A Kamala Harris win this week is not good news for the UK and Europe. A Trump win is much, much worse.

Trump’s “America First” campaigns has fed a latent US isolationism which has forced the Democrats to adopt some of his policies, because, like it or not, America is a democracy and the president elected to represent all Americans.

According to one poll, only 22 percent of young Americans support involvement in the Middle East. Half of Republicans think that the US is supplying too much aid to Ukraine and only 44 percent of Republicans think that the US should play a leading role in the world. Democrats are more internationally minded with 65 percent in favour of an active foreign policy. The good news is that NATO has popular support with a bipartisan 70 percent approval rating. The fact is, however, that America is moving into its shell at one of the most dangerous periods for the world since the end of World War Two.

America’s diplomatic corps would be hard put to meet expectations even if there was a swell of opinion in favour of increased global involvement. It is still reeling from the Trump years when budgets were cut by 30 percent, ambassadorial posts were left empty and 60% of the diplomatic corps left either in protest or cutbacks. Biden has increased budgets but the damage done by Donald Trump will take years to repair.

Trump, of course, regularly threatens to withdraw from NATO. Biden and Kamala Harris have recommitted to the alliance but it was a Democratic president—Barack Obama—who first attacked NATO allies for failing to spend at least two percent of their GDP on defense. He also unveiled the “Asia Pivot” which shifts the military focus from Europe and the Middle East to East Asia. Trump, Biden and Harris have embraced the Asia Pivot.

Defense costs money and the policies of Trump, Biden and Harris are undermining the economies of UK and Europe. Trump, again is the worst. His tariffs on all imports—possibly as much as 20 percent on British and EU exports will hit exports. It will, of course, also lead to a tit for tat tariff war in which everybody loses—especially the consumer.

Kamala Harris will continue Biden’s $738 billion Inflation Reduction Act” which is peppered with isolationist policies. The IRA includes such things as a $7,500 handout for the purchase of US-made-only electric vehicles, and tax credits only for products made in America. The EU has protested and threatened to take America to the World Trade Organisation. But the WTO has been rendered useless by America’s 7-year refusal to agree to new judges for its appellate body.

Ten percent of America’s GDP is produced by the tech billionaires in Silicon Valley. Artificial Intelligence is acknowledged to be both a massive opportunity and threat to society. The EU has introduced the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) to regulate big tech. The US is allowing big tech to operate a Wild West economy which soaks up $1 trillion in foreign investment which could otherwise go towards British and European technology start-ups.

The fact is that the UK and EU need to start thinking of how to exist alongside an isolationist and protective America. For a start, it needs work to out how to fill the vacuum created by the withdrawal of the US. This means increased defense spending and cooperation, more foreign aid and more money spent on diplomacy.

A recent report by the London-based Coalition for Global Prosperity (CGP) called for 3.5 percent of Britain’s GDP to be spent on international affairs. This was needed, said the CGP, to combat threats to world peace and democratic countries. The expenditure would break down to 2.5 percent on defense and 0.5 percent on diplomacy. The report, “The Rising Price of Freedom,” also calls the restoration of the 0.7 percent spend on foreign aid.

The CGP says Britain is well-placed to play a bigger role with its permanent seat on the UN Security Council, major involvement in the World Bank and IMF, a key member of the Five Eyes, NATO and the Commonwealth.

Britain, however, does not have the resources to fill the yawning gap being left by Americans. Its logical partner is fellow democracies in the EU, but the UK left them with Brexit. When Theresa May negotiated the withdrawal terms she proposed that post-Brexit Britain participate in such projects as the European Defense Agency which encourages defense cooperation resource-sharing among members. The proposal was known as the Chequers Plan and it was rejected both by the European Commission and the UK parliament.

The bones of May’s Chequers Plan were revived recently when Britain and Germany signed a “landmark defense agreement”. Under this agreement German defense company Rheinmetall will open a UK factory producing artillery shell (Britain stopped effectively stopped producing artillery shells in 2012). The two countries also agree to joint work on the development of drones and long range missiles, and the German air force will augment RAF patrols in the North Sea.

Britain and France also have the 2010 Lancaster House Treaty which set up cooperation in nuclear technology and testing and a structure for join army expeditionary forces.

Both those agreements—along with the agreed British attendance at EU foreign ministers meetings-are part of what the Labour government is calling an “EU reset”. The idea appears to be that Britain will participate in agreed areas of mutual concern but remain outside the official structure.

The fact is Britain and the EU’s joint concerns in Ukraine, the Middle East, Sudan and on issues such as immigration and climate change make it essential that they work together. An EU reset is essential in the wake of increasing American isolationism.

* Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and author of “The Encyclopaedia of the Cold War” and “America Made in Britain".