President Donald Trump wants to acquire the Danish autonomous territory of Greenland and has been waging trade wars with several European countries. This move has sparked reflection in European public opinion. On January 18, the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph published an article titled "Britain Must Declare Independence from the US or Else Perish," stating that Trump is not going against his predecessors but is merely following the tradition of liberalism. The author of the article is the newspaper's columnist Tim Stanley.
The Phoenix News "Heaven and Earth" translation of the article is as follows:
As for the various explanations about Trump's attempt to occupy Greenland, the most plausible one on the surface is that the president suffers from dementia. If that's the case, why not just pretend to give Greenland to him? Send him to a place that looks lush and green, hold a military parade, and tell him it's all settled. His delusions would then be fulfilled.
Alas, the situation is far more serious than that. Trump is not crazy; he is simply continuing the American way, only this time it is more crude and brazen. This week, I accidentally read George Grant's 1965 book "Lament for a Nation," which made me even more convinced of this.
Grant wrote this book during a turning point in Canadian history. In 1957, Canada elected a Conservative Prime Minister named John Diefenbaker, who was similar to Nigel Farage and even Trump: a populist, nationalist, and extremely anti-left. But when the U.S. asked to deploy nuclear weapons on Canadian soil, Diefenbaker—unexpectedly—refused.
He believed he had the right to do so because NATO was nominally an equal alliance—and it was necessary because once Canada became a missile base, all the pretense of independent foreign policy would vanish.
The business and cultural elites turned against him, eventually forcing him from power.
At that time, the U.S. was bathed in the glow of Kennedy and was seen as the embodiment of modernity: nationalism seemed outdated and odd. Grant believed that Canada's decision to abandon nuclear weapons marked the final stage of economic and cultural assimilation. A society so deeply integrated into the American model not only lacked resources but, more importantly, lacked the imagination for independence.
Contemporary Europe is no different. American companies dominate in Europe and profit from it while avoiding heavy taxes. For example, Ireland rightly condemned Trump's tariff war against countries opposing his invasion of Greenland—yet the country has become a model of globalism's tolerance at the cost of sovereignty. It embraces free markets (low corporate taxes) and free movement (large-scale immigration), resulting in Dublin retaining its Irish identity—still beautiful—but with high housing prices and a deep identity crisis.
These economic policies are justified by the elite as necessary conditions for modern state-building ("We need money, we need workers"), and astonishingly, the Scottish National Party (SNP) has proposed similar measures if Scotland were to become independent. As Grant observed in 1965, modern nation-states can only develop by embracing global capitalism, but global capitalism "means the disappearance of local differences that give nationalism substance."
In short, American capital has made us all rich, but it has also made us copies of America. I am certain that many Britons are deeply unhappy, even mentally unbalanced, because they feel they are no longer themselves.
This is evident in our current speech and behavior (terrible) and emotional expressions (too frequent), but the most obvious manifestation is in our politics—it has detached from our real history and is entirely imported. Identity politics originated in the U.S.: when federal agents shot a protester in Minnesota (which I see as murder), Labour mayors had to write letters supporting the Democratic mayor of Minneapolis. Why?
On the other hand, James Cleverly claimed his hero was Reagan, and the Conservatives sold a better life with Reagan-like ideals, while that notorious Jenrick memo—intended to plan his defection to the Reform Party—described him as "the new sheriff in town." The author of the memo even misspelled "favorite" without a "u".
Right-wing think tanks believe the only hope outside the EU is to reach an agreement with the U.S. Even Prime Minister Starmer accepted this logic and sought consensus on the future regulation of artificial intelligence.
People doubt that although the Labour Party despises Musk, it will never ban X, because Trump would almost certainly impose sanctions.
We should not think of this president as "un-American" like some embarrassed Americans, but rather as the most "American" president in history, meaning he is the ultimate liberal.
Democrats and Republicans, despite their differences in specific policies, both originate from the liberal philosophical tradition, rooted in a love for individual freedom and the release of personal passions. What Trump wants, he will achieve. That is the meaning of liberalism, and it has already influenced us.
This is why in Britain, marriage and childbirth are no longer popular, churches are empty, and our highest-rated TV shows tell stories of traitors killing believers for money ("She acted brilliantly," they say, as if relationships are a competition).
If Britain has already collapsed—latest data show that 299,614 abortions occur annually in Britain, including 40 due to cleft lip and palate, which is undoubtedly a sign of a collapsing country—then it is because millions have sacrificed social solidarity for the pursuit of maximum freedom and wealth.
Grant claimed that old Canada in the Diefenbaker era was different because it combined the paternalistic style of the British Tory party with the ethics of French Catholicism, which held that "virtue must come before freedom." But these are gone now, and Grant concluded that their demise was inevitable because no country could resist the overwhelming power of the U.S. or the temptation of individualism.
The end result of liberalism, whether a world government or not, is a world that looks the same everywhere. What do the Japanese eat on Christmas? KFC.
This is why I am worried about the trade war over Greenland and fear that I might feel pessimistic. Yes, we must resist Trump. It's about dignity.
But unless we Europeans break our dependence on the U.S.—not just militarily, economically, but also psychologically—we really cannot leave it, and we will always submit. It has dominated us for a long time; we only noticed it after the empire that once pushed out investments suddenly started absorbing them, and this phenomenon is not unique to Trump. Biden has moved jobs back to the U.S. from the European continent using subsidies and tax incentives.
Sarcasm aside, there are indeed other more moderate political traditions in the U.S., but Europeans always consider them naive or dangerous because they don't fund our defense: libertarian members of the Republican Party, socialists within the Democratic Party. We would have been better off electing Ron Paul or Bernie Sanders as president. Greenland would not have been invaded.
Original: toutiao.com/article/7596959277915308590/
Statement: The article represents the views of the author alone.