MJ Akbar
Those who prefer television might want to check out a great classic of the medium, a masterpiece of political satire that raises an intelligent laugh 45 years after being produced by BBC: Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister. No historian has narrated the story of faded power as effectively. Turn to Season 2, Episode 1 of Yes, Prime Minister. The theme still ricochets across front pages. Defence spending. Or non-spending.
In 1980 Britain had 400,000 men in uniform, with 20,000 stationed in North England. Today, the British Army is down to 74,296 men and women, including 4,244 Gurkhas, the smallest in two centuries (British colonies had their own armies, loyal to the Crown). Once the arithmetic of essential deployment is done, Scotland Yard may have more to contribute to Ukraine in its war against Russia than the oncemighty British Army.
Starmer, who has discovered his inner Flashman, has increased defence spending from 2.3 per cent to 2.5 per cent of GDP, or one-fifth of 1 per cent of GDP. You wouldn’t quite see the numbers that way if you heard the manufactured applause around the decision. In truth, Starmer is helpless. He did not start defence casuistry. Nor can he tax the British public to send money for an overseas war, if he wants to survive.
Taken for granted
Europe has been cannibalising the American economy for more than seven decades to pay for its security, while giving lectures from a high pedestal. Germany, to its credit, does not lecture. But that does not change vital statistics. If they start now, it will take Germans 10 years to turn broomsticks into guns. Americans know this. Trump is reflecting American anger at being taken for granted. America pays for nearly 70 per cent of NATO’s budget. Trump is tired of freeloaders. He has been insisting for years that Europe should spend 5 per cent of its GDP on its security. Europe has pretended it is deaf. If Europe had spent 5 per cent, Russia might have felt more secure in Moscow than Kyiv.
Trump was more conciliatory towards Macron and Starmer, but they too got a taste of the new power in the House. The Telegraph’s caustic Madeline Grant was brutal in her description of the Trump-Starmer meeting: “A fireside chat, of sorts, followed. Actually the fire wasn’t on and they didn’t really chat at all. The PM gave off the air of a nerd trying to cosy up to the school bully. The President’s monologues were occasionally punctuated by rather pathetic squeaks of agreement from Starmer.”
Starmer, she writes, looked more like he was passing a gallstone than making conversation while Trump indulged in a stream of consciousness commentary about those he liked: Vladimir Putin, King Charles, and Starmer’s wife Victoria.
American history
The surprise is that Europe should be surprised by America’s demand for accountability. Maybe they no longer read history written by Americans. Neither Woodrow Wilson nor Franklin D Roosevelt considered themselves isolationist, but both evaded Europe’s ‘world wars’ until convinced that American interests were at stake. Roosevelt provided aid, but did not join the war against Hitler’s destructive fascism until Japan’s egoistic blunder, the attack on Pearl Harbor. Japan won Pearl Harbor and lost the war.
Dwight D Eisenhower, who led the Allied war effort, taught Britain and France their limits in 1956 when in conjunction with Israel they tried to seize the Suez Canal from Egypt. He switched off American support. Deflated Britain and France, rulers of mighty colonial empires, collapsed. Has Trump signalled a Suez moment? Listen, or else…
Hyperventilist Steve Bannon described the Zelensky confrontation as “ten minutes that changed the world”, which is an exaggeration if only because the world has been changing without America’s permission for a while. But those 10 minutes changed Europe. The events of February 28 will seed a library of books.
Peter Mandelson, who can hear things more clearly because he now lives within audible distance of the White House, told Zelensky on March 2 to give “unequivocal” support to Trump’s demand for minerals, declare a ceasefire, and defy the Russians to follow. He was being kind to the man in civilian fatigues who requires a radical exit from an existential dilemma. Trump’s National Security Advisor Mike Waltz was less circuitous. Ukraine, he said, would need a new leader if Zelensky doesn’t listen.
It has only now begun to register with various principals that inbuilt into Trump’s demand for Ukraine’s minerals is an iron-clad security guarantee. An American President may evade a direct response when an ally is invaded, but no American President can ignore an attack on Americans and American interests. The presence of American investors in Ukraine is ipso facto a security guarantee.
Trump supporters are calling it a brilliant bit of chess. There may be an element of post-facto selfcongratulation in that surmise. But it is undeniable that the pieces are in place on the chessboard. There is only one move left, however long that takes to negotiate. Ceasefire. Peace, well described as a chimera, will take longer, if it ever comes.
