That space for the UK between the EU and the US is becoming smaller by the day. - ThreadSky

anthonypainter.bsky.social • 1 day ago

That space for the UK between the EU and the US is becoming smaller by the day.

Blimey. Asked about Trump, Merz says he’s in close contact with European leaders about becoming “independent” from US (and confesses “I never thought I’d say that on TV show”). Casts doubt on value of NATO summit in June.

This from a die-hard Atlanticist. Things are moving fast.

Comments

stuafcb.bsky.social•22 hours ago

Surely the space is getting bigger.. but the UK's influence is getting smaller all the time...

katiecannon.bsky.social•1 day ago

UK: Should we sell everything to an American corporation?

Or ……

andrew-stones.bsky.social•1 day ago

...have we done so already, unbeknownst to the public, meaning we have nothing left to trade (give away)?

katiecannon.bsky.social•1 day ago

Gotta print up some currency and invest in your economy

Esp education & technology and such

andrew-stones.bsky.social•1 day ago

Tech is looking like a continually renewing scam for aggregating wealth to fewer and fewer players. We the plebs get to have every aspect of life infiltrated by time-consuming complexity, whilst we witter irrelevantly via expensive gadgets and worry about how to afford nursing care and pain control.

katiecannon.bsky.social•1 day ago

I understand what you’re saying

I’m talking about ability to maintain your nuclear weapons, staying independent of starlink & Musk, etc, more generally

Etc

andrew-stones.bsky.social•23 hours ago

Personally I fear that the UK is already beyond “maintaining” the kind of independence you allude to… might be more a case of “regaining” it… requiring the kind of political will, clarity (with the electorate) and courage not very evident right now… but we'll see…

ianinspen.bsky.social•1 day ago

In many places the US army bases were never really welcomed and they often worked like little outposts with minimal contact with local people.

anthonypainter.bsky.social•1 day ago

What Trump, Musk, Vance etc have profoundly misunderstood is that twentieth century European history is not just a Discovery channel show for us. We feel it viscerally to our very core. It's part of who we are: we know where capitulation to tyrants leads.

paultopping.bsky.social•23 hours ago

Are you sure? Seems like the young and/or uneducated have no real idea about tyrants except as a frequent movie trope.

nlcoombe.bsky.social•23 hours ago

I Wonder If the vast majority of people understand.There seems to a HUGE lack of understanding for our history.

saraswati2301.bsky.social•13 hours ago

For understanding it one first has to learn that history, objectively and without distortion. …

wtfrench76.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Well said!

ianrobo.bsky.social•23 hours ago

I went to berlin for the first time a couple of weeks ago and walking around, walking those same streets they marched, where they walked then the berlin wall etc We as you say understand more at our core, though far right is too high in countries thats still know how we got there

ianrobo.bsky.social•23 hours ago

assurbanipal.bsky.social•13 hours ago

My daughter did an homework on my mother-in-law's life for school. When she tells, for example, that the train they took to escape was bombed, it really gives history a concrete dimension.

anthonypainter.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Yes, we are still in the age where every family has its war story- just. We need to think about how we retain that consciousness when the living connection is broken.

catchafire777.bsky.social•23 hours ago

I feel this it true but can’t help worry somehow there’s a but coming …….

lipstickscribbles.bsky.social•22 hours ago

Discovery 😂

Those three learned all they needed to know about Europe from Perfect Strangers.

mihailim.bsky.social•22 hours ago

I want to agree but am terrified at the prospect that the sentiment you expressed is really just whistling past the graveyard. In Romania we're seeing nostalgia for the stalinist dictatorship from both the 18-24 *and* the 55-65 age brackets, which is insane on the face of it. I still hope, *but*.

saraswati2301.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Few months ago the first thing the taxj driver on the way from the airport to downtown Bucuresti told me was „everything was better under Caucescu…“. I stopped talking to him - I‘m myself from Eastern Europe, and I hate that „nostalgia“. People‘s memory is short and distorting !

julialamberth.bsky.social•22 hours ago

One wonders why they don’t feel “land of the free” viscerally in their core?

whereiswiseoldowl.bsky.social•23 hours ago

I agree with you. This is where stupid Americans comes from (not all of course). Many untraveled, uneducated and so much hatred. Their history is slavery and segregation and they want it back and worse. Europe knows its history and wants better.

steveakehurst.bsky.social•1 day ago

Really have long felt the FCO have been complacent / hubristic in their reading of Trump 2 - thinking that the standard playbook (‘engagement’, flattery, ‘being the grown ups in the room’ etc) which worked ok with Trump 1 will be fine again this time. It’s a totally different project.

steveakehurst.bsky.social•1 day ago

Getting closer with Europe also makes more sense electorally, for what that’s worth. Especially given how head long Badenoch and Farage are throwing themselves at Trump world.

Could have been a meaningful dividing line as it has been for the Libs in Canada.

trevor0257.bsky.social•13 hours ago

There never was space.

peterjbon.bsky.social•1 day ago

The UK needs to make up its mind, in a credible way. Can’t have it both ways.

artisanloaf.bsky.social•1 day ago

if we can't have it both ways, we wont have either, seems to be the uk perspective.

mark1962b.bsky.social•1 day ago

Starmer has been unequivocal in being anti Putin and pro Ukraine.

stuafcb.bsky.social•22 hours ago

.. and getting splinters on the question of EU v Gilead

artisanloaf.bsky.social•22 hours ago

yes, he's been clear on that, but not critical of the trump admin for their incoherence and inconsistency afaik.

i'm not foolish enough to expect them to be critical of doge/anti-dei/anti-woke/anti-trans/anti-immigrant.

but i think he could say 'leave our commonwealth canadian friends alone'.

mark1962b.bsky.social•22 hours ago

I think this will all play out over time. Let’s look at this again in a couple of weeks.

ivanskavinsky.bsky.social•1 day ago

andrew-stones.bsky.social•1 day ago

Oh dear.
A (UK) governing party with liberal, social-democratic, green, socialist “convictions” anyone; and the “courage” to stick with them?

celtic1888.bsky.social•23 hours ago

The UK?

Where's that?

Did you mean Airstrip One?

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