Author Archives: Tom Arms

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 12th July 2026 - 10:30 am

NATO

The NATO summit was a wild diplomatic roller coaster ride. But then, how could it be otherwise with President Donald J. Trump in attendance.

Ankara was another example of his negotiating style: Start with the maximalist position delivered in the loudest and most belligerent style and then gradually back away from that and claim a happy agreement which is probably nowhere near the truth.

Trump arrived demanding Denmark give him Greenland. If the Danes refused, he would withdraw all US troops from Europe. He also said that the US was ending all trade with Spain because of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s refusal to let Trump use American airbases for attacks on Iran, or even to allow him to use Spanish airspace. Finally, he attacked Iranians “as vicious scum” and again criticised NATO allies for refusing to help him in the Middle East.

It didn’t work. Denmark, backed by the rest of the alliance, stood firm on Greenland and the Europeans are turning a deaf ear and blind eye to his rants about Iran. Trump started the war. He can finish it.

Spain is more interesting. US companies have billions invested in Spain and the trade between the two countries runs into billions more. Ending trade is not that simple and is self-defeating. Trump has instructed lawyers to come up with a plan. They will likely come up with some form of selective tariffs, but even that is difficult because of Spain’s membership of the EU.

What Trump achieved in Ankara was more headlines that he thinks made him look good for his MAGA base. What the rest of the Alliance achieved is confirmation that they are right to increase defence spending; become less dependent on American-built weaponry; become politically more independent of America and to continue to work towards becoming a separate Western political pillar supported by their own military-industrial complex.

Ukraine

Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky went to Ankara hoping to buy more American Patriot missile systems. He left with a licence to manufacture them.

For months Donald Trump’s approach to Ukraine has been characterised by pressure on Kyiv. He has attacked Zelensky, paused aid, presented himself as the equidistant honest broker between Russia and Ukraine when he was leaning heavily towards Russia.

Then came Ankara. Trump publicly praised Zelensky. He spoke of his “very good relationship” with the Ukrainian leader. And then…Trump presents Ukraine with the gift of the license to manufacture Patriot air defence missiles in Ukraine.

Ukraine now ceases to be merely a consumer of Western weaponry (although its drone manufacturers were also steering Ukraine towards weapons independence) and becomes a producer of Western weapons. The licence to produce inside Ukraine also means that replacement missiles and components can be manufactured and moved more quickly to the frontline.

The license also represents another step towards integrating Ukraine into the Western defence-industrial base without having to grant it NATO membership.

But why the change in Trump’s policy? Mainly because the gods of war are starting to move to Ukraine’s side. For years, Vladimir Putin had Trump convinced that he was “holding the cards” in the Ukraine war. That there was no way that the Russian steam roller could lose.

Ukraine is not winning. But neither is it losing. The Russians continue to throw waves of suicidal attacks against a seemingly impenetrable Ukrainian frontline. Meanwhile the Ukrainians have started to score points with long-range drone attacks on Russian oil installations and factories.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged 2026 world cup, donald trump and ukraine | 2 Comments

Observations of an Expat: Visions of America

By Tom Arms | Sat 11th July 2026 - 10:25 am

For those who looked carefully, there were two contrasting visions of America at its 250th birthday. Each was presented by a prominent American and could not have been more different.

The first Is Donald Trump’s America First vision. This is an America where immigrants are not only refused entry but are rounded up by armed agents; sent to overcrowded detention camps and deported. It is vision which is viewed through the narrow lens of American nationalism.

The second was rooted in the idea that America has a responsibility beyond its borders—a universal vision which is closely linked to immigration, human dignity and the belief that America’s ideals belong to everyone, not just Americans.

The universalist vision was expounded by another prominent American, Pope Leo XIV. The pope was invited to Washington for the 4th of July celebrations. He declined the invitation. The Vatican has never explained why the pope declined, but some papal observers have speculated that Leo was concerned that his visit would be used for political purposes supporting Donald Trump.

Pope Leo did, however, visit via video link the day before the big day. On July 3rd, he was presented via Zoom link with the Liberty Medal at the National Constitution Centre in Philadelphia. The medal is presented annually to the individual whose “courage and conviction” has done the most to advance the cause of liberty around the world. The centre is strictly non-partisan, and former recipients have included Volodymyr Zelensky and the Dalai Lama

In his acceptance speech, Pope Leo was careful to echo the centre’s non-partisan tradition. He did not criticise the administration. He did not mention Trump’s name. He did not call for open borders. However he did express the hope that America would remain “ever true to the dream that has earned it the title of land of the free and home of the brave.”

He also praised the Declaration of Independence whose ideals he hoped would remain “a guiding light for the present moment and for the years to come.” Finally, the pope said that America had become a “byword for freedom” because of the way the country had welcomed successive generations. And he urged Americans to remain faithful to that tradition.”

Posted in Op-eds | 4 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 5th July 2026 - 9:15 am

July 4th

America is so divided that it cannot even decide how best to celebrate the country’s 250th birthday.

Ten years ago Congress set up a bipartisan committee to organise America’s 250th birthday celebrations. The committee- which was called America 250—would have a budget of $100 million.

But almost as soon as he started his second term, Trump, decided to set up a rival organisation which he called Freedom 250. It was part of his anti-woke, anti-DEI and white nationalist campaign. Trump did not like the way America 250 told the American story. The bipartisan committee focused on the story of achievement but at the same time acknowledged failures and contradictions.

Freedom 250, on the other hand, presents American history as an inspirational story of exceptionalism, patriotism and national greatness. Naturally, white men dominate.

The events that Freedom 250 organised were typically Trumpian: a NASCAR race in Washington; The UFC cage fight in front of the White House, athletic games, military displays and a “Great American State Fair” on the Mall which stretches from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial. At midnight on July 4, Freedom 250 will set off “the largest firework display in history.”

Trump’s plans have run into difficulties. The UFC fight was roundly condemned. The numbers attending the Great American State Fair are significantly lower than expected and a number of singers who were expected to perform have backed out when they realised that the president was behind the event.

Trump says he is not concerned about the cancelled artistes. Instead of singers he intends to “give the longest speech I have ever given.”

Meanwhile, America 250 is struggling to pay the bills. Only $25 million of the promised $100 million has materialised. Much of it is believed to have been redirected on Trump’s orders to the Freedom 250 account. Democrat Congressman have pledged to investigate.

NATO

Trump flies from the July 4 celebrations to Ankara for what has been billed as “one of the most consequential NATO summits” in the alliance’s history.

Reports suggest that the American president intends to arrive with both guns blazing; one of them aimed at the defence spending of his allies and the other at their refusal to become involved in the Iran War. “They weren’t there for us!!!” Trump recently wrote on his Truth Social platform. In Trump’s playbook, alliances are reciprocal.

The president’s long-term aim is probably not all that different from that of the Europeans and Canadians. He envisages an alliance where the US remains the primary nuclear guarantor. America would also provide strategic lift, intelligence and high-end capabilities. The Europeans would pay for and field the bulk of the conventional forces in Europe so that the US can concentrate on China.

Posted in News | Tagged NATO | 2 Comments

Observations of an Expat: I am an Immigrant

By Tom Arms | Sat 4th July 2026 - 10:03 am

I am an immigrant. I emigrated from the United States to the United Kingdom on the 12th of December 1971.

I had studied for a year in Britain 18 months before and fell in love with the country and one of its citizens and moved back despite the dreary weather and traffic jams.

I did not flee a Middle Eastern War. I did not turf up at Heathrow claiming political persecution. I did not risk my life to cross the English Channel in freezing weather. Nor was I fleeing from poverty or conflict. In fact, if I had stayed in America I would probably be enjoying a comfortable country club existence.

Nevertheless, I feel an affinity with African, Asian, Hispanic, or any person from any race or country who left their homeland to seek a new life. It is not easy to leave the safety net of cultural familiarity, family and friends.

If you are born to a country your acceptance is automatic. As an immigrant you have to constantly prove your worth and justify your decision to uproot your entire life and start afresh. At the end of the day, you, more than a native-born person must feel that you have contributed something.

I feel I have succeeded. I started an international news agency which launched the careers of well over a hundred journalists. My children are all a credit to me as are the 200 boys—many of them now young men– who have passed through my scout group over the past 25 years.

I am not boasting. In fact, I don’t regard myself as particularly unusual. Immigrants in every country have outstanding records of contributing to their adopted homelands.

Think about it. By their very nature immigrants have proven through their actions that they are risk takers. They are adventurers. They are focused, determined and prepared to work hard to achieve their aims. Such people are assets to any community lucky enough to have them.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged immigration | 13 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 28th June 2026 - 8:55 am

Donald Trump

Trump is all about revenge. Just ask James Comey and others who failed to jump when the master called.

Secretary of Defence/War Pete Hegseth echoes the presidential instincts, and he has made it clear that the president is angry that Europeans did not fly to his aid in Iran when he wanted in the way that he wanted.

Hegseth added that if Europeans fail to support American operations, then they cannot assume that America will continue stationing tens of thousands of troops on their soil.

Hegseth’s threat follows the comment from Secretary of State Marco Rubio that the forthcoming NATO heads of government summit in Ankara on July 6-7 could be the “most consequential” in the Alliance’s history.

Put together, it is easy to conclude that the president might be planning to use the summit to announce long-anticipated significant withdrawals of US troops in Europe.

There are more than 62,000 US troops based in Europe. They do more than provide a first line of defence against conventional attack from the East. They are 62,000 free-spending Yanks who support tens of thousands of jobs. Many local economies are dependent on American troops.

And that is how Hegseth and Trump view the presence of US forces in Europe. Primarily in transactional terms involving the expenditure of US dollars outside American borders.

There is, however, much, much more involved in their presence. US troops in Europe have enabled America to project military and political power on a global scale. That projection has in turned produced trillions of dollars for the American GDP.

The 10,000 American airmen in England’s East Anglia are the backbone of the unsinkable aircraft carrier off the coast of Europe. The US base at Naples is the command centre for its Mediterranean fleet. Ramstein Airbase in Germany is a major medical evacuation centre as well as the command headquarters for operations in Africa and the Middle East.

Trump’s instinct is for revenge. But like many instincts, it is self-defeating.

The atemoya

An obscure tropical fruit has become the latest proxy in the Cold War between Taiwan and China. The atemoya, a sweet hybrid of the sugar apple and cherimoya, is at the centre of an economic and political battle that has little to do with agriculture and everything to do with sovereignty.

The atemoya originated in Florida in 1908 as a cross between the sugar apple and the cherimoya. Heart-shaped it has a pale-green skin with knobbly segments and poisonous black seeds.

But it is the inside that counts. The meat of the fruit has been described as a mixture of pineapple, pear, strawberry, vanilla and coconut. One agronomist referred to it as “the pina colada of the fruit world.”

Even better than the fruit’s taste is the price that it commands. The average export price of the atemoya is $3.16 a kilo and a single fruit can weigh over a kilo.

Some of the world’s best growing conditions for the atemoya can be found in Taiwan’s Taitung County, a mountainous agricultural region. Before 2021, farmers made an exceptionally good living out of exporting 80-90 percent of their atemoya crop to mainland China. Then disaster struck.

Beijing suddenly banned all imports of the “green gold” of the fruit world, claiming that it had become infected with the Pacific mealybug. Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) denounced the claim as a politically motivated protest.

Taiwan’s atemoya growers faced financial ruin and just barely survived the crisis with a combination of government subsidies and a diversification into the Japanese and South Korean markets and processed foods.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged china, iran, taiwan and US troops | 1 Comment

Observations of an Expat: Gaza

By Tom Arms | Sat 27th June 2026 - 10:33 am

While the world’s attention has been fixed on Iran, Lebanon and the Strait of Hormuz, Gaza has quietly slipped from the headlines. That is unfortunate, because the territory is settling into a dangerous and potentially permanent limbo.

Except for the occasional exchange of fire, fighting between Hamas and the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) has stopped. What has replaced conflict is an armed truce with a deep mutual distrust preventing any progress on last autumn’s peace plan.

The IDF still occupies more than 60 percent of Gaza with orders from Benjamin Netanyahu to increase that slice to 70 percent. The two million Gazans are crowded into a tent city on the beaches in the 30 percent which remains in Palestinian hands. There is chronic unemployment and the Gazans are totally dependent on aid for their survival.

The IDF occupation was—still is—billed as “temporary security buffers.” Nine months later, however, the ‘temporary’ zones contain fortified bases, permanent roads for armour, observation posts, logistics hubs and cleared fields of fire. They increasingly resemble the infrastructure of a long-term military occupation.

The IDF was meant to hand over control to a 20,000-strong International Stabilisation Force (ISF) which would oversee the final disarmament of Hamas and the training of a Palestinian Police. So far only 200 American soldiers have turned up, and they don’t appear to have a role. Several countries have been approached to contribute to the ISF, but all are frightened at being caught in the middle of an Israeli-Hamas crossfire.

The 15-member team of Palestinian technocrats who are supposed to run Gaza until elections can be organised has been appointed. It even has a chairman, former Palestinian Authority official Dr Ali Sha-ath. But the committee has yet to leave Cairo. They refuse to enter Gaza until the security situation improves. In their absence, Hamas continues to exercise political control.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged gaza | 2 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 21st June 2026 - 11:10 am

Iran

The Iran War has forced American motorists to reconsider long road trips. At the same time a farmer in Kenya is facing a drastic drop in his $2,200 income and a Sri Lankan construction worker in Dubai is worrying about how his wife and children would survive without his remittances. The Iran War has been little more than an inconvenience for most people in the West. For those in the developing world it was—still is – a matter of life and death.

The people in the developing world were already reeling from the effects of cuts in foreign aid, the covid pandemic and the Ukraine War before the Iran War closed the Strait of Hormuz.

Petrol prices rose by as much as 50 percent in the US. They rose by the same amount in Kenya. The difference is that the average household income in America is $80,000. In Kenya it is $2,200.

East Africa imports about 25 percent of its fertiliser supplies from the Gulf region. The start of the Iran War coincided with the start of the planting season. If a farmer is unable to afford fertiliser than he buys less. This means lower farm incomes, higher maize prices, higher prices for animal feed, higher meat and milk prices. Greater food insecurity.

In the United States, agriculture contributes approximately one percent to the country’s GDP. In East Africa it contributes about a quarter and employs half of the population. Roughly 70 percent of Africa’s 1.5 billion people are directly or indirectly employed in agriculture.

Remittances to developing countries are also suffering. The Gulf countries are not known for their enlightened labour practices. In fact, for many migrant workers, conditions have been described as akin to “modern slavery.”

Millions, however, leave their families in Africa and South Asia to live up to ten in a room while working on construction sites in the Gulf region. When the bombs started to fall many of those workers were laid off. For countries such as Nepal—where 25 percent of the economy is remittances—this meant financial ruin.

Families from Mombasa to Kathmandu suddenly faced the cruel arithmetic of paying more food and fuel with less money arriving from sons and daughters working in Dubai or Riyadh.

Americans and the rest of the world

Americans often struggle to understand the rest of the world. That is an over-generalisation. America has produced some of the world’s finest experts on China, Russia, Britain and the Middle East. But the average American has little need to look beyond his own borders.

Why should he? America spans a continent. It possesses almost every climate, every landscape and nearly every natural resource. Its entertainment industry dominates the globe. Most Americans spend their lives without needing another language and only about one in five owns a passport.

That self-sufficiency has bred a certain assumption: that what works in America should work everywhere. It is not unique. The British Empire convinced itself that imperial rule brought civilisation. Vladimir Putin appears to have believed that Ukrainians would greet Russian tanks with flowers. Great powers have always had a tendency to mistake their own preferences for universal truths.

The tragedy is that military and economic power can reinforce this misconception. If you are powerful enough, people often tell you what you want to hear. Success breeds confidence. Confidence breeds hubris.

Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan and now Iran all share a common thread. Again and again, Washington has assumed that superior force could overcome history, culture and nationalism. Again and again, it has discovered that people usually prefer imperfect governments of their own choosing to enlightened rulers imposed from outside.

America’s problem is not that it is uniquely arrogant. It is that, like every great power before it, it has become convinced that its own experience is universal.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged iran and north korea | 3 Comments

Observations of an Expat: Surviving Iran

By Tom Arms | Sat 20th June 2026 - 9:23 am

America will survive the Iran War. It has survived worse. Israel may not be so fortunate. Superpowers can afford mistakes. Small countries living in dangerous neighbourhoods cannot.

People have been predicting the decline of American power since Vietnam. America lost in Vietnam, failed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and suffered humiliation in Somalia. Yet the United States remains the world’s dominant military and financial power. Superpowers can absorb defeats. They possess strategic depth.

Of course, the same may not be said about individual politicians. Donald Trump has been seriously weakened inside and outside MAGA world. So have the Republican politicians who have hitched themselves to the Trumpian star.

But in the case of Israel, there is more at stake than a few right-wing security-minded politician. Israel is a country of fewer than ten million in a hostile region. Its security rests on three pillars: military superiority, American support and deterrence—the belief among its enemies that resistance is futile.

If the Iran War has weakened any of those pillars, the consequences for Israel are potentially much greater than for the United States. America’s allies may doubt Washington’s judgment, but they are unlikely to abandon the dollar or NATO. Israel, by contrast faces increased diplomatic isolation; reduced confidence in US support; strengthened adversaries convinced that Israel’s power has limits; domestic political divisions and—most important of all—the end of the aura of invincibility that has been central to Israeli strategy since 1967.

In Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu thought he had found a kindred spirit who believed in solving problems through the barrel of a gun with a few dollars thrown in for good measure. In Gaza he humbled Hamas with American help. It cost 73,000 Palestinian lives and a great deal of international support. Americans, for the first time, began to question their unquestioning support for Israel.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged benjamin netanyahu, donald trump, iran and israel | 6 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 7th June 2026 - 10:04 am

AI

Sitting next to Pope Leo XIV when he launched his controversial encyclical on AI was Chris Olah—co-founder of the AI company Anthropic.

His presence was no accident. The Pope’s 235 page “Magnifica Humanitas” calls for regulation of technology to protect the dignity of humankind.

Olah’s position is the same and he has made a name for himself by refusing to allow the Trump Administration to use Anthropic for military and intelligence purposes.

Olah is on one side of a technologically-driven political divide in Silicon Valley. On the other side are figures such as Marc Andreesen, who has been involved with many of the tech industry’s leading brands and Peter Thiel, CEO of the AI company Palantir.

Thiel and Andreesen far-right libertarians who want to avoid regulation. They see technological development as essential and that the controllers of technology should also control the politics for the benefit of all. Both men are big contributors to Donald Trump and conservative causes.

The debate goes beyond Silicon Valley to the international political stage. The Trump Administration big concern is winning the AI race with China. Donald Trump recently signed an Executive Order allow government oversight to prevent cyber-attacks. But he did so reluctantly. He wants to keep regulation to a minimum; encourage private investment in AI and then use the product as an instrument of national power.

The EU wants AI to grow. It wants investment in European AI companies but they view government’s role as a partner and referee rather than spectator.

To put it simply: Trump wants to win the race. Brussels—and the pope-want to control AI. Britain wants to win the race safely.

The difficulty for Britain is that middle positions become harder to maintain as technologies mature. During the early nuclear age, Britain initially tried to bridge Washington and continental Europe. Eventually it had to choose where to place its strategic weight.

AI may force a similar decision. If the next decade brings increasingly powerful AI systems, the central geopolitical question may not be US versus China but whether the Western world adopts the American model of strategic competition or the European model of precautionary governance

Donald Trump and the liberal consensus

The Trump administration has always been an alliance of groups and people that oppose the so-called liberal consensus: the idea that the U.S. government should regulate business, provide social welfare programs, promote infrastructure projects, protect civil rights, and support a rules-based international order.

Since the 1980s Republicans accepted many of the institutional pillars of the post-war order—especially free trade, alliances and global leadership—even while seeking to reduce regulation and constrain the growth of government.

Trump upended that system, promising to dismantle the federal government built around the liberal consensus, the government his voters thought they hated because they thought its protection of equality before the law gave Black Americans, Brown Americans, women, and gender or religious minorities a leg up on white Christian men.

This racist lobby combined with a growing number concerned about immigration, cultural change, distrust of elites, de-industrialisation and globalisation. Or they thought funding for science wasted their money on the research that right-wing influencers mocked for wasting their money and intruding on their freedom. Or they thought the U.S. contribution to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and U.S. participation in alliances did not put “America First.”

In 2024, Trump cobbled together enough groups who thought that way to win the White House, and as soon as he took power, he set out to destroy the liberal consensus government with the help of loyalists he installed in key positions.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged AI, donald trump and iran war | 1 Comment

Observations of an Expat: NATO Irony

By Tom Arms | Sat 6th June 2026 - 8:58 am

Marco Rubio says the next month’s NATO summit will be one of the most consequential in history. He is right—but not for the reasons he imagines.

President Trump has spent years demanding that Europe take responsibility for its own defence. The Europeans have finally agreed. The problem is that they have also concluded that they cannot rely entirely on Washington.

That realisation is likely to dominate the summit. The immediate result will be more defence spending. The long-term result may be the emergence of a European military-industrial complex capable of challenging America’s dominance of the global arms market.

If so, future historians may conclude that Donald Trump did more than persuade Europe to rearm. He persuaded it to compete.

It will not be a happy group when the 32 NATO leaders gather in Ankara on 7-8 July. The 30 European members are still angry about Donald Trump’s designs on Greenland; statements about “European civilisational decline” and his failure to consult allies before starting a war with Iran. Trump is angry that Denmark won’t handover Greenland; NATO restrictions on US airbases during the Iran War and the Alliance’s failure to join the Israeli-American war on Iran.

But at the top of the agenda will be the Ukraine War and European re-armament. The Trump Administration has successfully shifted the cost of arming Ukraine from American to European shoulders with the PURL (Prioritised Ukrainian Requirements List) programme. Trump plus the Ukraine War and the growing Russian threat has prompted Europe that it needs more weapons now. It takes time to build the factories and shipyards to make them so they are by buying more from America.

The Russian threat is bonanza for the US defence industry. Between 2021 and 2015 European arms imports increased 217 percent over the previous five-year period. The estimated amount is $220 billion. European NATO is rushing to fill its defence gaps with off-the-shelf F-35s, Patriot Missile Systems, HIMARS, Apache helicopters and munitions.

But while shelling out billions to America, Europeans are also building the factories and shipyards that will build the weapons that will in the long-term replace American imports.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged donald trump and NATO | 9 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 31st May 2026 - 9:30 am

Cuba

A $100 million would go a long way to alleviate the humanitarian crisis caused by the US blockade of Cuba.

The island’s communist government has already made big concessions on the economic front in an attempt to appease the Trump Administration.

It has legalised small and medium-sized private businesses; abolished Cuba’s dual currency; opened more than 2,000 additional occupations to private initiative and allowed exiled Cubans to invest in the island’s economy.

On the political front they have been less forthcoming. Only a handful of political prisoners have been released and there is no sign of the regime introducing freedom of expression or a reform of its judicial system.

There is also the additional problem of who distributes the aid should it be released. Havana says it will handle the distribution through established government channels. Washington says those channels are corrupt and the money must be distributed by the Catholic church.

Finally, there is the question of whether the $100 million carrot is a mere ruse. That the Trump Administration will settle for nothing less than complete regime change; the dismantlement of Cuba’s socialist state and the return to pre-1959 style American domination of the Caribbean island.

To achieve that, Washington may just have to invade the island. They increasingly appear prepared to do just that. The aircraft carrier USS Nimitz has been parked in the Caribbean. The Cuban president, 94-year-old Raul Castro, has been indicted for murder.

And finally, Cuban-American Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that the military option is more likely than the diplomatic.

Israel

Benjamin Netanyahu has proven himself a tough man. Since the October 7 attacks he has launched wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran, to say nothing of the continuing turmoil in the West Bank. Few Israeli leaders have confronted so many enemies on so many fronts.

But toughness alone will not win the forthcoming election. Opinion polls show his approval ratings at between 40 and 47 percent and Likud is trailing a coalition opposition. If Netanyahu is to survive politically, he must prove not only that he can start wars, but that he can end them—and win them.

In Gaza Hamas has been badly damaged but not destroyed. This week the government ordered the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to increase their occupation from 64 percent of the territory to 70 percent. Yet despite repeated declarations of imminent victory from both Jerusalem and Washington, there remains no clear political settlement and no obvious answer to the question of what happens to Gaza when the fighting finally ends.

The ceasefire in Lebanon is meant to be an integral element in the ceasefire in the Iran War. Yet Israel continues to fire missiles into Lebanon and has moved ground forces into the southern part of the country to create a security zone. Netanyahu says he sees no reason to “take his foot off the pedal.” For many Israelis, a security zone may look like a military necessity. For others, it looks suspiciously like another open-ended commitment.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged cuba, india and israel | 1 Comment

Observations of an Expat: The Elephant Returns

By Tom Arms | Sat 30th May 2026 - 9:24 am

For several years the Brexit elephant sat quietly in a corner of Westminster, ignored by politicians who hoped it would eventually wander away. Instead, it has stood up, stretched its legs and begun stomping through the corridors of power once again.

“Rejoin,” Brexit was a “catastrophic mistake,” declared wannabe prime minister Wes Streeting.

Not so fast, said other main contender Andy Burnham, he hoped Britain would rejoin “in my lifetime” (Burnham is 56), but feared that any sudden rush to rejoin would further divide an already divided country.

Former PM Tony Blair then entered the fray with his 6,000-word essay. The former staunch Remainer opposed a quick application to return to the European fold. Instead, Britain should concentrate on rebuilding its economy and repairing relations with Brussels.

The Liberal Democrats remain the most pro-European party. But even they are focused more on a gradual progression—a return to the Customs Union by the end of this decade and practical moves towards deeper cooperation and integration.

The Conservatives, Reform and the new far-right party Restore, are simply against anything that smacks of improved relations with Brussels.

But what about the Europeans? They opposed Britain leaving, but they do they want Britain back?

In many respects, Britain is quite a catch for the EU, especially as the Ukraine War and the rise of China has forced it to focus increasingly on security issues. Britain has Europe’s largest navy with 450,000 tons under the Union Jack. France is just behind but current UK defense plans will put it well ahead by 2040.

Then there is the fact that Britain is a nuclear power. President Emmanuel Macron has talked about extending the French nuclear umbrella to other European countries. Such pledges would be more effective if they included the British deterrent.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged brexit, european union and featured | 13 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 24th May 2026 - 10:23 am

The Thucydides Trap

There has been much talk recently about the “Thucydides Trap”. China’s President Xi Jinping is reported to have warned Donald Trump during his recent trip to Beijing that China and America were heading straight for the “Thucydides Trap.”

So what is it? It is a term coined by the diplomatic historian Graham Alison in his book “Destined for War.” Allison uses Thucydides’ history of the disastrous Peloponnesian War between Sparta (the established power) and Athens (the rising power) to argue that when one power becomes to challenge the hegemony of an existing power then war is inevitable.

It is not quite. In the 1920s the American military was drawing up plans for a war against Britain. The plan was called War Red. The plan involved a major land invasion across the border into Canada and a naval attack on British colonies in the Caribbean.

Britain had a counter-attack plan, but its plan was not as comprehensive. Fairly early on it realised that its war-ravaged economy could not win a war against the rising American industrial giant. There were other important factors. These included the two countries’ shared experience of World War I. There was also the fact that a 300-year-old shared cultural experience and perspective outweighed the competitive aspects of the relationship. The British increasingly saw themselves as the Greeks to America’s Rome, as Harold Macmillan later put it.

“War Plan Red was one of the rare cases where strategic rivalry did not culminate in war. Alison gives 12 examples of how countries became victims of the Thucydides Trap. They include the Crusades, the Franco-Prussian War, World War One and World War Two. War Red is listed—along with three others—as the exceptions that prove the rule.

Cultural links ensured that War Red did not become a disastrous reality. But China and America lack the deep cultural, linguistic and historical ties that softened the transfer of power from Britain to the United States.

Ebola

Ebola is a terrible disease. It attacks your internal organs. You bleed from the inside out. Death is painful and quick.

In much of Africa it is customary to wash the bodies of corpses before burial. The practice can be fatal as the disease is spread through contact with infected bodily fluids. They remain contagious long after death.

In the last outbreak, 2014-2016, 11,300 people died. The epidemic was contained to West Africa because Britain and America flooded the region with health workers and soldiers. The UK committed more than $500 million to fight the epidemic. America sent 3,000 people to fight the disease.

It worked. The doctors and nurses won. Not only that but systems were put in place to effectively detect and fight any further outbreaks. Then came Trump in America and Boris Johnson in Britain. Aid budgets were slashed. Three thousand staff were cut from America’s Centre for Disease Control. The biggest axe fell on the departments involved in fighting overseas epidemics. The situation was almost as bad in Britain.

The epidemic fighting network that was established a decade ago was badly weakened. Especially hard hit were the surveillance systems which are designed to detect the first signs of the disease, contain it and treat it. Britain has so far committed only $30 million to fighting the latest outbreak. America has made promises but little has materialised. Oxfam says that coordination meetings now produce “blank stares” when money is requested.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged china, donald trump and ebola | 7 Comments

Observations of an expat: Dangerous diplomatic chess

By Tom Arms | Sat 23rd May 2026 - 10:15 am

In the wake of his Beijing sojourn, Donald Trump is embarking on a dangerous and complex game of diplomatic chess with Taiwan as the piece most likely to be sacrificed for the greater American good.

While in China, Trump became convinced what the rest of the world has known for some time. China cannot be bullied. Threats of escalating tariffs and civilisational extinction just roll off the Chinese political back. They have been around a long time and have seen it all.

Next, China is as much of a superpower as the United States. And, if he is going to avoid an Armageddon-like nuclear war, he has to learn to live on the same planet with Beijing instead of baiting and containing it.

Finally, the American president is almost certainly convinced that Xi Jinping is sincere when he says that China wants Taiwan and any American attempt to block a Chinese takeover could easily lead to a Sino-American “clashes and even conflict.”

The three-way dilemma of China-US-Taiwan dates back to before President Nixon’s historic visit to China. It has been resolved with the famous “strategic ambiguity” which was designed to deter war by making the Chinese uncertain about US intervention.

Trump doesn’t do ambiguity. He does transactions. The Taiwan issue presents him with an opportunity to use his much-hyped negotiating skills to pull off one of the great transactions of all time. A tempting prospect which ego would find difficult to resist.

But with whom and how?

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged china and donald trump | 2 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 10th May 2026 - 8:52 am

In a fit of pique Donald Trump announced that he was withdrawing 5,000 troops from Germany. He also said that he was considering pulling soldiers out of Italy and Spain.

Why these three countries? Because their leaders had the temerity to criticise the US president.

Trump is cutting off Uncle Sam’s face to spite his nose while shooting him in the foot. In short, it is a stupid move. America needs Europe. For a start. Europe is the largest financial pillar outside the United States supporting the US defense industry—it spends more than $100 billion a year. And the US defense industry is five percent of America’s GDP.

American bases in Europe also enable the US to project power throughout Eurasia, Africa, the Middle East and the western end of the Indo-Pacific region. It has bases in Britain, Germany, the Baltic countries, Poland, Spain, Italy and even Greenland.

The US bases enable the Pentagon to pre-position equipment and fuel for rapid deployments; provide some of the world’s finest hospitals; repair centres; intelligence; command centres and deployment infrastructure. Europe is the foundational stone that makes global power projection possible.

Trump’s recently published National Security Strategy focused on “civilisational decline” in Europe and the need to focus on the Western Hemisphere. But it also said that Europe would “remain as a platform for US global operations.”

Given the above, it should follow that the US president should learn to be nicer to the people he needs.

Trump is off to China next week. To be exact, he is in Beijing next Thursday and Friday for talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

At the moment the US and China are in the middle of a trade truce. That is because the trade war that Trump launched last April proved disastrous to both countries. Trump raised tariffs to over 100 percent. China immediately cut off America’s access to the rare earth minerals. Trump retaliated by reducing Chinese access to American technology and financial instruments. The result was a Mexican stand-off.

Both sides backed away, lowered tariffs and resumed access to products. But the spate left a bad taste in the mouths of both leaders. They think that Sino-American cooperation will only benefit the other. In fact, the only thing keeping Trump and Xi talking to each other is the fear of the economic damage each can inflict on each other’s country.

This will upset US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent who has spent the first part of this year negotiated a set of trade deals which he hopes will be signed in Beijing. According to diplomatic sources, it is more likely that the best result will be a pair of fixed smiles and a handshake.

May should be an interesting diplomatic month for India. It will have to perform a delicate balancing act between the American-dominated West and the Chinese-dominated East and South.

Posted in Europe / International and Op-eds | Tagged tom arms world review | 3 Comments

Observations of an ex-pat: War’s end?

By Tom Arms | Sat 9th May 2026 - 12:17 pm

The Gulf region is on the cusp of peace. That is according to President Donald Trump who issues more lies and obfuscations than my dog Bear barks in any given day.

Having said that, both Axios and Reuters report that there is now a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which indicates Iranian willingness to discuss suspending uranium enrichment, a partial lifting of US sanctions against Iran and unfreezing of assets and some sort of return to normality in the Strait of Hormuz.

It should be stressed, however, that an MOU is not a peace deal. It is merely an agreement on talking points.

But According to Trump the MOU was enough for him to suspend “Operation Freedom”—a major US naval effort to throw a “red, white and blue protective umbrella” over shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. Wrong. The real reason for its suspension was the Saudis fear that Iran would fire on the protective convoy. The convoy would fire back. Trump would order renewed missile attacks, and the war would again spread throughout the Gulf.

Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff may be the two Americans meeting with Iranian (and/or Pakistani) officials in Geneva and Islamabad, but behind the scenes America’s junior partners in the Iran War are calling at least some of the shots. These are Israel, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE.

Israel is more like full partner than junior partner. Its Government is certainly the most hawkish. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu played a key role in dragging Trump into the Iran War and according to him is in “almost daily contact” with the president. The Israeli security establishment views Iran as an “existential threat” to Israel. It wants to overthrow the theocratic regime and replace it with a pro-Israeli secular government that will end support for Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen.

Netanyahu has the support of Israeli public opinion. It is starting to drop, but is still pro-war. At the start of March, 80 percent of Israelis supported the war. This had dropped to 54 percent by the end of April. 61 percent are opposed to the ceasefire.

Another factor in Israeli thinking is that they are totally unaffected by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. None of their energy or fertiliser supplies come from the Gulf Region.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged observations of an ex pat | 4 Comments

Tom Arm’s World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 3rd May 2026 - 9:46 am

Ukraine

Robots are the future face of war. And Ukraine’s dominance in the production of drones and unmanned boats and ground vehicles means that it is well on its way to becoming a defense industry superpower.

Drone production is up from 800,000 a year three years ago to seven million in 2025. They enjoy a three to one advantage over the Russians over the top of the range First Person View (FPV) drones. These are drones fitted with a camera which allows the operator to see in real time everything the drone sees. Ukraine is also producing 1,000 fixed wing drones a day. These can travel up to 1,500 miles into Russian territory.

Ukraine’s success with unmanned boats and submarines has given it dominance in the Black Sea. But its latest success has been with a variety of Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs). They are used primarily to deliver supplies to front line troops, but they have also been used to lay mines and rescue soldiers trapped behind enemy lines. The latest versions are also used as launching pads for armed drones.

Ukraine has 2,500 companies involved in the development and production of drones and unmanned vehicles which, according to President Volodomyr Zelensky, have conducted 22,000 missions in the first three months of this year.

Russia is, of course, also stepping up production of drones and unmanned vehicles. Early in the war Moscow had the advantage. But Ukraine adopted an entrepreneurial approach to production which has overtaken and streaked ahead of Russian manufacturing whose rigid production base is heavily centralised Soviet-style.

Which brings us to Ukraine’s future as a defense industry superpower. Most of the country’s unmanned weaponry is fully utilised fighting the Russian behemoth. But Ukrainians are starting to sell to other countries a limited surplus and—more importantly their expertise– to help pay for the war. And when the fighting finally stops, Ukraine’s lead in the field will play a major part in financing the country’s reconstruction.

Recently President Volodomyr Zelensky made an unscheduled trip to the United Arab Emirates to talk to them about drone defenses for protection against Iranian missiles. The Gulf States are already well-equipped with American-made Patriot missiles and THAAD (The High-Altitude Air Defense) systems. But these cost up to a $1million per fired missiles whereas Ukrainian drones range from $2,500 to $25,000.

So far Kyiv has concluded deals—or is the final stages of negotiations with the following countries: Germany, Britain, Norway, the Netherlands, Romania, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Japan, Turkey, Azerbaijan and Syria. Defense experts estimate that sales of equipment and know could be worth $8billion this year, rising to $22 billion-plus in 2028. This means a substantial contribution to Ukraine’s defense budget of $80 billion. However, it is a drop in the ocean when one considers the estimated $500 billion in reconstruction costs.

The success of Ukraine’s drone industry has a wider financial impact than immediate cash revenue. It enables the country to project itself as an industrial power for decades to come which improves its ability to borrow on the international bond markets to pay for both the war and reconstruction.

The King and Trump

One does not discuss private conversations with the monarch. That is the convention—in fact, the rule—when talking with the British king.

There is an exceptionally good reason for this rule/convention. The king must be seen to be above politics. He must be to appoint prime ministers based on the wishes of the electorate rather than his own personal prejudices.

That does not mean that the king cannot discuss politics with politicians. And because he has been involved at the top end of the political process his entire life, he is well-placed to give advice. And he does. To political leaders around the world. He just does it PRIVATELY.

That is why eyebrows were raised when Trump revealed the contents of a private Oval Office conversation with King Charles when he told the world that the king is opposed to Iran having nuclear weapons. “Even more than I do,” he quipped.

The president’s comment was no great revelation. Of course, King Charles III is opposed to nuclear proliferation as Buckingham Palace made clear with a slightly raised eyebrow. That is the British government position, and the king supports the government of the day.

The king’s views on the subject are less important than the fact that – once again—Donald Trump has proven that he cannot be trusted to abide by the normal rules and conventions.

Iran

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged donald trump, iran, King Charles III and ukraine | 2 Comments

Observations of an Expat: Special Relationship

By Tom Arms | Sat 2nd May 2026 - 9:39 am

The phrase “Special Relationship” was coined by Winston Churchill in postwar triumph. It survives today in strain.

The call for Britain and America to continue their wartime alliance was a clarion call to defend against Soviet aggression.

It worked. The West won the Cold War and in the post-Cold War years the two countries have seen advantage – Britain more than the US—in continuing to cooperate in military and intelligence matters to counter terrorism and rogue states such as Afghanistan.

Of course, over 80 years, the “Special Relationship” has had its ups and downs. At the moment, it is having a serious down. King Charles’s successful visit has done little more than apply a sticking plaster to the widening transatlantic gulf.

However, the ties between Britain and the United States are more than political. As I make clear in my book “America Made in Britain” (note subtle plug), they cover the entire gamut of human relations and include language, trade, finance, philosophy, religion, law, sport, theatre, publishing…. The fact is that the two countries are joined at the historical hip and not even Donald Trump or JD Vance can change the past.

The political, military and intelligence ties that politicians call “The Special Relationship” would not be possible without our shared history.

Let us start with the law—the bedrock on which every nation is built. Every American state’s legal system is based on English common law. There is one exception—Louisiana’s French history means its legal system is based on the French. The federal courts and the Supreme Court use English common law and regularly refer to the Magna Carta medieval English court cases in their judgements.

Almost all the major American religious organisations—Methodists, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Quakers, Unitarians, Congregationalists, and Baptists—started in Britain before crossing the Atlantic. Roman Catholics secured their foothold in Maryland which was designated as a haven for Britain’s Catholics.

Britain and America are each other’s biggest foreign investor. American investment in Britain is $900 billion and creates 1.6 million jobs. Britain has $800 billion invested in the US and creates 1.4 million jobs.

America’s Declaration of Independence and constitution are the political expression of the English Age of Enlightenment. Sir Isaac Newton laid the foundations of the enlightenment in his 1687 “Principia” when he shifted the balance of society so that it was no longer based on faith and belief but on scientific observation and logically determined mathematical formulae.

Newton was followed in 1698 by John Locke who echoed the future words of Thomas Jefferson when he wrote in his “Two Treatises of Government that under “natural law” all people have the right to “life, liberty and property.” He further argued that that the governed have the right to overthrow incompetent rulers.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged special relationship | 22 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 26th April 2026 - 10:30 am

United States

Mid-term election fever is starting to grip America. And it comes at a time when American’s trust in their electoral system – the cornerstone of any democratic state – is plummeting.

It is still six months before Americans troop to the polls to elect a third of their senators and all the members of the House of Representatives. But the candidates are busy at the hustings. This is mainly because American elections are a two-stage affair. Stage one the parties vote to decide who will be their candidate and in stage two the winners of the “primaries” compete for the main prize.

But will the elections be free and fair? Only 20 percent of Republicans think they will be, 25 percent of Democrats and 22 percent of Independents.

For this lack of trust, we can thank the current resident of the White House. His never-ending allegation that the 2020 presidential elections were stolen and claims that the current mid-term elections are likely to suffer the same fate have encouraged his MAGA base—and others to deny the veracity of any election result.

Actually, polls show that distrust in Americans started at the turn of the century with the Gore v. Bush presidential election. It recovered under Obama but then took a major beating when Trump came along. Basically, his assertion is that it is inconceivable that people would vote against him. Therefore, it is impossible for Donald Trump – or anyone he supports – to lose an election.

Democrats claim that to ensure that he wins, Trump will go to any length, including creating conditions that allow him to declare martial law to prevent elections being held. They also fear that he could send armed ICE agents to key voting districts to intimidate African American and Latino voters from turning up to vote or simply declare some votes invalid.

All of those measures would be illegal and would be quickly challenged and reversed in the courts. But then the courts themselves could be used by both parties to challenge results with which they disagree. This could result in delaying the seating of elected representatives and bring the electoral process into further disrepute.

Republicans fear that the Democrats will flood the voting booths with illegal immigrants and claim this has been a feature of past elections. It is true that some illegal immigrants have voted and that they voted Democrat. But the issue is a major red herring. In 2024, Michigan recorded the largest number of attempted votes by illegal immigrants – 15 out of 5.7 million votes cast. Other states recorded either single digits or no cases at all.

The House of Representatives Committee on House Administration is tasked with the job of adjudicating any disputed elections to the US House of Representatives. To try and head off any Trumpian-backed disputes, committee member Joe Morelle has produced a list of 150 ways that Trump may try to unfairly influence or block elections.

These have all been discussed with state election officials who are responsible for organising and monitoring elections (the federal government is expressly forbidden from involvement in elections). Whether that is enough remains to be seen. Certainly, the stakes are high in November. A Republican victory would mean two more years of Trump unfettered. A Democratic landslide—which is widely predicted– could lead to a third impeachment or, at the very least, a Trump White House encumbered by endless congressional investigations.

Iran

Chaos, chaos everywhere, with no end to the Iran War in sight.

Both Tehran and Washington are hotbeds of infighting and backstabbing without the sign of any clear leadership which is a prerequisite to end the war.

In the Pentagon this week, Secretary of Defense/War Pete Hegseth fired John Phelan, who as Secretary of the Navy was responsible for organising the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian ports.

No reason was given for the “immediate” sacking of Phelan, but it has been widely reported, that Hegseth was annoyed with Phelan going behind his back to speak directly with the president.

Since the fighting began, Hegseth has also fired Army Chief of Staff General Randy George, and Jacqueline Smith, editor of the editorially independent Pentagon newspaper “Stars and Stripes.” Since taking office, the former TV presenter has sacked more than a dozen senior generals and admirals.

As for Trump himself, his strategy appears to consist of a series of rolling ultimatums as he goes from calling on the Iranian people to rise up; to bombing Iran into the “stone age;” to joint management of the Strait of Hormuz to naval blockade….

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged gulf states, iran and us mid-term elections 2026 | 6 Comments

Observations of an Expat: Energy Security

By Tom Arms | Sat 25th April 2026 - 9:20 am

Energy Security. The Ukraine War made it a hot topic for a Europe dependent on Russian oil and gas. The Iran War – alongside the climate change debate – has revived the issue for the rest of the world.

The world’s main fossil fuel production centres are unstable. As a result, demand is growing to replace oil and gas with renewable energy. Furthermore, the renewable energy should be produced in areas which the consuming countries control. Many countries are already doing just that. Some better than others.

Surprisingly, Trump’s “drill, baby, drill” America does well when it comes to renewable sources of …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged energy security | 3 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 19th April 2026 - 11:44 am

China

The invisible hand of Beijing has been busily pulling the backstage strings to try and organise Iran War peace talks.

Pakistan—which has been the lead country in mediation country—is a close ally of China and is clearly coordinating Its honest broker activities with Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi who prefers to remain in the shadows.

Economically China desperately needs an end to Trump’s War. Ninety percent of its oil comes from Iran and, as the world’s second largest economy, China needs global stability to maintain growth.

At the same time, Chinese President Xi Jinping must be smiling to himself as Donald Trump entangles himself in a needless Middle East war which distracts him away from the Chinese priorities of Taiwan, the Philippines and the South China Sea. It also enables him to project China as a nation of calm reasonableness compared to an America run by an erratic president committed to riding roughshod over international law and conventions.

But what China does not want to do is be seen to be actively involved in discussions about the Iran War. This week a host of visitors including the Spanish prime minister and the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi visited Beijing to try to persuade Xi Jinping to offer direct mediation.

Tehran, for its part, has called on China to guarantee its security. The Chinese have the facilities to do the job. They have a naval base around the corner in Djibouti on the Red Sea. Even closer is their port of Gwadar near in Pakistan near the Iranian border. It is currently used exclusively for commercial purposes, but it could be quickly adapted to military use.

But China’s rulers have looked at the sad experiences of the US and concluded that they have little desire to commit their military to the risk of being dragged into a costly war that will undermine their own strength and brand.

Behind the scenes, backstage, quiet diplomacy—yes. Anything more, No, for fear of being blamed for any failure. And where the Middle East is concerned, failure is the name of the game.

Hungary

It is now time for the big Hungarian clean-up. The new prime minister, Peter Magyar has promised just that, and he has a comfortable super majority to achieve it.

But it will not be easy, Orban has packed the media, industry and academia with his cronies. They have all said they would construct legal obstacles to dislodge them, and the courts have also been filled with Fidesz supporters.

From a foreign perspective Magyar’s biggest challenge will be clawing back funding for the Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC). The MCC poses as an educational institute but in reality, is the main financial vehicle for funding an international far-right network of institutions, political parties, pressure groups and think tanks.

The funds for MCC come from shares in Hungary’s massive state-owned energy company MOL. Orban organised a transfer of a large bloc of MOL shares to MCC. They in turn have sent funds to the Reform Party in UK, AfD in Germany, the National Rally in France and Vox in Spain. MCC also helps to finance the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC)

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged china, donald trump, hungary, pope leo xiv and the vatican | 1 Comment

Observations of an Expat: The Cost

By Tom Arms | Sat 18th April 2026 - 9:43 am

Trump’s War against Iran has upended the world economy. And it has only just begun. As one economist said: “At the moment things are bad. They are going to get worse and they could become catastrophic.”

At the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) spring meeting of world finance ministers the IMF revised down world economic growth for 2026 from 3.3 percent to 3.1 percent. It then went on to warn that if the Iran War continued much longer there was a real risk of a global recession.

Of the world’s advanced economies, the UK is the hardest hit according to both the IMF and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Predicted growth in the UK is 0.8 percent for 2026, down from 1.3 percent.

Even harder hit are the Asia Pacific countries who are dependent on the Persian Gulf for their gas and oil-based energy. Asia is also the most populous continent and accounts for more than half of global manufacturing which means that economic hits to that region have major global impact. The UN Development Programme (UNDP) reckons that the war has already cost Asia-Pacific countries $300 billion.

Fossil fuels are not the only vital commodity exported from the Persian Gulf. The region is the world’s major source of urea which is a derivative of natural gas and a major component of fertiliser. There is a real danger that the lack of fertiliser will hit global crop yields.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has warned that forty-five million people could be pushed into “food insecurity” and that food shortages could reach “catastrophic levels.”

The Eurozone has also been hit. IMF growth predictions for the Eurozone have been revised down from 1.3 percent to 1.1 percent and inflation is expected to go up from 2.1 percent to 2.6 percent. Trump’s war has made it unlikely that the European Central Bank can cut interest rates. In fact, they may have to raise them. This view is being echoed by central banks around the world.

Germany is the hardest hit of the Eurozone countries. This is because its economy is heavily geared towards manufacturing which in turn is fuelled by oil and gas. Because France derives a large part of its energy from nuclear power plants it will escape a lot of the pain, but the French finance minister has warned about inflation and supply chain risks.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged donald trump and iran | 9 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 12th April 2026 - 10:04 am

UK and Russia

UK-Russian tensions have been ratcheted up several notches this week. It started when Vladimir Putin sent a Russian frigate to escort two shadow fleet oil tankers through the English Channel.

The move was a response to Sir Keir Starmer’s threat to board and impound any of the sanctioned tankers moving through British waters. Result: stand- off.

The tankers issue was followed by a press conference at which Defence Secretary John Healey announced that British forces—in cooperation with Norway—had foiled a Russian attempt to cut a key undersea cable north of the UK.

Not revealed at the press conference was that the cable in question is the FARICE-1 undersea cable which goes through the Faroe Islands to Iceland and then along the west coast of Greenland into the Canadian Arctic. It is the only cable in the region and is used extensively for military communications in the Arctic where the Russians have established military superiority.

NATO has recently awakened to the Arctic. Trump’s move on Greenland is part of that awakening. Another part is Britain’s decision to this summer send a carrier group to the “Far North.”

The Russian cable-cutting attempt by three Russian submarines was a clear bid to disrupt communications between the carrier group and its command headquarters. If the submarines had been successful, then the British force would have had to rely on satellite communications. These are highly sophisticated but more susceptible to jamming and cyber-attacks than communications through an undersea cable.

Britain should expect more Russian attempts to cut seabed communication cables. The UK is a global hub for undersea communications. Seventy cables run in and out of Britain. They carry normal internet traffic, trillions in financial data and military comms. To cut these cables the Russians have developed a new Gugi and Akula class of submarines that can operate deep undersea levels.

To counter this Defence Secretary Healey this week’s press conference to announce that he is investing $137 million in RAF sub hunters. The government is also increasing the overall defense budget to $350 billion—or 2.5 percent of GDP—by the end of next year.

Germany

Germany is also upping its defenses. But it is created domestic problems on the way.

In January, the government launched its Military Service Modernisation Act. This requires that all men—when they turn 18—complete a government questionnaire about their suitability and willingness to serve in the military. Women can also volunteer to complete the questionnaire.

The aim is to build a database of people who can be called upon to voluntarily serve in the military if there is a sudden increase in tensions.

Many however, fear that the act is a step towards conscription. Their fears seemed to be justified by a clause in the act that all men—regardless of their willingness to serve or not—must notify the Bundeswehr (the German army) before leaving the country for more than three months.

This week Defense Secretary Boris Pistorius tried to allay conscription fears by announcing that men would NOT have to reveal that they were leaving the country for more than three months.

However, fears remain, that Germany’s Military Modernisation Act is a back door to a return to conscription.

Hungary

It has been a long-established diplomatic convention that governments do not interfere in other countries domestic affairs—especially elections.

The Trump Administration is no respected of conventions and this week they proved it by dispatching Vice President JD Vance to Hungary to campaign for incumbent “illiberal” prime minister Viktor Orban.

Vance claimed that his appearance did not really constitute interference in Hungarian elections. He went on to say that he was not telling people whom to vote for “but what I am telling you is that the bureaucrats in Brussels…should not be listened to.” He added the clarion cry: “Go to the polls… stand with Viktor Orban because he stands for you.”

To counter any claims that he was not interfering in the Hungarian electoral process, Vance said that he was in Hungary to counter interference in the elections by the European Commission.

The truth of the matter is that Brussels has carefully refrained from making any comment for fear that they would be accused of interference. Orban and Vance submit that this silence is a form of interference.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged germany, hungary, russia and united kingdom | Leave a comment

Observations of an Expat: Two-State Solution

By Tom Arms | Sat 11th April 2026 - 9:59 am

TWO-STATE SOLUTION. That is the only answer to the Palestinian conundrum; the Arab-Israeli problem and now, the Iran War.

Neither the US nor Israel can bomb the Palestinian issue out of existence. It only creates recruiting sergeants for future generations.

Hitler tried it with his Final Solution. Even though six million Jews died in horrific circumstances he failed. The Jewish state rose from the ashes of the Holocaust with a determination that they will never again face extermination and that the land of Israel is theirs by right of God’s promise to Abraham.

Problem was that the Biblical land was occupied by other people who called themselves Palestinians. They were not a state. They were more like a tribe within the Ottoman Empire and later the British Mandate. They had land. That land was taken from them by the Jewish state in wars in 1948, 1956 and 1967.

But Israel’s religious right-wingers demand the Biblical lands of Eretz Israel and the entire country fears that a Palestinian state on their borders will create a permanently hostile nation as their next-door neighbour.

Wake up Israel, a permanently hostile neighbour is exactly what you have created with decades of on-off bombing campaigns and land attacks. The only answer is a two-state solution which recognises that both sides have more to gain from peace than war.

It will not be easy. It will take years of carefully crafted negotiations, and both sides will need to keep the goal firmly in sight. It will start with confidence-building measures. They can be trivial things which create an obvious benefit to both sides. Once those are in place and creating results than it will be more difficult to return to war because it will mean giving up the gains achieved with the confidence building measures.

This has been done before. The best formerly intractable example is Northern Ireland. In the 1970s no one could envisage an end to the Troubles in the province. The IRA and Ulster paramilitaries were busy shooting each other and the British army and government was caught in the political and military crossfire.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged palestine and two state solution | 8 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 5th April 2026 - 10:07 am

Sir Keir Starmer should be Britain’s Foreign Secretary. His handling of foreign policy is first-class.

Unfortunately, for a country’s foreign policy to be effective, it needs a strong economic and political base and Sir Keir — as Prime Minister — has failed to produce that.

But the world economic crisis created by Trump’s attack on Iran and Iran’s closure of the Straits of Hormuz means that the British Prime Minister now must focus on world affairs.

He has decided that he — along with French President Emmanuel Macron — should take the lead in trying to find a diplomatic solution that would re-open the Straits of Hormuz.

This is right. Britain and France are — after the United States — the two biggest Western powers in the Gulf Region. But it is difficult to see how they can achieve their goal.

For a start there is a war and Trump could escalate or declare victory and suddenly pull out. It is almost impossible to predict what this mercurial Sir Keir Starmer should be Britain’s Foreign Secretary. His handling of foreign policy is first-class.

Unfortunately, for a country’s foreign policy to be effective it needs a strong economic and political base and Sir Keir—as prime minister—has failed to produce that.

But the world economic crisis created by Trump’s attack on Iran and Iran’s closure of the Straits of Hormuz means that the British Prime Minister now must focus on world affairs.

He has decided that he—along with French President Emmanuel Macron—should take the lead in trying to find a diplomatic solution that would re-open the Straits of Hormuz.

This is right. Britain and France are—after the United States—the two biggest Western powers in the Gulf Region. But it is difficult to see how they can achieve their goal.

For a start there is a war and Trump could escalate or declare victory and suddenly pull out. It is almost impossible to predict what this mercurial President will do next.

Next, in the closure of the Straits of Hormuz, Iran has discovered a new political weapon with which to beat the West and at the same time create an attractive revenue stream. It has declared the 20-mile-wide maritime chokepoint Iranian waters and says it will close it at will and/or levy toll charges on the oil tankers that pass through every day.

To prevent such a move Sir Keir and President Macron are talking about sanctions and everything short of Trump’s insistence that other western powers despatch warships to replace the American Navy and take control of the Straits of Hormuz.

Posted in Europe / International | Tagged birthright citizenship, donald trump, hungarian election 2026, us attack on iran and Viktor Orban | 15 Comments

Observations of an Expat: Nuclear Questions

By Tom Arms | Sat 4th April 2026 - 9:55 am

The nuclear deterrent must be at the centre of Europe’s security policy. For nearly 80 years that deterrent has been in the hands of the US through its membership of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO).

Britain and France have also had nuclear arsenals. But they do not come close to countering the stockpile of Russian weapons. Their purpose is to give heft to the political power of the two former European colonial powers.

That is changing. It must change. Trump’s repeated threats to withdraw have made it necessary. The most recent is the most worrying. The US president went to war without consulting his NATO allies and without a clear goal or exit strategy. He inevitably ran into difficulties and called upon his NATO allies to extricate him from what looks like an unwinnable conflict. Not wanting to be dragged into a “forever war” in the powder keg Middle East, the NATO allies refused. Trump responded by heaping insult on insult and issuing his clearest threat yet to withdraw from the “most successful military alliance in world history.”

Of course, a Trumpian withdrawal from NATO would not be a simple matter of signing an Executive Order. Marco Rubio saw to that shortly before he was appointed Trump’s Secretary of State. While still in the Senate he co-sponsored a bill which requires a two-thirds vote of the Senate for US withdrawal from the NATO Treaty.

Trump has a one-seat majority in the Senate. But even if it were larger, it is unlikely that he could twist enough Senate arms to secure a two-thirds majority. Fourteen Republican senators — including his sycophantic ally Lindsey Graham — have said they would vote to stay in the alliance. So that route appears blocked.

But the president could still severely damage the alliance. As commander-in-chief he has operational control over all military units so he could simply order the 70,000 US troops in Europe to come home. It would be a stupid move and put him on a collision course with his party in the Senate, but it is just the sort of thing Trump would do.

Such a move would immediately put a big question mark over whether America’s nuclear umbrella would stay in place. Which is why the European members of the alliance are discussing how they could replace the American deterrent.

Posted in Europe / International | Tagged donald trump, NATO and nuclear deterrent | 23 Comments

Observations of an Expat: War Powers

By Tom Arms | Sat 28th March 2026 - 9:37 am

America’s NATO allies are—according to Donald Trump—”cowards” for failing to join his war in Iran. He later added that the US would “never forget” the position of the Europeans at this “critical juncture” in world history.

Trump’s anti- NATO rants reveal an astonishing ignorance of the legal and political obstacles facing other world leaders who want to wage an ill- conceived and poorly executed war which threatens to escalate and plunge the world into economic depression.

It is not entirely clear how, but Trump alone of the world’s democracies appears to ride roughshod over international and domestic laws to wage a dangerous war.

America’s Founding Fathers foresaw the possibility that a dangerously hubristic individual might one day occupy the White House. That is why Article One of the US constitution gives Congress – not the president—the power to declare war.

There are, however, get-outs for a belligerent president to respond quickly to sudden attacks. For a start the Founding Fathers changed the wording of Article One from “make war” to “declare war.” The change was meant to allow the president to respond to a sudden attack—but not to initiate.

In the wake of the Vietnam War, the president’s war powers were restricted further with the 1973 War Powers Act. This legislation instructs the president to inform Congress within 48 hours of the start of military action. If Congress fails to approve the action then troops have to be withdrawn 60 days. There is room for a further 30-day extension if required—but that’s it.

Congress also has the power of the purse which means that it can simply refuse funds to finance the fighting. The Iran War is costing $1 billion a day which is coming out of the existing defense budget. Tump, however, is said to be planning to ask Congress for an additional $200 billion.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged donald trump, iran and observations of an ex pat | 4 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 8th March 2026 - 8:28 am

Texas is a bright red, far-right Republican, conservative state. It has not elected a Democrat to the US Senate for 37 years. That may be about to change. And if it does the repercussions will rock the White House.

Primary elections for one of the Lone Star state’s two Senate seats were held by both the Democrat and Republican parties this week. One of the recognised barometers of political success is the size of the voter turnout. The turnout for the Democrat primary was highest in the state’s history.

The winner was Texas State Representative James Talerico. A middle-of-the-road Democrat with a strong Christian background. The latter is important in bible belt Texas. Talerico won with 52.8 percent. Runner-up Jasmine Crockett (46.9 percent of the vote) conceded gracefully and immediately called on voters to support Talerico.

The Republican primary, in contrast, was a bitter contest, had a low turnout and none of the candidates won the overall majority required to win their party’s nomination. Incumbent Senator John Cornyn won 41.9 percent of the vote and state Attorney General Ken Paxton secured 40.7 percent.

There will be a run-off between the top two candidates on 26 May. Democrats hope that Paxton wins. He is an ultra-conservative MAGA man. He was a key figure in Trump’s campaign to overturn the 2020 election. He is being divorced by his wife on the grounds of desertion and has been accused of corruption, bribery, fraud, abuse of office, obstruction of justice and perjury. The Texas lower house voted to impeach Paxton, but the Senate narrowly voted to acquit, 14 to 16.

Elsewhere in America, the Democrats have flipped nine seats in state special elections (by-elections) since Trump took office. The Republicans have flipped none. The latest Democrat win was in Arkansas. Other wins have been in Georgia, Iowa, Mississippi, Pennsylvania and Texas.

Trump’s Department of Homeland Security has become synonymous with repression. Now the cabinet minister responsible for the department is no more. Kristi Noem has been sacked.

Ms Noem is the first senior figure to be sacked by President Trump in his second term. At this stage in Trump’s first term, 37 people had either been fired or had resigned.

In many ways Ms Noem was perfect for the job at Homeland Security. The former Governor of South Dakota is MAGA to her fingertips and her job involved enforcing the signature policy of the Trump Administration—deportations. Noem grasped the nettle with relish. In less than a year she has overseen a record 675,000 deportations.

Posted in Op-eds | Leave a comment

Observations of an ex pat: Iran

By Tom Arms | Sat 7th March 2026 - 7:20 pm

Iran and the US have been on a collision course since 1979 when the radical Islamic state was founded and 44 US diplomats were taken hostage.

But why now? But also, what are the who’s, what’s, how’s, when’s and where’s of the current car crash and its regional, national and global repercussions.

Who first—the US and Israel. America did not call on its traditional NATO allies. It did not go to the United Nations to seek legal sanctions. The United States did not even bother to inform the G7 countries. The United States acted unilaterally. In fact, Donald Trump acted unilaterally within the US government machine because he did not bother to consult members of Congress let alone seek congressional approval.

The only country that America allied itself with was Israel. It should be noted that this was the first time (other than the air attack in June) that US and Israeli troops have fought together. In the first and second Gulf Wars the US refused Israeli help and there was no Israeli participation in Afghanistan.

There was a very good reason for this. Arab governments may be prepared to accept Israel, but most of their populations remain implacably opposed to the existence of the state of the Jewish state. When Israeli and US forces fight side by side it alienates America from Arab public opinion and shakes the thrones of the Arab monarchies. Iran is unpopular with Arabs, but Israel is reprehensible.

The why and when are linked. Iran is the weakest it has been since the Islamic revolutionary government came to power 47 years ago. Years of sanctions have significantly weakened the economy. Economic hardship coupled with political repression has created waves of riots. Only weeks ago Iranian government shot tens of thousands of protesters demanding an end to the theocratic regime. And finally, the Iranian military has been weakened by the Gaza War and Operation Midnight Hammer which damaged—but clearly did not “obliterate” – Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged iran and observations of an ex pat | 9 Comments

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 1st March 2026 - 10:55 am

State of the Union

What a politician omits to say is often more important than what he says. There were two significant omissions during President Trump’s record-breaking State of the Union address on Tuesday night.

The first concerned Ukraine and the second Iran. Tuesday was also the day that Ukraine marked the fourth anniversary of the Russian invasion of their country. Notables from around the world gathered in Kyiv’s Maidan square to mark the occasion. Every Western country was represented – except the United States.

There was no American diplomat, politician or Trump-appointed delegate at this important and moving ceremony. The United States was conspicuous by its absence.

The Ukrainians were also hoping that somewhere in Trump’s speech there would be some mention of support for the Ukrainian cause. There was none. The only mention of Ukraine was in the context of negotiations which repeatedly fail because Trump insists on backing Russian proposals. These include the resignation of Volodomyr Zalensky; the ceding to Russia of all land that Russia currently occupies and more; the neutering of the Ukrainian military and a pledge that Ukraine never join NATO. In short, total surrender.

Iran was mentioned in Tump’s nearly two-hour speech. But what was not mentioned was Trump’s intentions towards Iran. At the moment the largest concentration of US naval firepower since the 2003 Iraq War is gathered off the coast of Iran. It includes two aircraft carrier groups which are comprised of two aircraft carriers, each with 75 fighter bombers and a complement of 7,000 personnel. Each aircraft carrier is supported by cruisers and destroyers, supply vessels, support ships and submarines. The cost to the US taxpayer is tens of millions per day.

Why they are there was omitted from Trump’s speech. Are they off the coast of Iran to threaten to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities. The ones that were “obliterated” earlier this year. Or are they in Middle Eastern waters to protect Iranian protesters—tens of thousands of whom have been slaughtered by their own government. Or are they there to demand the destruction of Iran’s missile programme. Or, is Trump demanding a regime change and a combination of all of the above.

The fact is that Trump has no clear plan and that is how countries become embroiled in “forever wars.”

Ukraine

How do you calculate a nation’s war morale? Its willingness to fight. Its resilience and ability to absorb blow after blow and retain an air of optimism.

The analysts at the CIA, Royal Services Institute (RUSI) and the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) as well as military attaches are experts at counting men, missiles, tanks and planes. They factor in population sizes and supporting economies; place them on the military/diplomatic scales and come up with what is called the “strategic balance.”

But what they fail to include—what they cannot include—is a calculation that represents a country’s willingness to fight.

At the start of the Ukraine War the Russian military was 4.5 times bigger than Ukraine’s. Its economy was nine times larger, and its population was 3.5 times bigger. As Trump would say: The Russians had all the cards.

Or so it would seem. After four years the Ukrainians fought mighty Russia to a standstill. Putin’s economy appears to be faltering and there are reports of Russian officers forcing their troops at a gunpoint into suicide assaults.

On Tuesday the Ukrainians marked the fourth anniversary of the start of Putin’s War with a moving ceremony in Kyiv. It appeared to reveal that the Ukrainians are as determined to drive Putin’s men from their homes as they were four years ago.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged donald trump, france and ukraine | 4 Comments

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