The prime minister has a duty to be candid with the British public about the scale of the global realignment caused by a volatile US president
O
ne foreign policy achievement that Donald Trump prefers not to boast about is his role in helping Mark Carney win last year’s Canadian general election. The incumbent Liberal party faced crushing defeat before Mr Trump threatened to annex Canada. Mr Carney’s candidacy was buoyed up by a patriotic rally against US bullying.
Perhaps because his country has also been coveted by Mr Trump, Mr Carney has given one of the most clear-sighted responses of any democratic leader to the US president’s designs on Greenland. Addressing the World Economic Forum in Davos this week, the Canadian prime minister set out the challenge for countries whose security and prosperity have depended on a global system underwritten by the US.
“The rules-based order is fading,” Mr Carney said, making way for a time of “great-power rivalry”. The change compels “middle powers”, such as Canada, to build new coalitions, invest in security and diversify economic ties. A new multilateral framework must be made from the ruins of the one Mr Trump is vandalising.
