Why managing Trump is far more important than defending international law for Starmer

It’s not often that you have a cabinet minister say the quiet bit out loud. But in his candid interview on the Today programme on Tuesday morning, Wes Streeting summed up the dilemma that the UK and the rest of Europe face in dealing with Donald Trump.

On one hand, they want to defend an international rules-based order and can see perfectly well that the US’s military strike on Venezuela and capture of president Nicolas Maduro was likely to have been illegal.

On the other hand, they do not want to poke the bear and anger Trump into doing something rash, which would harm them.

And as Sir Keir Starmer joins French president Emmanuel Macron and other world leaders on Tuesday, including representatives of the Trump administration in Paris, this dilemma will hang over their conversations like a Damoclean sword waiting to crash down.

As Mr Streeting put it: “The prime minister chooses what to say, how to say it, and when to say it, very carefully.

“He always has at the forefront of his mind is, how does he make sure that he uses his influence and leverage in a way that first and foremost, works to our national interest, whether economic interest or security interest, and then for the collective interest as well of our global security and the rules-based system, which we’ve seen disintegrating before our eyes.”

In other words, forget vocally defending international law when you have to manage an ego like Trump.

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And in many ways, Venezuela is very much a side issue now. Maduro is in prison, the act is done, and there is no going back. The die is cast.

But other issues loom large and fast.

There is a genuine fear about Trump sending the US military into Greenland and simply taking the sovereign territory of a EU member and Nato ally without so much as a by-your-leave.

After all, if he can do it with Venezuela, why not Greenland?

And what could the UK and Europe do in such circumstances? The answer is not a lot. They could not take on US military might, and imposing sanctions would be crippling domestically. Already, the impact of US tariffs has hurt all of Europe – trying to block US trade altogether would be economic suicide. Europe and the UK need more trade with the US, not less.

The truth is that an incursion into Greenland would see a lot of diplomatic noise but little else short term.

Added to that, the conversation today will be on the coalition of the willing for Ukraine. The only way to get peace there with Russia is through a US-brokered deal. Europe is too weak. But this is about setting European borders with Russia.

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Somehow, they need to persuade a Trump administration alarmed by the economic damage caused by the Ukraine war that it has to be tough with Vladimir Putin.

Once again, though, it will be Starmer whose role is pivotal.

The other European leaders still see the UK prime minister as the Trump whisperer, a statesman who can get a hearing from the US president and persuade him against some of his more erratic moves.

Sir Keir will be at the heart of efforts to manage the US and Trump, today and in the coming weeks.

But, in the long term, this Paris summit may represent a turning point. Europe will need to work out how to bolster its military, security and economy in a world where it can no longer rely on or trust the US. Those conversations will be happening on the fringes.

The UK will itself need to be part of those conversations, but, a decade on from the EU referendum, it will finally be faced with a choice of a future with its EU allies or as the sidekick of a belligerent America.