’s Day.Emma TaitLondon Your report (‘Guess who’s back?’: the inside story of Nigel Farage’s quest for power, 15 February) confirmed what I already suspected: Reform is basically a party run by millionaires, for the benefit of millionaires, with a good dollop of nativism added to the mix.Alan PavelinChislehurst, Kent Re remarks in school reports (Letters, 14 February), my favourite is from around 1971, courtesy of a great history teacher: “Intelligent answers, a mastery of the facts would help.” I’m sure CP Scott would have agreed with him.Kevin McGillPrestwood, Buckinghamshire More

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      A tale of two suckers: Donald Trump’s plastic straws and Keir Starmer | Stewart Lee

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      It’s difficult to know whether to set any store by Donald Trump’s bleak and yet also often banal pronouncements, which read as if handfuls of offensive concepts have been tossed into the air by a monkey, read out in whatever order they landed and then made policy. Until it’s clear they can’t work. At which point, the monkey must toss again.But this month, Trump, whose morning ablutions increasingly appear to consist of dousing himself in sachets of the kind of cheap hot chocolate powder I steal from three-star hotels, like a flightless bird stuck in the machine that glazes Magnum lollies, declared he wanted to build his hotels on the mass graves of Gaza. Hasn’t Trump seen The Shining? It won’t end well. Pity those whose children have the misfortune to die next to a monetisable stretch of shoreline. And hope humanity’s next wave of mass killings happens somewhere uneven and way inland that hopefully wouldn’t even make a decent golf course.Is Ukraine the frontier upon which the future of European democracy hinges, or is it just a massive stretch of undeveloped fairway, its leisure/conference utility value currently compromised only by the desire of some losers to continue living in the country they consider home? Where we see the falling domino chain that starts with Poland and ends in your back garden, does Trump see only a succession of 18-hole courses full of men in caps and enormous flapping flares brokering manly deals at the tee? Drive your golf carts over the bones of the dead!But maybe Trump’s horrible mouth-cack is just continuing evidence of his former acolyte Steve Bannon’s advice to “flood the zone with shit”? Does Trump really hate all sea creatures so much that he has to reinstate the plastic straws Joe Biden successfully, and commendably, outlawed? Perhaps he was once told to keep his hands to himself by a mermaid. “These things don’t work,” Trump said of paper straws. “I’ve had them many times, and on occasion, they break, they explode.” Must millions of seabirds, turtles, manatees and dolphins die because Trump imagines that paper straws explode? Or so he can suck up his Diet Coke fast enough to amuse Elon Musk, Pete Hegseth and JD Vance by burping a smelly chorus of YMCA in Biden’s face next time there’s a gathering of ex-presidents.Because Trump, a fully grown man with unlimited funds, loves Diet Coke, and it’s tempting to wonder how many of his seemingly incomprehensible policy decisions can be traced back to his desire to be continually saturated by the soft drink. Maybe there is a subterranean lake of the stuff somewhere deep beneath the Greenland tundra that the climate crisis, which doesn’t exist, will soon make accessible to Trump’s deep Diet Coke drills? Delighted Inuit strip off their sealskins and dance in the showering liquid as they realise they have just struck a rich seam of their new master’s black gold. Like some kind of infantilised diaper king, Trump has genuinely had a special Diet Coke-summoning button installed in the Oval Office. Hopefully, he won’t get it mixed up with that other button. It will be a shame if all life on Earth is fatally irradiated just because Trump wanted a 500ml bucket of fizz to swill down his Big Mac and fries.But are we meant to take Trump’s erratic announcements seriously? While the last concerned voices of the dying liberal press pen outraged articles to their dying liberal readers about Gaza hotels, the invasion of Canada and Trump making it compulsory to drink everything through a Trump Plastic Freedom Straw Company Deluxe Plastic Freedom Straw ™ ®, even cauliflower cheese soup, his homunculus Musk has been quietly dismantling the infrastructure of American government as you knew it. There are cup-and-ball tricksters on Parisian street corners with more subtle moves.Half a dozen of Musk’s own hand-harvested incels-in-waiting, the kind of people who under normal circumstances would have got rich by inventing a way in which hardcore digital pornography could have been mainlined directly into the bloodstream in liquid form, have, under the spurious authority of Musk’s imaginary “department of government efficiency”, gone in and stolen all the data about everyone and everything in the US ever. Never mind. I am sure they will use it responsibly. What can possibly go wrong?Some people gathered at the scenes of Musk’s cost-cutting exercises and waved placards. Others sat and gawked at news footage of Kanye West’s naked wife’s arse or enjoyed disappointing trailers for the new Captain America movie, while the world as they knew it crumbled beneath their king-sized sofas. Keir Starmer backed away, as one might from a neighbour’s unpredictable weapon dog, avoiding direct comment, dodging a commitment to the AI declaration like a coward and hoping for the best, while Trumpy growls and foams. Which simply won’t do.Look. I’m as disappointed as the next metropolitan liberal elitist champagne socialist by Starmer’s government. While I accept, for example, the migration crisis must be addressed, I didn’t expect Starmer, who once left his “village and went to the city of Leeds” and “discovered a whole new world of indie bands – like Orange Juice and the Wedding Present”, to do it with Nigel Farage-style performative cruelty. Address the migration crisis, by all means, but don’t be a c*** about it. Did Orange Juice suffer the indignity of their eponymous third album not even entering the top 50 in 1984 just so, 41 years later, Starmer could send Yvette Cooper out to downgrade the desperate, like Paul Golding in heels.Currently, as Putin puffs up under Trump’s protection and unregulated AI threatens to rewrite history in real time, Starmer is on his knees sucking the paper straw of Trump’s presidency. I fear it may be about to explode in his mouth.

      Stewart Lee tours Stewart Lee vs the Man-Wulf this year, with a Royal Festival Hall run in July

      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk More

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      Europeans are right to be angry with Donald Trump, but they should also be furious with themselves | Andrew Rawnsley

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      It was, Sir Keir Starmer told members of his inner circle, one of his most meaningful visits abroad. In the middle of last month, he flew to Kyiv to double-down on the commitment to back Ukraine’s struggle for freedom, a pledge he first made a defining feature of his leadership when Labour was in opposition. Hands were warmly clasped with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, wailing air raid sirens greeted a Russian drone attack, financial promises were made, and signatures were inscribed on a 100-year partnership treaty. The prime minister solemnly intoned the western mantra about backing the resistance to Russian tyranny “for as long as it takes” for Ukraine to become “free and thriving once again”.All of which now sounds for the birds, thanks to Donald Trump. It was with his trademark contempt for his country’s traditional allies that the US president blindsided them by announcing that he had initiated peace negotiations with Vladimir Putin over the heads of Ukraine and the European members of Nato. The UK received no more warning of this bombshell than anyone else. So much for the vaunted “special relationship”. The US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, then unleashed another punch to the solar plexus of European security by publicly declaring that Ukraine would have to accept the surrender of large chunks of its territory and should forget about becoming a member of Nato. The future defence of Ukraine, he went on to declare, would be down to Europe, because the US wouldn’t be sending any of its troops to sustain a security guarantee.Humiliated and anguished, European leaders are crying “betrayal”. The UK government is not adding its voice to that charge in public, but it privately agrees. There is astonishment that the US president blithely conceded to several Russian demands before negotiations have even begun. “What happened to the Art of the Deal?” asks one flabbergasted minister. There is disgust at the Kremlin’s undisguised glee with what it interprets as a vindication of the barbarity it has inflicted on its neighbour. There is fear of the consequences for the Baltic states and others by rewarding Russian predation. There is horror at Trump’s subsequent suggestion that Putin be invited to rejoin the G7, as if the bloody slate of war crimes perpetrated by the Russians can simply be wiped clean.A hideous idea doing the rounds is that Trump will make a state visit to Moscow timed to coincide with the May Day parade, which celebrates Russia’s military. What a grotesque spectacle: the supposed leader of the free world sitting with the Kremlin’s tyrant watching a march across Red Square by the army that has committed so many atrocities in Ukraine.The biggest surprise is that so many people claim to be surprised. We knew that this US president despises America’s historic allies among the European democracies as he disdains the architecture of international security that his predecessors built. His geopolitics is one in which carnivorous great powers cut deals with each other and the smaller ones fall into line or get crushed underfoot. If you are genuinely shocked by these developments, I can only assume you haven’t been paying much attention.The perils are acute. A dictated peace will embolden Putin and other predators by sanctifying the redrawing of international borders by force. Were the US in concert with Russia to dismember Ukraine over the protests of Kyiv and European capitals, the transatlantic alliance would be mortally fractured.Europeans are right to be angry with Trump, but they should also be furious with themselves. They are to blame for leaving their continent so vulnerable to this danger-infused turn in world events. Trump has always had a point when he’s railed about Uncle Sam being treated as Uncle Sucker and he isn’t the first US president to tell Europe to take more responsibility for its security, even if none before have been so brutal about it. Under the lazy assumption that the US would always ultimately have their backs, European countries have spent too little on their own defence. The Russian invasion of Ukraine was often described as a wake-up call, but too much of Europe responded by hitting the snooze button. Three years on, the latest authoritative report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies finds that Moscow is feeding more resources into its war machine than the entirety of non-Russian Europe is spending on defence. Some frontline Nato countries, notably Poland, have ramped up their military budgets in response to the ravaging of Ukraine. The Poles grasp that the cost of deterrence is worth paying to avoid the far greater price of leaving yourself exposed to devastation. Others are still asleep. Last year, eight of Nato’s 32 members were still failing to meet the modest obligation to spend at least 2% of GDP.It is not that Europe lacks the resources to protect itself without US assistance. Russia’s population is about 144 million. The total population of Nato countries, excluding the US, is over 636 million and their combined economic heft is about 12 times that of Russia. The means are there; what’s been lacking is the will.Defence spending is about to become a lively issue in British politics. George Robertson, defence secretary during Tony Blair’s time at Number 10 and subsequently a secretary general of Nato, has been leading a strategic defence review. Lord Robertson is a shrewd Scot who has overseen a serious piece of work that has come to conclusions which will be jolting. His grim findings have just been delivered to the desks of the defence secretary and the prime minister. They will have landed with a thump.The Robertson review will add further detail to an already alarming picture of escalating threats out-matching inadequate protections. It suggests innovations designed to extract more bangs for taxpayers’ bucks by improving the efficiency of defence spending. It also recommends the reprioritisation of roles and activities. It makes the argument that it’s not just how much you spend that matters, it is also how well you spend. Yet the bluntest message of the review will be that Britain is not adequately resourcing its security. John Healey, the defence secretary, has effectively conceded that already by decrying the “hollowed-out” armed forces left behind by the Tories, a “dire inheritance” which includes the smallest army since the Napoleonic wars and an air force losing pilots faster than it can train replacements.One of Mr Healey’s junior ministers has said that the British army could be wiped out in as little as six months if it engaged in a war on the scale of the conflict in Ukraine. In the realm of cyberwarfare, the head of the National Cyber Security Centre recently warned that Britain’s shields aren’t strong enough to protect from the myriad bad actors who are menacing us.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionLabour’s election manifesto made a pledge to get spending up to 2.5% of GDP, but not until some distant and undefined point in the future. At an imminent meeting with the prime minister at Number 10, the heads of the armed forces are expected to argue that there will be more cuts to our enfeebled capability unless they get an additional £10bn a year than has been budgeted for.People in a position to know tell me that Sir Keir is becoming swayed by the case to spend more. For that to happen, three big obstacles will have to be overcome. One is the Treasury, which has ever viewed the MoD as a prodigiously wasteful spender, as it often has been. When money is already tight, Rachel Reeves is going to take a lot of persuading to make a special case of defence. There will be baulking by the many Labour ministers and MPs who will flinch at more money for missiles when it will mean less for public services. There’s also a job of persuasion to do with the British public for whom defence and security has not recently been a priority. At last summer’s election, just one in 50 named it as their top issue in deciding how to vote.It is going to take a lot of effort to shift the dial, but the need to do so is becoming pressing. There’s an old diplomatic saw: “If you’re not at the table, you’ll probably be on the menu.” In this era of international relations, exemplified by Trump seeking to do a strongman-to-strongman deal with Putin to carve up Ukraine, the law of the jungle is beginning to prevail. If the UK and the rest of Europe don’t want their vital interests to be on the menu, we’re going to have to stump up the cost of a seat at the table. More

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      Wednesday briefing: Inside the US president’s chaos machine

      by

      Good morning.Few words can fully capture the first few weeks of Donald Trump’s presidency. Dizzying? Unrelenting? Disorienting?Trump’s team has described its strategy as “flooding the zone” – in essence, overwhelming the opposition, the media and the public with a torrent of executive orders, mass dismissals of federal staff and the suspension of trillions in national funding. The logic is simple: create too much chaos for the media to cover, and make your critics struggle to keep up.How long the White House can sustain this approach remains uncertain – as does the question of how soon the systematic purge of government employees will translate into real consequences for the public.Dismantling the systems of government with brute force will inevitably yield blunt consequences. Take US foreign aid, which was, in Elon Musk’s words, put through the “wood chipper”: a 90-day funding freeze abruptly halted medical trials for cholera, malaria, HIV and tuberculosis. The department of education recently got this treatment, after Musk’s department of government efficiency (Doge) terminated nearly $1bn worth of its contracts.If the newsletter catalogued everything Trump has done so far, the scroll bar on your screen would all but disappear. Instead, today’s newsletter focuses on four recent developments. That’s right after the headlines.Five big stories

      Middle East | Benjamin Netanyahu has said that Israel will resume fighting in Gaza if Hamas does not release more hostages by noon on Saturday, endorsing a threat by Donald Trump that could shatter the three-week-old ceasefire between the two sides.

      Economy | Nationwide, Britain’s biggest building society, has waded into a row over whether the government should cut tax breaks on cash Isas, arguing such a move would reduce the availability of mortgages for first-time buyers.

      AI | The US and the UK have refused to sign the Paris AI summit’s declaration on “inclusive and sustainable” artificial intelligence, in a blow to hopes for a concerted approach to developing and regulating the technology.

      Assisted dying | The Labour MP Kim Leadbeater has said her assisted dying bill for England and Wales will still have the strongest safeguards in the world despite the removal of a requirement for scrutiny from a high court judge. Opponents derided the change as “rushed and badly thought out”.

      Housing | Rogue landlords in England will face curbs on how much housing benefit income they can receive if their properties are substandard, Angela Rayner has said as she announced an extra £350m for affordable housing.
      In depth: Four fronts of Trump chaos, and where they go nextView image in fullscreen‘Geopolitical blackmail’ in the Middle EastLate on Monday, Hamas announced a delay in the further release of Israeli hostages, citing violations of last month’s ceasefire agreement. Among the grievances listed are delays in allowing displaced persons to return to northern Gaza and continued shelling and gunfire.However, as this Guardian report highlights, the warning comes amid increasingly hardline stances from the US and Israel regarding Gaza’s long-term future. Last week, Trump’s incendiary remarks suggesting the US could “take over” the Gaza Strip and that the Palestinian population should be relocated were widely condemned as an endorsement of forced displacement amounting to ethnic cleansing. His response to Hamas has only heightened tensions in the region, with the president declaring that “all hell is going to break out” if all remaining Israeli hostages are not returned on Saturday.Earlier this week, Trump (pictured above with Jordan’s King Abdullah II in 2018) reinforced his stance on depopulating Gaza, suggesting he could cut aid to Jordan and Egypt if they refused to permanently absorb most of Gaza’s Palestinian population. Both nations, though reliant on US aid and trade, have flatly rejected the proposal, calling it a red line. Experts say, however, that their economic dependence leaves them vulnerable to “geopolitical blackmail”. Jordanian officials, in particular, fear that postwar plans for Gaza could increase the likelihood of West Bank annexation. Jason Burke’s piece delves deeper into these concerns.Jordan’s King Abdullah met yesterday with Trump, becoming the first Arab leader to do so since his comments about forcibly displacing Palestinians from Gaza. The president continued to double down on his position, saying that the US had the authority to “take” Gaza, despite the king making clear his country was firmly opposed. Trump did seem to slightly walk back his position on withholding aid from countries like Jordan to get his way on Gaza, insisting that he was not using it as a threat: “I think we’re above that.”Bethan McKernan has a helpful explainer on what all of this means for the state of the ceasefire.Ukraine’s futureView image in fullscreenSpeaking to reporters last week about the three-year war in Ukraine, Trump said: “I want to end this damn thing.” He is eager to be seen as the peacemaker, not least because it would mean there is no reason to continue to spend so much on aid for Ukraine. There is also the not-so-small matter of his longstanding ambition to win the Nobel peace prize.In an interview with the New York Post, Trump said he had spoken with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, over a negotiated settlement and suggested that Russian negotiators are keen to meet with US counterparts.A bit of insight came, perhaps, when Trump cast doubt over Ukraine’s future sovereignty, suggesting the country “may be Russian someday”, a few days before his vice-president, JD Vance, meets with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy (above). However, Trump has not ruled out continued US support for Ukraine’s war effort – provided there is a financial return. His price: $500bn in rare minerals. Ukraine is rich in resources such as lithium and titanium, crucial for electronics manufacturing. Zelenskyy has been leveraging the country’s vast natural reserves in diplomatic talks with Trump, though the idea of tying military aid to resource extraction has already drawn sharp criticism.For more on this, read Shaun Walker’s excellent interview with Zelenskyy from Kyiv.Musk, Altman and the AI arms raceOpenAI’s Sam Altman has not only caught the president’s attention but has outmanoeuvred Elon Musk by positioning OpenAI at the heart of the government’s emerging artificial intelligence strategy.Musk, the world’s richest man, responded as he often does: by attempting to buy control. Leading a consortium of investors, he made an unsolicited $97.4bn offer for OpenAI, which was recently valued at $157bn. Altman swiftly rejected the offer, posting on X: “No thank you, but we will buy Twitter for $9.74 billion if you want.”The move comes just weeks after Altman and Musk clashed publicly, following Musk’s criticism of Trump’s Stargate initiative – a $500bn project involving OpenAI and Altman.‘Diplomatic love bombing’ in the UKView image in fullscreenIn the UK, Trump’s tendency to hold grudges and wield power ruthlessly against those he perceives as enemies has not gone unnoticed. Over the past few months, the Labour government has taken a conciliatory approach towards his administration, hoping that Trump’s transactional nature will either yield diplomatic and economic benefits – or at the very least, keep Britain out of his crosshairs.Several Labour ministers have softened their stance on the president, as has the prime minister. Peter Mandelson, the UK’s ambassador to the US (above), has publicly walked back his previous criticism of Trump, admitting that his remarks describing the president as “a danger to the world” were “ill-judged and wrong”. In a Fox News interview, Mandelson instead praised Trump’s “dynamism and energy”, adding, in an interview with the BBC, that Britain must respect Trump’s “strong and clear mandate for change”.Political correspondent Eleni Courea has written that the UK’s “diplomatic love bombing” appears to be paying off – Trump recently remarked that Keir Starmer “has been very nice” and that the two leaders are “getting along very well”. (Courea’s full piece is well worth a read.)skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionYet the UK prime minister’s reluctance to antagonise Trump has led to a muted response on even the most controversial policies, such as the forced displacement of Palestinians in Gaza. Ultimately, none of these efforts change the fundamental reality that Trump is “fickle and reactive”, as his decisions are seemingly driven primarily by what serves his interests at any given moment.For the latest on Donald Trump – and there will be more – keep an eye on the Guardian’s homepage.What else we’ve been readingView image in fullscreen

      First Edition’s own Archie Bland and his partner, Ruth Spencer, write damningly about a new Netflix feelgood film that offers astounding but ultimately false hope to families of those with severe cerebral palsy. “Lucca’s World perpetuates the idea that children like our son are broken and must be repaired, rather than whole people who deserve every chance to live full and happy lives,” the pair write. Charlie Lindlar, acting deputy editor, newsletters

      Mehdi Hasan is blistering on the Republicans and their dog whistling about DEI and the liberal media’s enabling on the issue. The right do not have good faith critiques of diversity policies, Hasan writes: “This is the weaponisation of a three-letter term to denigrate Black people and pretend the political and economic advancement of minority communities over the past 60 years was a mistake”. Nimo

      Jeff Ingold has a unique playlist. Standing (as of now) at 75 songs, the roughly six-hour set list comprises one song for every man with whom Ingold has slept. The result is a meaningful musical extravaganza that transports Ingold through the deep relationships and fleeting romances of his life. “When most people hear Candle in the Wind, they think of Diana. Me? A threesome I had with a couple in south London.” Charlie

      After Kendrick Lamar’s stellar Super Bowl performance, what is left for Drake (besides his millions), many of us wonder. Ben Beaumont Thomas explains that though the rapper has endured a public evisceration, he can still regain his relevance – and perhaps even his cool. Nimo

      “Not so much drifting slowly downwards as nose-diving at a frightening rate.” After last weekend’s galling defeat to Italy in the Six Nations, Robert Kitson is frank about the worrying state of Welsh rugby in this week’s edition of the Breakdown newsletter (sign up here!). Charlie
      SportView image in fullscreenFootball | Jude Bellingham put Real Madrid 3-2 ahead with the last kick of the game to give his side an advantage in the Champions League playoff against Manchester City. More Champions League resultsRugby | Wales have appointed Cardiff’s Matt Sherratt as interim head coach after Warren Gatland’s second spell as head coach abruptly ended on Tuesday. Gatland has paid the price for Wales’s dismal recent record, having presided over the worst losing run in the country’s 144-year international rugby history.Football | Sam Kerr has been found not guilty of racially aggravated harassment after calling a police officer “fucking stupid and white” when he doubted her claims of being “held hostage” in a taxi. The captain of the Australian women’s football team and Chelsea’s star striker faced up to a maximum sentence of two years in prison.The front pagesView image in fullscreen“Zelenskyy: Europe cannot protect Ukraine without Trump’s support” – an exclusive interview is the Guardian’s lead story. “Court gives Gazans right to settle in UK” reports the Telegraph while the Mirror says “Left to rot” as it investigates NHS dental care or the lack of it. “Judge tweak hits support for assisted dying bill” reports the Times while the Express insists “MPs must back ‘crucial’ right to die law”. “Absurd we cannot sack rogue cops” is the Metro’s splash while the i has “UK savings rates cut by 30 banks – and first mortgage deals under 4%”. Top story in the Financial Times is “‘Trump trades’ backfire as greenback weakens and bond yields come down” while the Mail splashes on “Labour’s new borders watchdog will WFH … in Finland!”.Today in FocusView image in fullscreenWhy giving up the Chagos Islands could cost Britain £9bnEleni Courea discusses the UK’s historic deal to sign sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, and why some inside the Labour party are now regretting it. Campaigner Olivier Bancoult outlines why he hopes the deal will go aheadCartoon of the day | Martin RowsonView image in fullscreenThe UpsideA bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all badView image in fullscreenEstablished in 1942, the Women’s Timber Corps saw upwards of 15,000 young women work during the second world war as “lumberjills”. Aged between 17 and 24, they assumed roles traditionally filled by men in Britain’s forests, felling trees to aid the war effort. Joanna Foat’s new book, The Lumberjills, tells their story through stunning archive photography – and this gallery gives an enthralling taste.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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