Republican Russophilia: how Trump Putin-ised a party of cold war hawks

The idea of Moscow as a paragon of Christian nationalism has penetrated the party of Reagan - and the lurch in US policy has huge implications for the global order

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In a speech that ran for 100 minutes there was one moment when Donald Trump drew more applause from Democrats than Republicans. As the president told Congress last week how the US had sent billions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine, his political opponents clapped and unfurled a Ukrainian flag - while his own party sat in stony silence.

It was a telling insight into Republicans' transformation, in the space of a generation, from a party of cold war hawks to one of America first" isolationists. Where Trump has led, many Republicans have obediently followed, all the way into the embrace of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin - with huge implications for the global democratic order.