America First, Britain Second was the title of my blog last year when the British press highlighted Trump’s “snub” of Great Britain in favor of a visit to France on July 14 to celebrate Bastille Day.
Prime Minister Theresa May invited President Trump on behalf of the Queen when she met him in Washington DC in January 2017, just a week after his inauguration — an invitation he accepted. Although no date was fixed, it was widely believed it would take place that summer during the G20 summit. It didn’t.
As a London born American, watching President Trump celebrate Bastille Day in France, instead of a state visit to Britain as originally planned, was dis-heartening — but understandable. Watching Macron’s arrival at the White House with a ceremony featuring nearly 500 members of the U.S. military and a booming 21-gun salute, private dinner at Mount Vernon and the first Trump State dinner, is the latest reminder of the tattered Anglo-American relationship.
The troubled cross-Atlantic U.S.-Britain relationship is a “special relationship” underpinned by much more than strategic interests. It is based on ties of culture, ideas, language and history I wrote in Custom Maid Knowledge for New World Disorder. The American-British alliance is one that must continue to endure and survive the 21st-century.
Churchill and Roosevelt highlighted the bond and relationship between their two countries during World War II. Abraham Lincoln and Prime Minister William Gladstone had a very high regard for each other as America was convulsing itself to get rid of slavery.
The idea that no monarch should be able to rule arbitrarily and that there had to be accountability, was actually British, and the American Revolution was built around that idea.
America, like Britain, has numerous political and economic differences with Europe, especially France. That is why watching President Trump celebrate Bastille Day that featured U.S. troops march along the Champ-Elysees to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the U.S. entry into World War One, instead of the many American-British military alliances, especially during World War Two and over the years to today, was disconcerting.
Watching the pomp and circumstance surrounding the “Trump whisperer’s” three day visit as Macron and Trump kissed, embraced, backslapped, held and clasped hands in their grand histoire d’amour, was a contrasting reminder of the strained relationship the U.S. has with Britain and Europe.
Britain and America have to get their historical ties back on track if their alliance is to survive the 21st-century. Isn’t a more robust bilateral transatlantic alliance with the country that gave birth to America and a historically reliable ally preferable to trying to sustain and salvage the frazzled hostile multilateral European alliance lead by France and Germany? More on the German front when Germany’s Angela Merkel visits later this month.
Forget about the French Kiss! Let’s get back to a British cuddle.