The US's unpredictable nature requires Europe to rethink its defense strategy.
Europe's dependence on US military tech and equipment poses a significant vulnerability.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
This follows on from yesterday and the big story, which we're all working our way through, because in four weeks, we've had to rethink all our major strategic assumptions. And in some ways, it's daft of us. We should have seen this coming with Trump one. So we've actually had eight years to really begin to wake up to the possibility that the US is no longer going to be a predictable, reliable ally, and that the entire rules based international Order the US created is being abandoned by the US. But it was such a big deal, such a difficult thing to get our heads around. And because of course, the US has been the largest economy in the world and the largest military in the world for 80 years. And it basically created the UN, created NATO, created the World Bank, that imagining a world without it, I'm still struggling for what exactly the metaphor is. It's more than a foundation stone. It's like, you know, two thirds, the entire building is being removed. We talked in the last podcast about vulnerabilities a little bit, but I guess Stephen Flatley's question gets to that. So let's just start with that and try to understand what the vulnerabilities are and why getting independent from the US is much, much easier said than done. Well, firstly, it's because so much of our kit comes from the US. So enormous amount of, you know, our F-35s, for example, which is the attack aircraft we decided to buy, are basically built with some UK components, but basically built in the US. And the Americans, when they sell these things around the world, often demand that they retain the data that these planes pick up. So these planes are full of extraordinary kind of data gathering stuff. But it's all considered top secret. The data is owned by the US. I think at one point we had to negotiate, just shortly after I left government, I think we had to give $400 million to an American defense company to be able to have our own data from our Own planes. And as the Afghans discovered, if you buy American kit, you're totally dependent on American contractors to do software updates. And if they don't provide the software updates, the whole stuff is grounded. So the reason the entire Afghan air force and helicopter force collapsed and the Taliban took over the country is the American removed all the contractors who were there doing the software Upgrades, which have to happen after every mission. Then there's the problem that America retains the right to not deliver stuff. So Sweden had ordered a lot of Patriot missiles and the United States suddenly said, actually, we can't really afford to give them to you because we want them ourselves for something Else. This whole world of US defense equipment was not just about the performance of the kit, because sometimes American kit is over-engineered, un-engineered, unbelievably expensive. And it's been proved in Ukraine, we're in a world where in fact, the Ukrainians are showing that you can use $1,000 drones and iPhones to do a lot of the stuff that $150 million planes were Doing. One of the reasons we buy the kit is because of security guarantees. So the most extreme example of all is Switzerland buys F-35s. Now, an F-35 is the most advanced fighter aircraft in the world. And it's there to do these incredible long range stealth missions. There is literally no reason for little Switzerland, this neutral mountainous country to have these planes. The only reason they buy them is that implicit is you buy it and America has your back. Now, America no longer has our back. I think very few people now believe that Trump is going to do anything to defend a European country if it's attacked by Putin. So we then have to think about how we replace all this stuff. Well, you can just about imagine that there could be Britishish italian designed planes or french german designed planes and in fact the typhoon and rafael can come into that space There is stuff we can do to replace american anti-aircraft missiles rheinmetall is now producing more and more 155 millimeter munition your german pronunciation has come in all rory Thank you very much thank you but we're still dealing with the fact that perhaps our biggest single vulnerability is in tech because the world of defense is increasingly a world dominated By companies like palantir on anduril spacex and would say, we've got you over a barrel. So when I meet these people from these American companies, they're like, Europe's finished, you're completely dependent on American tech, the future of the world is American tech. And you can't live without us. And wars are won on the basis of our tech platforms. And of course, the seven largest tech companies in the world are American. So what would it mean for Europe to actually become independent of Google, independent of the cloud services provided by Microsoft? We have something called SAP, which is incredibly important for running supply chains. But even that lives on cloud services provided by these enormous American companies. So there is a double strategy here. There's a strategy about making our own defense equipment and finding markets for our own defense equipment. And then there's an entire strategy about developing a technological infrastructure where, again, we don't really have the finance in place. I mean, famously, we innovate, but we don't produce commercial companies because it's much easier to get funding in the US. There's not a big European market for investing in tech. We don't take risk in the same way that the US does. So tech companies are perpetually flipping over to the US. There are potential companies. There are great German, Swedish, British companies to be building in, but we'd have to completely change our financial infrastructure as well as spending a lot more money. (Time 0:07:35)
Importance of Aid
Cutting aid to fund defense undermines soft power and international influence.
Rebuilding the Foreign Office and development infrastructure is crucial for true independence.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
Yes. So yes, India's question. Let's get into that for a second. So you've spoken a lot about the importance of aid. What do you think of aid spending being cut to support defence spending? Now, this is partly about if we're going to be serious about stepping up, it's not just serious about manufacturing. It's about becoming a serious country in terms of our skills and our soft power as well. So we would need to, if we're going to become properly independent of the US, really invest in rebuilding the Foreign Office, rebuild our development infrastructure, really work Out who we are in the world and how seriously we're doing it. Because a lot of what we've done for the last 60 years, I used to make jokes about this, but genuinely, my first boss in the Foreign Office, when you asked him what to do, would say, find Out what the Americans are doing and doing a little bit less. And if you've got that culture, you don't really feel that you need to develop all the linguistic skills that you need, the scale of the embassies that you need, the scale of the development Infrastructure, the number of intelligence stations we would have to open in places like Africa because we can no longer rely on the Five Eyes process. Alice, a question for you. So you started on this in yesterday's pod, and I thought it was really interesting, and I want to develop this. So let's imagine that we really thought about Europe, and maybe we thought about the European Union plus a number of non-member states, which the United Kingdom would be a very important Example, which bolt on and integrate economically defense and security onto the European Union. That could be the UK, it could be Ukraine, and it could be Turkey. And this could be Norway. And it definitely could be a vision, for example, I think, of customs union and single market without initially free movement to people. Perhaps without ever free movement to people. Why? Because most European countries don't want free movement from Turkey. Many voters in Britain don't want free movement into Britain. And the European countries are in a different situation than they were in 10 years ago, because they are facing labour shortages. So it's less of a priority for them. (Time 0:15:04)
New European Alliance
A new European defense and economic alliance could include the UK, Ukraine, and Turkey.
This alliance could involve a customs union and a single market, potentially without free movement of people.
Transcript:
Alastair Campbell
That mix at the meeting in Kiev by the Norwegian Prime Minister was Canada. Yes. The other thing, Rory, I didn't have time to send it to you because I just got this this morning, but I was sent a very interesting paper on something called the Rearmament Bank. And at first I looked at it and thought this is just going to be one of those sort of, you know, winky wanky, I've got a great idea, I can save the world. And so you always look at who's actually sending this thing and who's involved in it. So the first name was Guy de Selye, who was involved in founding the EBRD, the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development. The second name was General Sir Nick Carter, former chief of the UK defence staff, who I happen to know of old has been very, very worried about the decline in UK defences. And then finally, Edward Lucas, senior advisor at the Centre for European Policy Analysis. And essentially what this is talking about is it relates to what you've just said. It talks about getting a core group of like-minded European NATO members that has to be veto proof. That was the first thing, complementing the defence mandates that already exist. But basically saying you need 10 billion upfront state finance in order to borrow 90 billion. And essentially based on the process that was modelled by the EBRD. So I think these are new structures that are going to have to start coming up because the current structures right now don't look fit for purpose. You know, did you ever think you would see the day when the United Nations, which we've always thought post-war was this great institution where the world politics could play out, where We, the UK and France, were on the wrong side of a vote, where on the other side you had China, Russia, or America. Well, we were on the right side of the vote, weren't we? We were on the wrong side in that we couldn't get them over. We were totally on the right side of history, yeah. And we were voting the right way, but we were not with the Americans on that. That felt pretty threatening. And that does mean that these other sorts of institutions are going to have to develop and evolve. And I think this is what Mertz was talking about. I think he was talking about these like-minded pro-European, pro-NATO countries. And it is interesting. We've talked a lot in recent weeks about the potential for Turkey's power in some of these issues and relationships. And this is a classic one. If this had the Turks backing it, you know, it could get off the ground.
Rory Stewart
Willingness to fight. They've been a big supplier of drones to Ukraine. They are strategic adversaries of Russia in the Black Sea, and of course, in Syria, where they were on different sides. And Erdogan has now volunteered and said he's happy for the idea of Turkish troops to deploy to Ukraine and for Ukraine to join NATO. As we talk about who future European allies could be, I think Turkey is a very important part of that. Now, we might also think about, you talked about Canada, other democracies, Australia, South Korea, Japan. Now, these are enormous economies with huge amounts of resources if we wish to try to have some kind of rebalance and strategic independence. My friend Gerald Knauss from ESI, who I adore, is very interested in Jean Monnet and the great visions of the early 1950s. And of course, he would say that what we need is to envisage something which is more like the coal and steel community. In other words, something that's more than just an economic union that has a sort of political security infrastructure, but isn't as bureaucratic, isn't all about the commission. Your point about Nick Carter and vetoes isn't about, you know, arguing about the common fisheries policy, which would be the first thing that would get involved. But in order to get there, Alastair, I've now given you this task. Okay, you've got Keir Starmer, you've got Macron, you've got Merz and a Ruhm. You've got Tusk. You've got Erdogan. Yeah. And you've got Zelensky. How do you actually get them to get beyond the rhetoric and really step up? And I mean, let's say our objective is within a year to create a new outer circle of Europe, a new form of European defence and economic alliance. How are we going to get there as opposed to just waffle about it and miss the chance entirely? (Time 0:17:27)
European Leadership
European leaders must move beyond rhetoric and take concrete steps towards a new defense and economic structure.
Appointing a lead envoy and setting clear objectives for negotiation could expedite this process.
Transcript:
Alastair Campbell
I think this is already beginning to form. I think we're seeing it in the statements. Now, there are massive issues that arise from it. You talked about one of them yesterday, which is actually the extent to which we, the UK in particular, are so linked into America. But I think you'd have to do this in a way that ultimately the Americans said, yeah, that's kind of what we want. Because what Trump keeps saying and what the American message is, we can, you and I focus a lot on them being no longer a reliable ally. But let's just understand that what they're essentially saying is you lot have taken us for granted for too long. Do more of your own stuff. Look after your own backyard better than you've done. So I think you mentioned some of the names there and there would be others. You get them in a room. Essentially, they have to agree. And this could happen quite quickly. As I understand it, Keir Starmer is going to come back from Washington. He and Macron have been talking pretty regularly in advance of these two visits that they're both making this week. And I think it's this weekend they're then going to gather some of the other European leaders. It wouldn't take that long before you say, look, we have to accept now, we have to have a reshaping of the European defence and security situation. And the fact that the Norwegian Prime Minister yesterday was talking about in the way that he was, the fact that the Danish Prime Minister was talking the way that she was, the fact that Macron spoke yesterday as he did, that Keir Starmer is going to be saying much the same thing on Thursday. I don't think it would be that difficult. And that's why I think this rearmament bank is really interesting. You would have to have the development of institutions that sat alongside and in some cases maybe eventually replace existing institutions. And the EBRD, if I remember, that got together very, very quickly and started to deliver big budgets and big projects. I think it probably was within a year, but I think it was very, very quick.
Rory Stewart
I mean, it'd be interesting to see whether Starmer has the confidence to say, I am now appointing a lead envoy. And this is my objective. We're going to negotiate with these partners to create this economic and military cooperation structure. It's going to be a formal structure. This is how we're going to work. And we're going to integrate these things. We're going to integrate finance across Europe, defence funding. We're going to identify all the gaps. We're going to work out how do we put nuclear weapons into Germany.
Alastair Campbell
Manufacturing. Manufacturing. This is what I said yesterday when I said that I thought that this is, you know, people have sort of all sorts of complaints that they've had about Keir Starmer. But this in terms of UK and Keir Starmer leadership is actually a massive challenge and opportunity. And I think if he rose to it, it could actually be the making of it. I was very impressed yesterday. I saw James Heapy, former Defence Minister, Ben Wallace, who I've been sort of keeping an eye on because he's been saying some very interesting things, and also Tobias Elwood. It was very interesting hearing them. I actually thought, you know, the point you keep making about these ministers are much better when they're out of office than in it. They were all three of them speaking with real insight and conviction, but also coming from a position of understanding what Keir Starmer does right now is unbelievably important For the future of Britain and for the future of Europe. If you see it in that context, I think the country is ready to come behind something really quite big on this. And I think it will involve us getting through the crap that gets talked about Brexit and actually understanding there's something existential about this. It is a massive challenge and it involves us understanding we are a major European power when it comes to defence and security, but we've got to become even more major and we've got to Get the others to develop in the same direction. (Time 0:21:57)
Nazi Salutes
Elon Musk and Steve Bannon have made Nazi salutes, sparking controversy.
They deny their intentions, but some far-right figures recognize the gesture's meaning.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
Obviously, a lot of the questions that we're getting at the moment are focused on the US end of this as well. So Fulp, who's a member on Discord, another member's question. And thank you for members who are sending in questions. Could you please explain what's going on with Elon Musk and Steve Bannon both making Nazi salutes to crowds recently? They know what it means. It's clearly deliberate. And yet they deny it. What's their intention? Follow-on question. How do they marry their apparent support Nazi ideology with their apparent trenchant support for Israel? This is a really interesting thing, and there's been some good journalistic coverage on this. Clearly, Musk and Bannon are playing ambiguously on the line on this stuff. So they do these salutes, and then they deny that that's what they intended to do. But Jordan Bardella, who is the young, more charismatic face of the French far right, who was at this conference in which Bannon did this salute, recognised it enough as a Nazi salute To say he wasn't going to speak at that conference. It didn't seem to bother Nigel Farage or Liz Truss in the same way. No, but it's interesting that the far right, people like Bardella, are conscious that they know what's going on. They can read the signs. And some of the journalistic coverage is pointing out that what you're going to see probably quite soon is MAGA crowds doing Nazi salutes themselves almost as a dare, and then it becoming More and more normalised. So let me take one aspect of Fulpe's question. You talked about America wanting Europe to become independent. Yes, but it's a little bit worse than that, isn't it? Because they're also a government in America that is deliberately trying to undermine mainstream elected European governments by supporting their far right opponents, you know, By actually using Twitter, and we can get on to what that means, but using a massive social media platform to deliberately undermine elected governments in the way that Russia has done For many, many years, the United States is now doing completely openly. And remember, these far right governments that they're supporting, as we keep pointing out, don't share any of the strategic vision that we're laying out. They don't want close European solidarity, they are unashamedly pro Putin. And so there's a tension going on. On the one hand, there's a vision of creating NATO without the United States, which would still have, broadly speaking, the old security values of NATO. And another vision, which is the United States funding far-right groups that want to give up on all the guiding principles of NATO. (Time 0:25:48)
Far-Right Tactics
The far right's use of free speech arguments aims to normalize offensive language.
Their focus on power and domination appeals to some, particularly on social media.
Transcript:
Alastair Campbell
This is what's been interesting about what's going on in Germany. Historically, the AFD has broadly defined it as anti-American, seeing it's always like America, why are we allowing America to occupy Europe? But once Elon Musk comes along with promises of support and money, and as we said last week, three quarters of all stuff on X was basically coming from that sort of AFD perspective. Look, it's like there are some words that we know that you shouldn't use, okay? And sometimes they get used. And people do it, as you say, because they feel like they've been dared to do it. And this is the danger of this whole weaponization of the so-called free speech argument. What they mean by free speech, a lot of these people on the right, is they want to be able to say things that society has deemed to be too offensive to be said. They want to go back to that. And likewise, I think with the Nazi thing, it's never gone away in terms of there being an attraction among some people, particularly men, an attraction to this notion that politics Ultimately is about power, power is about domination, and you dominate other people. And it's been really interesting. When I was in Germany, if you talk to Germans, even people on the right in Germany, they can't really understand why the Americans can't see why this Nazi thing runs so deep. Why somebody like Musk makes a speech to the AFD and says, you've got to get over your guilt and all that stuff. A reasonable German doesn't understand why a reasonable American can't see that. So this is, I think, very, very deliberate. What Bannon did, I think, deliberate. What Musk did was deliberate. Why do they deny it, to go back to the question? This goes back to their thing about owning the libs. They want us to get upset about it. And that guy who's just been appointed as Patel's deputy at the FBI, this guy Dan Bondingo, a kind of right-wing conspiracy theorist podcaster, he is on record as saying he exists to Own the libs. He wants us to get angry and agitated. So we had a question from Jess this week. Do you have any advice for when big events in politics and the news begin to strain your mental health? I think that is happening. And by the way, my answer, Jess, is I think you just have to be very, very careful about not spending all your time following the news, looking at the news, reading about it and so forth, And almost try and step back from it. But it's very, very, very, very hard. But right now, we need to understand, Rory. You need to understand. I need to understand. I mean, just think about this. In the last couple of weeks, you've been attacked on social media in various forms by Elon Musk, J.D. Vance and Dominic Cummings. What's that about? And Donald J. Trump Jr. And Donald J.
Rory Stewart
Trump. What's that about? It's about owning the libs. And each one of these attacks gets 10 or 15 million views and thousands of associated threats coming. I took Sunday off and didn't look at Twitter at all and felt much better. I genuinely don't know. I mean, just for a second, I genuinely don't know whether there's any point by being there. I mean, occasionally I think, okay, if I'm annoying J.D. Vance enough and if I get a chance to challenge him on something as important as this, it's worth doing. But in other moods, I think, no, no, no, I'm just playing into their game. This is ridiculous. I'm not changing anyone's opinion. I'm just giving them an enormous desire to troll me. But I don't know what you do about it. I mean, if I don't go on, I then get all these messages from friends saying, are you okay? Because they're seeing that from the mild, JD Vance says, I have a low IQ, through to the slightly worse, Elon Musk saying I'm a corrupt grifter, through to the Dominic Cummings, I should Be killed. What do you do about the fact that there are tens of millions of people saying this stuff or sharing this stuff? (Time 0:28:30)
Managing Online Negativity
Separate online attacks from reasonable opinions.
Limit news consumption to protect mental health.
Transcript:
Alastair Campbell
I think you have to separate them from what you think that reasonable people think. It's like we had a question this week. I really enjoyed Alistair calling Elon Musk a real twat, but does it really help debate? And the truth is, no, it doesn't. So we all maybe, I think, get driven slightly to a place we don't necessarily in the cold light of day always want to be. For a lot of these people, they're making money out of being offensive. They're making money out of being extreme. My Fiona keeps saying to me, I don't know why you're on there. All you're doing is helping Elon Musk get even richer. There may be something in that, but I don't look at the replies in the way that you do. I don't know how many likes I get or they get. I just don't look at it. I use Twitter to express a view. Very occasionally, I will engage with people. But in the main, I just scroll through. I don't actually spend that much time in there, far less than you do.
Rory Stewart
I mean, I just want to put this out here to continue how to really annoy the far right. So here we are, dear Mr. Elon Musk, we should ban Twitter completely in the United Kingdom and in Europe. It is clearly now a mechanism being used to undermine our democratically elected governments and supporting far right parties.
Alastair Campbell
I would buy that. The only thing is, so then people will say, well, how do you square that with still being on it? Answer, because this is something that anybody who was around when the BNP were taking hold and gaining, you can't vacate space to them. So I think there is always a reason to be there. I actually think that that would be a good move. Whether we like it or not, is part of the economic and future success of this country. Are you seriously saying that we're going to upset all these massive players and da da da? I suspect that would be what he'd say. We'll see.
Rory Stewart
One of the interesting things is, of course, were we to do that, Elon Musk, who at the moment seems to own a great deal of Donald Trump, will then deploy full American economic trade and Other sanctions against the United Kingdom in the name of free speech in order to protect the 40 billion that has been invested in his company, Twitter. So as Europe tries to defend itself, I think the big existential threat in Europe is actually that we're going to be undermined from within. That's what J.D. Van said about Europe. Well, this is the last chance saloon for the coalition in Austria. This is the last chance saloon, I think, for the coalition in Germany to prove that they have an alternative.
Alastair Campbell
I agree with that, but Rory, just on Germany, I don't think that Musk added much to the support of the AFD. And I think he may have helped the other, particularly the left-wing party, De Linke, I think he helped mobilise them. And I think there was within decent people a sense of, I'm not being told who to vote by this guy. I think they were always going to get around 19, 20 percent. That's what the polls have been saying for months. So I'm not convinced. I think actually this was not a good result for Musk. I'm not even convinced it was a very good result for Putin, because I don't think, I think we look at Hungary, look at Slovakia, you look at some of these other elections, Romania that We talked about before. I think you could argue Russia really made an impact. I still think they made an impact in Brexit, by the way. And I will think that to my grave. But I don't think they did in Germany.
Rory Stewart
They may just be learning, though, because now you've got essentially Russia and the American presidency working on the same side. I mean, they're all doing the same. They're all trying to support far-right groups in Europe. Russia, because the far-right groups are pro-Russian. America, because they think that the values of Europe are not the values of the Trump presidency. And they want to bring in people who share their values. I think we're underestimating how much social media has changed everything. We've talked in the past about how much the crisis we face is about fundamental economic conditions and why it is or isn't the 1930s. And the truth is that, yes, life is difficult in Europe, but my goodness, it's not the 1930s. But the thing that makes the far right take off is social media. I mean, I think it's no coincidence that 2012, which is the beginning of the age of populism, is also when Twitter and Facebook get off the ground. And I think if we don't shut these things down, I think our democracies are in real trouble. (Time 0:32:27)
Ban Twitter
Ban Twitter in the UK and Europe to counter its use in undermining democracy.
This action would address the platform's support for far-right parties.
Transcript:
Alastair Campbell
Yeah, okay. Well, listen, there you go, Elon, JD, Rory Stewart. You can have another go at him because he's basically said Twitter should be shut down. I think there will come a point where some country or other decides to do it. Have you noticed as well, Rory, how they never attack China or Russia over impinging on free speech, which is quite amazing. But we also had a question about Chelsea Football Club, which bizarrely, Rory, does relate to this. A question which came from Matthew, a member, can you explain what has happened to the money that was meant to go to Ukraine from the sale of Chelsea Football Club?
Rory Stewart
Do you remember this one? I do, because I work with a lot of non-profits. This is an enormous fund that was supposed to be supporting people in conflict, not just Ukraine, it could be used for people in conflict in Sudan and Afghanistan and elsewhere. And I knew some of the trustees. And this has been going on for many, many years now.
Alastair Campbell
It's been going on since Abramovich had to sell Chelsea. So there's £2.3 billion sitting in a British bank account. It exists to fund humanitarian programs for victims of the war in Ukraine at no cost to the British taxpayer. It was created when Abramovich sold Chelsea. He proposed that the fund should be offered up as humanitarian money, I presume as a way of avoiding extra sanctions. It was agreed between our government and Abramovich that the money would be used to fund humanitarian programs supporting victims of the war in Ukraine, wherever they were in the world, But it still hasn't gone. The money is sitting in a bank account. So as I understand it, I spoke to somebody at Save the children about this. They actually lobbied David Lammy. So the official line, if you phone the government press office, is to say, oh, this is sitting in the desk of David Lammy. But David Lammy said he wasn't aware of this. On the third anniversary, backing Save the Children in calling for this money to be released and given to people with humanitarian needs in Ukraine. I mean, two billion, you can buy quite a lot of humanitarian aid with that at a time when in other parts of the government arena, we're cutting it. Final (Time 0:36:47)
Europe-China Relations
Europe may seek closer ties with China due to US unpredictability, but should remain wary.
China's transactional nature and complex relationship with Russia pose challenges for Europe.
Transcript:
Rory Stewart
Serious one for me, and then I think maybe we can finish with some lighter hearted ones. So Johnny's saying should europe now be looking to china as an alternative partner if we can't rely on the united states and this is let me throw let me throw one at you in the same area michael
Alastair Campbell
O'd michael o'd if china decided to spin up a full replacement to usa id would rory agree to it? How would he weigh the huge humanitarian benefits against being a pawn in an authoritarian soft power play? That's a great question. I think you would.
Rory Stewart
No, I wouldn't. No, I wouldn't. I wouldn't run a Chinese development organisation worldwide. No, I think that would be too, too, too dubious.
Alastair Campbell
What about as a deputy? As a deputy.
Rory Stewart
I think your great friend David Cameron went off to do a few investments with China, didn't he?
Alastair Campbell
You can't go through a week without having a dig at David Cameron. I mean, I think we're going to have to ask David Cameron to come on the podcast, but just do it with me.
Rory Stewart
It's very interesting. If you look at the China Daily yesterday, and actually one of their foreign policy magazines too, and these are things which are basically by the staff and the Chinese Politburo. For the first time, there's no criticism of Europe. And for the first time, you see them saying that Europe is a force for stability, China is a force for stability. Europe has complex security needs, and it needs to make more multilateral arrangements with other countries, for which brackets read China. So there will be people now within Europe saying, well, you know, China's not democratic, but at least it's a bit more predictable than the United States. It has long 15, 20 year plans and it's not trying to steal Greenland from us. And, you know, really, do we have any alternative if we've got to get off American tech other than to look at Chinese tech? And after all, they produce a lot of stuff very cheaply. They can transform our electric vehicle fleet. And, of course, the other way, too. I mean, Germany's entire car industry depends on selling to China. 50% of the profits of European luxury goods and automobile manufacturers are made in China. So I think there will be the beginnings of very strong movements in Europe, at least on things like trade, to start getting closer to China. And Europe probably isn't going to have any choice other than to do that. On the other hand, it should be very wary, because China is not a long standing friend of Europe. China, boy, if you think Trump can be transactional. As I said, it appears that as soon as David Cameron met the Dalai Lama, China basically cut off 10 years of investment into Britain. Its relationships with Russia are complicated, to say the least. Its economic power is so immense that it's very difficult for individually European countries to negotiate with it without being ripped off. But I definitely think that one of the unintended consequences of what Trump is doing is that instead of what Elbridge Colby, who's the policy chief now at Defense, is fantasizing about, You know, he's put out a statement saying, Europe should spend 5% on defense and take overall support in Europe. And also, Europe should be supporting the US against China, we should be deploying into Taiwan and this and the other. Forget it, right? I mean, if you can't have it both ways, if the US abandons Europe, they're not going to be supporting the US against China. And if anything, they will be undermining US attempts to isolate China. (Time 0:39:06)
Commonwealth Silence
The head of the Commonwealth has not addressed threats to Canada's sovereignty.
This silence raises questions about international solidarity against US aggression.
Transcript:
Alastair Campbell
Here's my last serious one, Rui. Mrs. Premis, why has the head of the Commonwealth had nothing to say about repeated threats to Canada's sovereignty? More broadly, who can lead international solidarity against US aggression? Why does it seem anemic so far? And we've actually answered this before, about we both agree that there should be more British and other Commonwealth voices speaking up for Canada against this dreadful sort of constant Denigration of Canada as a sovereign state. But it's also an opportunity to tell you that on leading on Monday, we've got the two contenders to become the next prime minister of Canada, because whoever replaces Trudeau as leader Of the Liberal Party will become Prime Minister until the next general election. So that's Chrystia Freeland, who we've talked to for the first time in the podcast, and Mark Carney, who we're talking to for the second time. So that's out on Monday. Oh, my goodness, they're good. I mean, in terms of mental health, I do think (Time 0:42:33)
