On 13 June, @theguardian.com published a collective letter concerning Russia’s war & attacking Dr #FionaHill, the chancellor of Durham University & one of the principal authors of the UK’s strategic defence review. As UK-based or British-educated experts in matters pertaining to Russia, we disagree.

Apparently the answer is to elevate him to replace Walz in Nat Security

Worth noting how far right MAGA US intellectuals often now claim that Canadian national identity is fake and Mexicans are not capable of managing a state. All reminiscent of the predominant narratives in Russia claiming that Ukrainian identity does not exist and Kazakhs are incapable of statehood

Ok, who inserted the crickets?!

A billboard by The Telegraph, reportedly in Kent, England.

"Trump seems to give Putin carrots he didn't ask for while also taking away the stick. I haven't read the Art of the Deal. Maybe that's how it's supposed to be." Great to talk to @timsteno.bsky.social o and Carol Massar on @bloomberglp.bsky.social this afternoon.

‼️🇫🇷 President Emmanuel Macron accused Vladimir Putin of lying about Ukraine today but the real, and scarcely disguised target, of his comments was Donald Trump. “France’s position is unchanging,” Macron said. “We believe in the sovereignty of peoples & territorial integrity” 1/

It’s time for UK and Europe to make clear to the Trump administration that this peace plan, including the abandonment of Crimea to Russia, is a load of utter bollocks. www.wsj.com/opinion/russ...

"The EU is our largest trading partner and this government is determined to work to reduce barriers to trade across the economy to help drive growth." says Nick Thomas-Symonds in his oped. Note 'across' not just agrifood. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Slowly, slowly we will get back that which we had

An epitaph for Trump: “You were given the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour and you will have war.” on.ft.com/3S3gkjR Trump’s shameful Crimea ultimatum to Ukraine

Little chance the CBP can keep up with and appropriately apply the constantly shifting landscape of tariffs and the likelihood of tariff arbitrage is high.

Excellent Unhedged, as always. Here’s hoping that “moron risk premium” makes it into finance lexicon.

As I wrote the other day, when the safe stuff sells off in a crisis, you are in trouble. So anyway yeah here we are on.ft.com/3RErGe2

Why Mark Carney is the leader the rest of the west needs right.m now - not only has he served as Governor of two central banks but he knows how to deal with ignorant populists who have managed to grab hold of the levers of power in a G7 country and triggered a monumental act of economic self-harm

But it continues with him as president, 100%.

Check out the latest edition of my @financialtimes.com newsletter. (1/2) Why Trump's tariffs won't last long: on.ft.com/43IgnsG

"One day, son, our thriving export business will be yours."

“Paweł Kowal said in an interview that a “red line” would be crossed for Poland and the rest of central Europe if expanded Russian borders were legally recognised as a result of the invasion of a neighbouring country”. on.ft.com/4lhvyPK

What a flop. Marine Le Pen’s public fight-back against her legal ban from the 2027 French presidential election started badly today. She hoped for up to 20,000 supporters at a rally in Paris. Her party claimed 10,000. An independent count suggested only 6,000. 1/

Excellent piece. “The tariffs announced on Wednesday are roughly 10 times as high as those of most other industrialized countries, and higher than the infamous Smoot-Hawley tariffs (of Great Depression fame)”.

3) That was just the US version. What’s particularly impressive is that he’s managed this on a global scale. Starting to get the feeling that “Trump” annotation is going to be the chart equivalent of a layer of volcanic ash in the fossil record.

Parents over the body of their dead 15-year-old son in Krivyi Rih Speechless 💔

I presented the following figures on defense spending at the NATO ministerial meeting. In 2016 (before Donald Trump's first term) as European allies, together with Canada, we spent $255.6 billion. In 2024 - $506.7 billion. A 98% increase. We are stepping up.

Global markets continue to respond as renewed American greatness takes hold. Investors will not forgive the US for this. Even if He's out next time, we can't do this every 4/8 years

“If it endures, Donald Trump’s decision on April 2 2025 to enact sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs on US trade partners will go down as one of the greatest acts of self-harm in American economic history”. on.ft.com/4j9QKp4

This is exactly the issue. The notion that Lutnick proposes on the superiority of American beef is just nonsense.

The unpredictability of America for the foreseeable future is more serious than the tariffs themselves. Companies can’t make long-term decisions if policy is made and changed on a whim. Much of the rest of the world will respond by creating U.S.-free supply chains.

I have yet to see any active groups sharing alternative purchase options, as they have in Canada, but I hope they appear.

The popular alternative to Zelenskyy, such as one exists, is Zaluzhnyi. If a free and fair election results in Zaluzhnyi, do they really believe he would be more malleable than Zelenskyy?

Perhaps no coincidence that this welcome dose of Trump realism about Putin’s objectives and approach to peace in Ukraine came straight after the US President spent hours with Finland’s @alexstubb.bsky.social www.ft.com/content/784b...

Perhaps domestic crises will put his many dangerous geopolitical initiatives on the back burner.

Very curious that Poilievre refuses to get his RCMP security clearance. Apart from the obvious question why, how could he effectively govern as PM without it? www.cbc.ca/news/politic...

It is absolutely right that we do not need Greenland (or Canada) for natsec reasons because they are already close NATO allies. So the only rationale to turn the US into an aggressor in our own hemisphere is if you don’t plan on NATO being a US alliance in the future.

“Presidential idiocy is temporary . . . Anti-Americanism is akin to amputating your broken leg instead of waiting for it to heal” Temporary, but also on the cards every four years. on.ft.com/3FKDIzX

when another boy has lost his balloon

So I just don't see how any US allies and partners can allow him to visit their territory after this and Munich. Beyond the lack of respect, it's a national security threat.

He's making the case for invasion. Very late-2002 remarks.

Danes and Greenlanders must wonder: if the US government is using its leased base on Danish/Greenland territory to threaten Danish/Greenland sovereignty... then why the hell are Denmark and Greenland leasing that territory to an unfriendly foreign power?

Can't help feeling that, at some point in the next few months (or maybe years), Starmer is going to have to make this speech. It's painfully obvious that he wants to be able to avoid doing so - but at all costs? Really?

Presumably he said this after PM Carney stated the old relationship is over.

I’ve seen even folks on this site scolding Canadians for “overreacting” which I think misreads the power dynamic quite a bit. America is the biggest military power to have ever existed and I don’t think people understand what it’s like to contemplate being on the other end of that

How Europe can make it easier for start-ups to scale - Brent Hoberman makes the case for a voluntary pan-European legal framework for start-ups dubbed EU Inc. It could be one that the UK could join despite Brexit www.ft.com/content/21db...

This is a really important point. It's assumed that Russia just needs sanctions relief from America. That is not the case. "Without Europe on side, Russia’s trade, access to payment systems and foreign investment would all remain severely limited." www.economist.com/finance-and-...

I think the Atlantic piece is probably the scoopiest scoop of the last few decades. And it has clarified one thing - other than the total idiocy of sending opsec over group chats - Hegseth and Vance have a genuine animosity towards Europe. Something for us all to ponder.

Apart from the absolute clown show ineptness of including a journalist, the really interesting thing about that Signal chat is the venom towards Europe. It clearly isn’t for show.

The Carlson/Witkoff interview makes clear to my mind that a fundamental rupture is coming, between the US and Europe.. over Ukraine America's perception of its self interest and Europe's assessment of its self interest are now fundamentally divergent, and unbridgeable