Category Archives: United States

Britain, Defence, Europe, Government, Politics, Russia, Society, Ukraine, United States

Trump’s peace deal. At what cost?

EUROPEAN SECURITY

CONFUSED, contradictory, and deeply concerning. That is the verdict passed at the Munich Security Conference on Donald Trump’s hectic first month in the White House. The alarm in the air is unmistakably fraught.  

That’s chiefly attributed to the Trump administration being in the driving seat with the Europeans not even on the bus. Though his destination is unclear to many of us, what we do know is the US President wants a Nobel Peace Prize and believes a deal with Vladimir Putin will deliver it – no matter the cost to Ukraine, Europe, and Britain.

Trump assertively believes in a might-is-right world where the strong do what they can and the weak accept what they must. Forget high-minded appeals to past sacrifice and shared values; flattery and greed are the currencies that count now.

Ukraine’s mineral riches will sate that thirst. Lindsey Graham, the US Senator who represents the old-style Atlanticist wing of the Republican Party, has told the President that Ukraine is valuable real estate and that Russia must not be allowed to develop it.

So, it is mystifying that Mr Trump, the supposedly hard-nosed author of The Art Of The Deal, has given Putin major concessions before the talks have even started.

Will he allow Putin to dominate Europe in return for Moscow severing its alliance with Beijing? He’s capable of pushing such a horribly mistaken policy that could be disastrous for our security.

The good news is that the Conference’s dreadful proclamation – inviting Russia back into the G7, promising friendly summits with Putin, and excluding Ukraine from NATO membership – may be dumped tomorrow.

The US President changes his mind with impunity. His desire, according to reports, is to lead the news every hour of every day. Consistency and predictability can be disregarded, attention is what matters.  

The bad news is that his bullying streak is consistent. European leaders are playing with fire when they rebuke him publicly. It will be all too easy for Trump to withdraw the vital 8,000 US troops who protect NATO’s eastern frontier.

He can cancel the intelligence-sharing with Ukraine that provides its hard-pressed troops with their electronic eyes and ears.

A broken, defeated Ukraine will be a catastrophe for Europe, with millions of refugees fleeing west.

It will embolden Putin to find his next victim – perhaps Estonia, where Britain has scraped together 1,000 troops as part of a NATO tripwire force. But without Americans, that tripwire rings no bells.

Yes, European countries are belatedly boosting defence spending. But it will take many years before they can fill the gap the Americans would leave. They cannot even provide a credible force to protect Ukraine after a ceasefire deal. When it comes to European security, the Americans are the only game in town.

All this leaves Britain in a dreadful position. We cannot join the Europeans in denouncing Trump’s selfish, cynical approach. Our intelligence and nuclear relationship with the US are central to our own defence. We know they can be a difficult ally, but the alternative is worse.

Yet we do not want to see Europe isolated, failing, and splintering. Nor do we wish to see it falling prey to Russian – and Chinese – influence. That would be a catastrophe for our own security.

We should also be vexed about a European superstate taking shape without our participation. President Zelensky has called for a European army and increasing fear of Putin is driving continental leaders to take collective security seriously as never before.

The bleak and hard truth is that Britain’s hollowed-out Armed Forces, stagnant economy, and lightweight political leadership risk leaving us marginalised and on the sidelines. And for that we have only ourselves to blame.

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Britain, China, Defence, Government, Military, National Security, Politics, United Nations, United States

Chagos deal risks the UK’s nuclear deterrent

CHAGOS ISLANDS

BRITAIN’S nuclear deterrent would be at risk from Chinese interference if the Prime Minister capitulates over the Chagos Islands.

A covert satellite system used to direct British and US nuclear missiles would be compromised if Keir Starmer signs off a deal with China-friendly Mauritius, it is feared.

The UK is currently locked in negotiations, led by Attorney General Lord Hermer and National Security Adviser Jonathan Powell, over handing over the strategically important islands in the Indian Ocean following a UN ruling.

The archipelago, controlled by the UK for more than two centuries, is home to the joint UK-US Diego Garcia military base. Britain is set to pay billions to Mauritius to lease the base back for 99 years under the terms of the deal.

But concerns have been raised that the UK’s system for coordinating nuclear missiles relies on connection points on the Diego Garcia base. To function properly, these “nodes” require physical protection and British control of the island’s electromagnetic spectrum.

However, the deal includes a clause saying other countries could also use the spectrum, from which Mauritius could profit.

This could offer Beijing a gateway to jamming the highly classified Automated Digital Network System 3 (ADNS 3), which is shared by the Royal Navy and the US Navy, and, which crucially, is part of the “Nuclear Firing Chain” (NFC). The deal would enhance UK national security, but without it, Britain would lose access to the spectrum. The future operation of the base without a deal would clearly be at risk.

Nonetheless, critics suggest that the government’s arguments are totally fabricated. They say that the islands are far more important than just this and the potential threat to our operations from a no deal is a total fiction from the pen of the Cabinet Office – and, by extension, the human rights law firm, Leigh Day.

Lord Hermer was a go-to barrister for Leigh Day before his appointment as Attorney General last year and he has been accused of a deference to international law over domestic needs.

Leigh Day is currently representing asylum seekers who claim they were trapped on the Chagos Islands after being rescued at sea by the Royal Navy. In 2019, the International Court of Justice ruled that Britain’s continued administration of the islands was unlawful.

Despite the UK ignoring the ruling, it was subsequently ratified by the UN General Assembly, which found the islands rightfully belonged to Mauritius. Sir Ben Wallace, a former defence secretary, said: “Many of the UN judges who made the flawed ruling come from totalitarian states including China.

“Is the PM really going to put their opinions before that of Britain’s security? Diego Garcia is British and must remain so.”

And, MP Tom Tugendhat said that in his former role of security minister, he had seen the advice on the implications of the deal, but the version being presented to the public was “nonsense”.

The settlement could also mean that the Royal Navy could be prevented from entering a buffer zone which Mauritius intends to set up around the islands.

Without any protection from Western navies, there is heightened fear that China could get close enough to the sensitive military facilities.

It is known that ADNS 3 provides assured tactical wide area networking between ships and shore around the world to support full battlespace connectivity.

Britain’s nuclear threat is carried by the Royal Navy’s bomber submarines. Any breakdown of communications or hostile interception of messages which are part of the NFC, or any other breach, would mean Britain losing its nuclear deterrent.

This is a highly technical matter, involving a lot of classified systems, which, according to critics, is being overlooked by government lawyers.

This part of the world is key to China’s expansionist agenda, and any deal with the UK would appear to facilitate that. These systems rely on guarantees around the security of Diego Garcia.

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Britain, Economic, Government, Politics, Society, United States

Shrinking the British state requires an Elon Musk

GOVERNMENT-ECONOMY

THE Left is hysterical after Donald Trump appointed Elon Musk to head up a new US Department of Government Efficiency.

The Tesla billionaire will try to radically shrink the inefficient state, slash red tape, and cut trillions of dollars of wasteful spending.

Never has the intellectual divide between political leaders on each side of the Atlantic been greater.

And nothing better symbolises this chasm separating Keir Starmer’s Labour and Donald Trump’s Republicans than Trump’s choice of hi-tech billionaire Elon Musk to be his efficiency tsar.

Since taking office in July, the Labour Party have been intent on expanding the bloated British state. You just need to look at the details of the eye-watering tax hike of £40billion in the Budget, the huge injection of £22.4billion into the NHS, and the creation of additional quangos.

The contrast couldn’t be any starker. Not only has Mr Trump tasked Musk but also appointed pharma and tech pioneer Vivek Ramaswamy, to head a new Department of Government Efficiency (DoGE). Both have already trumpeted their ambition to wipe $2trillion from the cost of running the US federal government. Word has travelled at lightning pace as Mr Musk declared on his social media channel X that there was no threat to democracy but is to be a direct attack on bureaucracy and America’s big spending state.

Yet, in the UK the Labour Government is set on a course of adding to its spending rather than cutting costs. The British state now spends a mind-boggling 44 per cent – up 5 per cent since the pandemic – of the £2.7trillion annual output of the UK economy.

Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor, a self-confessed admirer of the US, has an opportunity as head of the UK Treasury to follow suit and embrace a new world of efficiency. Just imagine the positive impact in the City if she decided to lay credible plans similar in proportion to those announced by Mr Trump.

There is no doubt that Britain is desperately in need of its own Elon Musk-type efficiency tsar. It would certainly change attitudes. If the US Department of Government Efficiency achieves $2trillion of savings without damaging outcomes, then the debate on the depth of public services will change at the next UK election.

Any efficiency here would start by dismantling Labour’s plans for new quangos and organisations which do little more than mimic bureaucracies and other government affiliations which already exist.

These include the new “Border Security Command” which is duplicating work done by the immigration and security services and the National Crime Agency; and “Skills England” which is doubling up on work being done by private sector trade organisations and trades unions.

The list goes on. Labour’s plans for an Industrial Strategy Council and a National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority, despite their elaborate and grandiose names, will simply add more red tape and wage bills, increasing the size of the state rather than improving productivity.

Across government, budgets have exploded over the last decade. The NHS which consumed £144billion in 2016 is now projected to cost £277billion in the current fiscal year. Education spending has climbed from £102billion to £146billion over the same period. The nation’s welfare bill has rocketed from £240billion to £379billion. And the Transport budget has gone from £29billion to £66billion. Staggering sums of money all round.

Still, no one can say that state services have improved – in fact, quite the reverse. Anyone seeking to claim “Pension Credit”, following the Chancellor’s brutal assault on the winter fuel allowance for pensioners, can testify for that.

If we had our own Musk to drive efficiency and better productivity in the public sector the red tape and bureaucracy would be peeled away without the unions being indulged. We were shown what could be achieved when, as Prime Minister, Boris Johnson appointed a vaccine tsar (Dame Kate Bingham) who harnessed the efficiency of the private sector to enable the NHS to produce Covid-19 vaccines in record time.

It says everything about Labour’s approach that British pharma giant AstraZeneca, which developed the Oxford Covid-19 vaccine, has just announced it is to plough a record £2.7billion of research and development expenditure into the US rather than the UK.

Only by having the willpower to challenge the inefficiency of the state will there be belief in it being shrunk to manageable levels.

That would create a more agile and productive nation. It is so needed.

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