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The UK Is Reconsidering Its Alliance With The U.S.

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  • The UK Is Reconsidering Its Alliance With The U.S.

    The UK is abandoning its alliance with Trump as the United States 'withdraws from its leadership around the world'
    • The UK threatens to tear up its defence alliance with the US after Trump's Iran crisis triggers a rupture between the two countries.
    • UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace says that the UK is looking to forge stronger alliances with other international partners which share its priorities.
    • He says the US risks "[withdrawing] from its leadership" of the world under Trump.
    • Wallace also reveals Trump threatened to tear up its intelligence-sharing relationship with the UK.


    Donald Trump's decision to assassinate Qassem Soleimani has triggered a major rupture between the United States and its historically closest ally in the United Kingdom.

    In remarkably outspoken comments, UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said on Sunday that Trump's isolationist foreign policy stance meant the UK was now looking for alternative allies around the world.

    "I worry if the United States withdraws from its leadership around the world," he told the Sunday Times.

    He added: "The assumptions of 2010 that we were always going to be part of a US coalition is really just not where we are going to be."

    The comments came after Boris Johnson's government distanced itself from the attack last week, with the UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab labelling it a "dangerous escalation," which risked a conflict in which "terrorists would be the only winners."

    A spokesman for the Prime Minister was also quick to condemn Trump's threats to target Iranian cultural sites as a breach of international law and a potential war crime.

    With the Iran crisis ongoing, the UK is now openly threatening to tear up its longstanding defence partnership with the United States.

    The US 'withdraws from its leadership' of the world under Trump

    UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told the Sunday Times that the UK was increasingly looking for alternative international allies,

    "Over the last year we've had the US pullout from Syria, the statement by Donald Trump on Iraq where he said Nato should take over and do more in the Middle East," Wallace said.

    "The assumptions of 2010 that we were always going to be part of a US coalition is really just not where we are going to be."

    Wallace said the UK would need to reduce its dependence on US military assets.

    "We are very dependent on American air cover and American intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets. We need to diversify our assets."

    Wallace told the paper that the UK would increasingly need to turn to other allies that more closely share the UK's interests.

    "Regardless of what the US does... we are going to have to make decisions that allow us to stand with a range of allies, the Five Eyes [intelligence partnership with America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand] and our European allies where our interests converge," he said.

    Trump is threatening to cut intelligence ties with the UK

    Wallace also revealed that the Trump administration had threatened to cut off its intelligence sharing partnership with the UK, if Johnson's government pursued its plan to allow the Chinese telecoms company Huawei a role in Britain's 5G network.

    "They have repeatedly said that. They have been clear about that," he told the paper.

    "President Trump, the national security adviser. The defence secretary said it personally to me directly when we met at Nato. It's not a secret. They have been consistent. Those things will be taken into account when the government collectively decides to make a decision on it."

    He added: "Friends and enemies that are independent make you choose." Link
    ___________

    I feel so much safer, knowing that the wise and far-sighted leadership of Donald Trump has directly resulted in such unheard of statements from our closest ally.
    “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

  • #2
    Wallace also reveals Trump threatened to tear up its intelligence-sharing relationship with the UK.

    Wallace also revealed that the Trump administration had threatened to cut off its intelligence sharing partnership with the UK, if Johnson's government pursued its plan to allow the Chinese telecoms company Huawei a role in Britain's 5G network.

    "They have repeatedly said that. They have been clear about that," he told the paper.

    "President Trump, the national security adviser. The defence secretary said it personally to me directly when we met at Nato. It's not a secret. They have been consistent. Those things will be taken into account when the government collectively decides to make a decision on it."
    So its about Huawei

    And this is such an affront that it requires a re-examination of the alliance ? really ?


    Wallace said the UK would need to reduce its dependence on US military assets.

    "We are very dependent on American air cover and American intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets. We need to diversify our assets."

    Wallace told the paper that the UK would increasingly need to turn to other allies that more closely share the UK's interests.
    Surprising statement considering UK already spends the 2% or so on its defense budget meaning Trump would not say UK was not paying into its defense budget

    This has been brewing for some time now

    The UK ambassador being called a pompous fool six months ago and made to leave Washington did not help matters.
    Last edited by Double Edge; 12 Jan 20,, 19:58.

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by Double Edge View Post
      So its about Huawei
      Guess you missed the "also" that was in there.

      For what it's worth, I trust Huawei as far as I can throw China. So in this case, I agree with Trump.
      But a "master deal-maker" should be able to work with ones allies, especially one as a close as the UK.

      This of course is far beyond Trump's abilities or even scope of understanding.

      Originally posted by Double Edge View Post
      Surprising statement considering UK already spends the 2% or so on its defense budget
      Not really surprising considering that defense spending covers a incredibly diverse range of line items on the budget sheet.
      “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
        The UK is abandoning its alliance with Trump as the United States 'withdraws from its leadership around the world'
        Newspaper sensationalism. THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES THE US ON THE PLANET WHO CAN SUPPORT MILITARY OPERATIONS ACROSS THE GLOBE!

        The UK is NOT looking to tear up defence pacts with the US and the last time, the Europeans and Canada took lead on a combat mission, Libya, the US had to do the heavy at the start and backfilled all logistics needs.
        Chimo

        Comment


        • #5
          I second WABs-OOE. Tabloid scuttlebutt. Absurd. Disappointed first time poster would post such tripe.
          Last edited by surfgun; 12 Jan 20,, 22:29.

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
            Not really surprising considering that defense spending covers a incredibly diverse range of line items on the budget sheet.
            He's been complaining about countries that were not putting in at least 2% of their GDP into defense

            UK does that

            Comment


            • #7
              If true, Its not the only country looking in other directions.

              https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/201...-seoul-demand/

              he defence ministers of South Korea and China have agreed to develop their security ties to ensure stability in north-east Asia, the latest indication that Washington’s long-standing alliances in the region are fraying.

              On the sidelines of regional security talks in Bangkok on Sunday, Jeong Kyeong-doo, the South Korean minister of defence, and his Chinese counterpart, Wei Fenghe, agreed to set up more military hotlines and to push ahead with a visit by Mr Jeong to China next year to “foster bilateral exchanges and cooperation in defence”, South Korea’s defence ministry said.

              Seoul’s announcement coincided with growing resentment at the $5 billion (£3.9bn) annual fee that Washington is demanding to keep 28,500 US troops in South Korea.

              That figure is a sharp increase from the $923 million that Seoul paid this year, which was an 8 per cent increase on the previous year.

              An editorial in Monday’s edition of The Korea Times warned that the security alliance between the two countries “may fall apart due to Washington’s blatantly excessive demands”.

              Mr Trump has previously threatened to withdraw US troops if his demands are not met, with the editorial accusing the president of regarding the Korea-US mutual defence treaty “as a property deal to make money”.

              The vast majority of Koreans agree, with a recent survey by the Korea Institute for National Reunification showing that 96 per cent of people are opposed to Seoul paying more for the US military presence.

              There is also irritation at the pressure that Washington is applying to the South to make Seoul sign an extension to a three-way agreement on sharing military information with the US and Japan.

              The General Security of Military Information Agreement is due to expire at midnight on November 23 and South Korea insists that it will only agree to an extension if Japan cancels restrictions on exports of chemicals critical to the South’s microchip industry.

              Japan is widely believed to have imposed the restrictions as the latest incident in its troubled relationship with South Korea, which includes the issue of compensation for labourers put to work during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

              The two nations' defence ministers held discussions with Mark Esper, the US defence secretary, at the weekend but hopes that a breakthrough might materialise came to nothing.

              Just days before an agreement designed to protect the allies from North Korean belligerence runs out, Tokyo and Seoul merely reiterated their long-held positions.

              The US demanded in July that Japan pay $8 billion a year to keep 54,000 US military personnel in the country, Foreign Policy reported late last week.

              Tokyo currently contributes $2 billion a year to US military costs in Japan.

              “This kind of demand, not only the exorbitant number, but the way it is being done, could trigger anti-Americanism”, Bruce Klinger, an analyst at the Heritage Foundation think tank, told Foreign Policy.

              “If you weaken alliances, and potentially decrease deterrence and US troop presence, that benefits North Korea, China and Russia, who see the potential for reduced US influence and support for our allies”.

              Daniel Pinkston, a professor of international relations at the Seoul campus of Troy University, was more blunt in his assessment.

              “It’s just extortion”, he told The Telegraph. “It’s little more than a mob boss going around and demanding protection money. The numbers that the US is demanding are politically impossible for Seoul and Tokyo to swallow and that is just fueling resentment."

              Comment


              • #8
                Maybe if they pay us like Saudi Arabia does (Watch the video)

                https://crooksandliars.com/2020/01/t...-about-selling

                Comment


                • #9
                  what all of this is, is -signaling-.

                  yeah, the UK or ROK isn't going to "tear up the relationship" or "reconsider its alliance with the US."

                  what they are saying is that they're pissed off and upset and signaling that maybe they have other options.

                  and over what? the US and UK are in GENERAL agreement about the dangers of Huawei, for instance, while the ROK has already indicated that they're willing to do more burden-sharing.

                  it takes someone of Trump's buffoonery and bullying to get US allies whom are largely content with the US leading the way to do this type of signaling.
                  There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    I don't know what to say about this. Probably due to American snobbery and abuse of priiveledges within the U.K. A sort of "we're friends so I will now see how much advantage of you that I take before you blow your top". They reached that fill line and can't take anymore and want to send 'em home.
                    Hit the grape lethally.

                    Comment

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