But even a president with as primitive America-first-and-only views as Trump must ultimately recognise that undermining $4tn of US foreign direct investment in Europe – dwarfing Ukraine’s imagined mineral wealth – is not in US interests.
The government is undertaking a politically risky “zero-based” public spending review of how every government pound is spent, aiming to reduce spending in real terms despite the legacy of austerity.
US defence spending is presented by both Trump and western leaders as a kind of free public good offered as an American gift to the world.
It is to US advantage to play a backstop security role in Europe even as Europe does more to help itself – the message Starmer must take to Washington this week.
Given that Britain’s precarious financial viability depends on the cold calculus of foreign investors, it is an asset that cannot be compromised even while we move to increase defence spending.
