Thursday 11 July 2019

Lining Up

Although it will have to wait until the brief Johnson-Bannon Premiership is over, in his mistreatment of Sir Kim Darroch, Donald Trump may at last be edging Britain towards a grownup relationship with the United States.

From 1776 until 1917, the American Republic and the British Empire were out-and-out enemies.

From 1917 until 1941, they were still very much rivals, a view that retained a considerable hold on both the American and the British public imaginations well into the post-War period.

But in 1941, as was made clear beyond doubt in 1956, Britain became an American client state. And so it has remained.

Until now, when the President of the United States has gone so far as to dismiss the British Ambassador. 

A line has been crossed, and in so doing a line has been drawn. Let us determine for ourselves what there will be on the other side of it.

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