The threatened return of Donald Trump endangers the UK’s most vital interests | Andrew Rawnsley

British politicians are deluding themselves if they think that the so-called special relationship' will protect us

A spectre is haunting Europe - the spectre of Donald Trump. In London, Paris, Berlin and every other significant European capital, bar Moscow, the horror sequel no one sane wants to see is Trump - The Return: No more Mr Nice Guy".

Having spent the last three years being much too nonchalant about the threat of him recapturing the White House, British politicians and their counterparts elsewhere in Europe can no longer deny to themselves that a Trump second coming is terrifyingly possible. The shock is the sharper for having been preceded by so much complacency. His defeat by Joe Biden in 2020 was greeted with a huge exhalation of relief that the United States was back under the leadership of an Atlanticist who believed in the US's traditional alliances with other democracies and didn't deny the existence of the climate crisis. Welcome back America!" whooped the mayor of Paris in a typically euphoric reaction. It didn't occur to enough people in Europe's leadership that all Biden's victory promised was a four-year breather, not a guarantee that we would never see Trumpism empowered again. Time that might have been spent preparing for that possibility by making the UK and the rest of Europe less dependent on America for the security of our continent has been woefully wasted.