In the Commons on Monday, Sir Keir Starmer was asked about rumours that America was about to suspend military aid to Ukraine. “I have not seen reports of the United States withdrawing support for Ukraine, and, as I understand it, that is not its position,” he replied.

It is astonishing that just a few days after his apparent diplomatic triumph in Washington, wooing the notoriously capricious American president, that he should have been blindsided about such a momentous decision.

Sir Keir was also asked whether the US could any longer be considered a “reliable ally”. He replied: “The US and the UK have the closest of relationships; our defence, security and intelligence are completely intertwined. No two countries are as close as our two countries and at a time like this, it would be a huge mistake to suggest that any weakening of that link is the way forward for security and defence in Europe.”

It may be dawning on the Prime Minister that the link is being weakened, or even severed, not here but on the other side of the Atlantic, whatever honeyed blandishments he received from Mr Trump during his talks.

The evidence is compelling.

Arguably, the most important event last week was not the humiliation of Volodomyr Zelensky in the White House but the vote in the UN on the third anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine. America voted against a resolution condemning Russia, siding with North Korea and Belarus in doing so.

This might have been considered a signal of US intent, unless we are to believe everything Trump does is some sort of clever ruse designed to discombobulate his opponents. Instead of searching for some secondary meaning perhaps we should consider that what he says and does is what he believes.

Sir Keir is adamant that Trump remains committed to Nato and to the Article 5 “all for one and one for all” provision. Really? Would anyone trust the US under its current president to come to the aid of, say, Estonia if the Russians invaded? The words of Bismarck come to mind: that the Balkans are “not worth the bones of one Pomeranian grenadier”. Trump thinks the same about the Baltics and a single US marine.

It is ironic, however, that the only time in its history that Nato has invoked Article 5 was on behalf of the United States after 9/11.

The geopolitics of the post-Cold War era are being turned upside down as, indeed, are all domestic assumptions. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Western democracies salivated at the prospect of spending the money previously allocated to defence and security on welfare, health and education.

History was over, the West had won, there were no real threats in Europe anymore. Russia was even admitted to the top table as a member of what became the G8. We could afford to hand out benefits never previously imagined. Parents would get free nursery care; pensioners free TV licences, triple locks and winter fuel allowances; welfare budgets ballooned with millions able to live a life of dependency on the state.

If a threat did reappear in Europe, Uncle Sam was always ready and willing to lend a hand and give the offender a good hiding. Nato was the vehicle and the Americans the principal driver.

That’s all gone now. The freeloading is over – as it should have been years ago. Now, from London to Warsaw the talk is all about spending more on defence. Sir Keir Starmer has raided the country’s foreign aid budget in order to push the military budget up to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027 but this is nowhere near enough. Nor is a vague promise of moving to 3 per cent some time in the next decade.

It is not as though the money is not there. What is missing is the political will to prioritise defence over all the other spending programmes on which people have come to rely. Not only do we need to spend more on our own security but there is now a pressing need to fill the void left by US isolationism.

The case for seizing £250 billion of Russian assets frozen by sanctions is, therefore, stronger than ever. There has been talk of doing so almost from the moment the first Russian tank crossed the border in 2022 but no one is able to agree on what to do. It came up at the weekend’s summit in London, but again a common position could not be found. Germany is among the countries raising objections.

Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk has been pressing the EU to expropriate the assets of the Russian Central Bank, which are mostly held in Belgium. So far only the revenues from the interest have been used. At the weekend Rachel Reeves authorised a £2.26 billion UK-Ukraine bilateral loan agreement taken from the profits generated on sanctioned and frozen Russian sovereign assets.

Reeves said: “It’s Russia that has to pay for the damage and the devastation it’s caused in Ukraine.” In that case, why not confiscate the assets rather than use them for speculation?

Opponents say the money is Russia’s sovereign property protected by international law. But legal considerations did not stop Russia invading its neighbour or continuing to strafe its towns and cities almost daily with missiles and drones.

Even if there is a peace agreement, Russia should pay for the reconstruction of Ukraine. Why should Western taxpayers fund work to repair the damage caused by the aggressor when we have £250 billion of its money under our control?

Another argument against confiscation is that the Kremlin will retaliate. But if the Americans are really disengaging from Europe, it would be perverse to hand back huge amounts of money that Moscow could then spend on weapons to be used against us.

Asset confiscation will be on the agenda for the G7 meeting in Canada in June, but the way things are going will America even turn up? The hosts are preparing a plan for seizure but it is by no means clear that agreement can be reached.

In the Commons Sir Keir Starmer said it was “a very complex issue” and would not commit to supporting the idea. This dithering must end. Trump may consider Vladimir Putin to be a potential ally but he behaves like our enemy and should be made to pay.

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How Starmer raised the stakes to get Zelensky talking

Volodymyr Zelensky clashed with Donald Trump in the Oval Office on Friday.

It was some time on Monday evening when Donald Trump picked up the phone to Sir Keir Starmer and told him the news that would send shockwaves through Europe hours later.

The worst fears of Ukraine and its allies in Europe were to be realised. Mr Trump was planning to withdraw all American military aid for Ukraine.

“We are pausing and reviewing our aid to ensure that it is contributing to a solution,” read a White House quote distributed to the American media just after midnight.

Western leaders had already spent three days trying to contain the fallout from Volodymyr Zelensky’s disastrous meeting with Mr Trump in the Oval Office on Friday. But in the end, the damage done by their public spat was too great.

However, the call from Mr Trump earlier in the evening had given Sir Keir a head start on coordinating the European response.

A second chat – between White House officials, the Prime Minister and another member of his Cabinet – gave both sides a chance to thrash out the consequences of the US president’s decision after it had been made public.

The situation was dire. Cutting off American aid to Ukraine represented the greatest breakdown in the anti-Russia Western alliance since the outbreak of the war in February 2022.

But the dispute between Mr Trump and Mr Zelensky was more than a row about funding and weapons – it was personal.

Contingency planning had been under way since Sir Keir and his No 10 team had watched the extraordinary spat between the Ukrainian president, Mr Trump and JD Vance in Washington days before.

One European diplomat in regular contact with London said there was “a great deal of frustration” among UK Government officials about how Mr Zelensky had handled the visit, which had been intended as a platform to sign Mr Trump’s critical minerals for peace deal.

Instead, the chaotic episode resulted in the collapse of US aid, which forms the backbone of Western military assistance and a bulwark against Russian aggression.

In an interview on Fox News shortly afterwards, Mr Vance said Mr Zelensky “showed a clear unwillingness to engage in the peace process” at the summit – and aid would not be restored until he behaved.

The episode was the greatest test yet of Sir Keir’s high-stakes strategy – to act as both Ukraine’s greatest ally and America’s ambassador in Europe.

If Ukraine could not be brought back to the table, then what diplomatic power did the UK have to help the US? And if Mr Trump walked away from Ukraine and Sir Keir followed, what friend was he to Kyiv?

The tension became even more pronounced when it appeared that Mr Vance had criticised the UK directly in his interview, referring to a peacekeeping operation from “some random country that hasn’t fought a war in 30 or 40 years”.

Downing Street pursued its strategy of avoiding comment on every stray bullet to leave Washington. A spokesman said on Tuesday morning that Sir Keir was “full of admiration for all British troops who have served, for instance, in Iraq and Afghanistan”, but declined to comment on the suggestion that the UK’s military was a spent force.

Credit: Fox News

Hours later, Mr Vance was forced into a clarification, writing on X that he had not been referring to either Britain or France in his comments – even though both have offered sizeable peacekeeping forces.

Sir Keir, meanwhile, was focused on the three challenges presented by Mr Trump’s aid decision, according to those familiar with discussions.

First, he had to persuade the president that a deal was still possible – and fast, before the real-life consequences of slashing aid for Ukraine became too unbearable on the ground.

Second, he had to bring European allies on side, maintaining the “coalition of the willing” he had launched at a Lancaster House summit on Sunday.

Third, he had to persuade Mr Zelensky to apologise, show humility and return to peace negotiations in the US.

Each of these was a significant diplomatic undertaking, and the combination of the three pushed Sir Keir into a Downing Street bunker for the day as he worked out how to deliver them.

A Whitehall source said British officials were in contact with the US “all day at various levels” on Tuesday in an attempt to roll the pitch for Mr Zelensky’s return. “It’s not just about calls. It’s more one continuous conversation,” said the source.

Inside the White House, Mr Trump’s allies were split on how they should engage with Mr Zelensky.

Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, and Mike Waltz, the national security adviser, were pushing to re-engage, while the Maga hardliners Steve Witkoff and Pete Hegseth were of the view that the Ukrainian president, along with the EU, should be left out in the cold.

Dealing with European leaders was mainly left to David Lammy, the Foreign Secretary, who was already scheduled to meet virtually with his counterparts in the Weimar+ grouping, which includes France, Germany, Poland, Spain and Italy.

That call became even more vital after the events of Monday night. Mr Lammy broke away from a reception with the Indian foreign minister at Chevening, his grace and favour country home, to join the conference.

It also came as Brussels announced a new scheme for up to €150 billion in loans to help governments boost military spending. Although the UK is no longer an EU member state, all announcements were coordinated with London.

The third task – persuading Mr Zelensky to back down and apologise – had already begun on Sunday in London.

There, Mark Rutte, the Nato secretary general, made the point that the Ukrainian leader’s personal relationship with Mr Trump had to improve for there to be any chance of a deal.

But it was Sir Keir who spoke to Mr Zelensky again on Tuesday in a phone call pushing him to support Mr Trump’s peace plan and critical minerals deal.

It is understood the Prime Minister relayed to Mr Zelensky that there were certain things Mr Trump wanted to hear, including a recognition that he had mishandled the Oval Office meeting.

At 3.37pm, shortly after hanging up the phone having spoken to Sir Keir, Mr Zelensky relented.

“My team and I stand ready to work under President Trump’s strong leadership to get a peace that lasts,” he posted on X, outlining his desire for “a truce in the sky” and “a truce in the sea”.

Then came the crucial line: “Our meeting in Washington, at the White House on Friday, did not go the way it was supposed to be. It is regrettable that it happened this way. It is time to make things right. We would like future cooperation and communication to be constructive.”

That paragraph – an apology without the word “sorry” – was viewed by British diplomats as a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for getting Mr Trump back around the table.

Mr Zelensky described his call with Sir Keir as a moment of “advice and support”, while sources in Kyiv were more blunt – it was a tactical move to reverse the pause in military aid from Washington.

On Tuesday night, there was little confidence in either European capital that the strategy had worked.

One Kyiv diplomat put the chance of Mr Trump returning to the peace deal at 50 per cent, as Ukraine and its allies waited with bated breath to hear the response from the White House.

A British Government source was even more circumspect about the prospect of a rapprochement, saying: “We just do not know. But it is not beyond the realms of possibility.”

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