At a time when Western media and political discourse insist on marketing the narrative that the Russian-Ukrainian conflict has settled into a permanent stalemate and a mutual swamp of attrition, facts on the ground reveal a completely different trajectory.

This prevailing perception represents a flawed strategic reading: Russia has not merely managed a local war of attrition, but has used it as a historical lever to massively restructure its military and industrial power. Today, the result is manifested in a decisive Russian superiority in the defence.

By manufacturing war, and through intensive preparation for a potential (and more conventional) confrontation with NATO, Russia reveals how the European continent is structurally helpless, militarily depleted, and unqualified to fight a conflict of this scale.

The Russian Military-Industrial Revolution: The Numbers Speak

The first of these leaps was manifested in human mobilisation and structural expansion, as the size of the Russian army jumped from 900,000 soldiers on the eve of the conflict’s outbreak to 1.6 million, with a relentless target of reaching a solid regular force of 2.2 million troops. This increase is supported by a complex logistical infrastructure and deep strategic stockpiles of conventional and advanced ammunition, which are capable of sustaining various large-scale emergencies.

Reflecting plans for a long-term confrontation with NATO, Russia has established the ‘New Leningrad Military District‘ along the Finnish border. This district includes a massive military corps, which some analyses estimate to be between 20,000 and 70,000 soldiers, formed by merging and expanding Soviet-era units, depots, and military enclaves in Karelia and Murmansk. On completion, this would produce an integrated front equipped and ready to fight a wide-ranging conventional war.

On the drone warfare and ‘aerial flooding’ strategy front, Russia has tripled the area of its Shahed-136 manufacturing facilities (known in Russia as ‘Geranium’) outside the city of Kazan. Although official documents and conservative estimates indicate production rates ranging between 100 and 600 drones per day (averaging 4,500 drones per month, with the ability to mobilize 1,000 drones in concentrated attacks), the entry of advanced jet-powered generations into service gives Moscow the future capability to raise the pace of attacks to record levels, aimed at completely paralysing Western air defences.

European Fragility: Feeble Armies and Empty Depots

On the flip side, generous and continuous support for Kyiv has emptied the conventional weapons and interceptor missile depots of European nations, exposing sharp structural flaws in the continent’s military readiness.

The United Kingdom, for example, suffers from a severe depletion of resources that prevents it from concluding major new heavy equipment procurement deals until 2030. A striking numerical shrinking has also left the entire British Army small enough to fit inside a modern football stadium, with thousands of empty seats remaining.

As for France, despite the efficiency of its forces, it lacks domestic logistical sustainability and strategic airlift capabilities, leaving it unable to deploy more than 7,000 troops to any external theatre of operations without declaring general mobilisation.

In Germany, despite the allocation of a €111 billion special fund in 2022 to modernise the army, bureaucracy and political divisions have prevented tangible results. Berlin’s plans to deploy a military brigade to Lithuania face logistical obstacles, immense pressure on production lines, and delayed contracts as a result of the war’s repercussions and the tremendous strain the defence industry is undergoing following the war in Ukraine.

The most dangerous vulnerability lies in the fact that Europe today does not possess a real air defence umbrella capable of withstanding a sustained Russian flooding attack of drones and updated cruise missiles, such as the ‘Iskander-K‘ and hypersonic systems. This imbalance has enabled Russia to possess a conventional destructive capability that could level Europe’s strategic infrastructure, with no equivalent conventional deterrence options available to the West.

The Deterrence Dilemma and Breaking Red Lines

For decades, European security doctrine has been built on the sanctity of ‘Article 5‘ of the NATO Treaty and the American nuclear umbrella. However, these calculations face a fatal logical challenge today.

Washington has sent a clear message that any Russian use of tactical nuclear weapons inside Ukraine would be met with a conventional US response using long-range missiles – the very same missiles whose stockpiles the West has critically depleted.

Should Russia launch overwhelming conventional strikes against the European depth, Western leaders will find themselves facing an existential dilemma akin to a political ‘checkmate’. Any French or British nuclear response would automatically mean an immediate Russian counter-retaliation that would annihilate their capitals. With European intelligence networks penetrated and domestic political decision-making fragmented, Moscow moves with the certainty that European leaders will ultimately choose to retreat and swallow a conventional defeat rather than commit collective nuclear suicide.

This understanding coincides with a radical shift in the tone of the Russian leadership. While Russian discourse has historically been characterised by caution and pragmatism, the Western permission for Ukraine to cross red lines and strike deep inside Russian territory has led to a decisive shift in Moscow’s stance. It has transitioned from a posture of managing a local conflict to actual psychological and military readiness for a broader war aimed at punishing European capitals directly.

The Historical Trajectory: How Ukraine Became a Thorn in the Side

The current crisis was not born by chance. It is the culmination of a long-term Western strategy that has used Ukraine as a platform for geopolitical targeting against Russia.

Since 1948, American intelligence circles viewed western Ukraine as an ideal arena for guerrilla warfare against the Soviet Union. This approach deepened through intelligence-driven political interventions in the 2004 Orange Revolution, leading to the 2014 Maidan events that overthrew Kyiv’s neutral government to install hard-line nationalist factions, officially transforming the country into an advanced confrontation front and a ‘thorn in Russia’s side’.

Despite Moscow’s attempts in the spring of 2022 to reach a flexible political settlement via the ‘Istanbul Communiqué‘ – in which Russia expressed a willingness to withdraw from Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in exchange for Kyiv’s neutrality and recognition of the Donbas’s independence – direct NATO intervention, the pumping of billions in aid packages, and intelligence efforts to launch counter-attacks aborted the diplomatic opportunity for peace.

This Western insistence on escalation later forced Moscow to permanently integrate those regions into the Russian Federation through the September 2022 referendums.

Strategic Conclusion: Bitter Choices to Save the Continent

Current data proves that the Ukrainian gamble has reached its end. Russia has already settled the war of attrition in its favour. In order to avoid a catastrophic military clash on European soil, decision-makers on the Old Continent must wake up from the offensive American vision and execute a courageous strategic pivot to save face, anchored on three inevitable realities:

• First – Realism in the Energy File: It must be acknowledged that the United States is incapable of providing a sustainable and affordable energy alternative for Europe, especially with global maritime straits – like the straits of Hormuz, Bab al-Mandeb and the Suez Canal – remaining at the mercy of regional powers and sudden closures at any time.
• Second – Strategic Reconciliation with Moscow: Europe’s industrial survival depends entirely on abandoning the framework that treats Russia as a permanent strategic enemy, and reintegrating it as a vital, indispensable partner for achieving economic stability and energy security.
• Third – Accepting the Eurasian Reality of Ukraine: The West must stop the futile pursuit of integrating Ukraine into the Western system. History and geography prove that Ukraine’s long-term stability lies in its return as a bridge state that achieves balance alongside Russia and Belarus, rather than remaining a depleting front line for a NATO alliance going through its worst structural and logistical crises.

Featured image via Diego Fedele / Getty Images

By Mohammad Fakih

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Nigel Farage is facing significant heat at the moment over a £5m ‘gift’ he failed to declare. Farage faces two separate investigations on the matter, and he’s also facing question about whether he used the money to purchase a £1.4m house in Surrey.

On the topic of the house, the BBC have been trying to get Farage on to discuss the matter. This was how Reform responded:

Victoria Derbyshire, "We asked for an interview with Nigel Farage tonight and we got a thumbs down emoji from his team"

"Over the last couple of weeks we've asked for an interview with Nigel Farage or anyone from Reform UK's front bench ten times"

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Jake Berry, who used to be a… pic.twitter.com/l594M6EQ1Q

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) May 19, 2026

Farage rattled and rolled

Jake Berry is a former Tory MP who also served as the party’s chairman. In July 2025, he defected to Reform, stating:

I’ve always believed that change comes with challenging the old order. In shaking up the system when it isn’t working

Oh yeah – we’re sure he’s always thought that – that’s why he joined the Tories – the longest running political party in the UK.

In the clip at the top, Berry said:

Well, the question is how did Nigel Farage pay for his house? We know because he told us he did an interview with Harry Cole and he said that he received money from Irem as a celebrity, which is actually part of a wider business career… Including representing companies that sell things like gold, including doing appearances in celebrity things. He got that money, he used it to buy his house, The explanation does add up.

I’ll tell you what doesn’t add up is this inference that money received 35 days earlier enabled him to buy the house. Anyone who’s ever bought a house recently know it takes about six months. And Nigel’s been really clear about this. He said he’d passed proof of funding, he’d agreed to buy this house a long time before this gift was received. And I accept his explanation.

For clarity’s sake, the £1.4m Surrey house is different to the Clacton house. The latter house also attracted controversy when people accused Farage of using his partner’s name on the deeds to avoid paying £44k in stamp duty.

The accusation Berry alluded to is that Farage actually paid for the house with an undeclared ‘gift’ of £5m he received from foreign-based crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne. Notably, this wasn’t the only thing Farage did after receiving the gift:

Here are the facts as laid down by Derbyshire:
1) Farage says he won’t run
2) crypto billionaire pays him £5mill
3) Farage U-turns and runs
4) Farage hides the donation
5) Farage announces if he wins the election he will slash capital gains tax for crypto firms

Same old same old https://t.co/ViEIFZkf3A

— Alonso Gurmendi (@Alonso_GD) May 6, 2026

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Back to the interview, Derbyshire said:

The explanation that he bought that house from the fee from I’m a Celeb when the money was paid into his media business company, and was still in the account, according to the FT, after the house purchase was made.

In other words, it seems to literally be impossible that Farage could have paid for the house as Reform is claiming:

Another whopper from Farage. His Celebrity money was paid into his Thorn in the Side account (his tax dodging vehicle) and never left it to buy a house. https://t.co/rY3yZXY01s pic.twitter.com/MOaCTYKMrI

— Mr Ethical (@nw_nicholas) May 16, 2026

On the back foot

In the interview, Berry got quite flustered and attempted to change the subject:

"He told us… he received money from I'm A Celebrity."

Sir Jake Berry, Reform UK, defends his party leader and argues that the continued focus on his finances is just "the mainstream media desperate to keep this story going against Nigel Farage". #Newsnight pic.twitter.com/4bquGSUITI

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— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) May 19, 2026

Berry also got the name of Reform’s candidate in the Makerfield by-election wrong:

Jake Berry: “What I think is extraordinary about this by-election, is you have ‘Robert Jenkins’, a brilliant candidate for Reform…”

Victoria Derbyshire: “That’s not his name by the way”

Jake Berry: “Sorry?”

Victoria Derbyshire: “It’s Robert Kenyon”#newsnight pic.twitter.com/3ZIdwbXvLw

— David (@Zero_4) May 19, 2026

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It seems clear why Farage doesn’t want to respond to these questions; it’s because he doesn’t have good answers.

Sooner or later, however, he will have to account for himself.

Featured image via Getty Images (Ryan Jenkinson) 

By Willem Moore

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One of the UK’s biggest disabled people’s organisations has slammed a trade union for supporting disability benefit reforms and conflating Department for Work and Pension (DWP) disability benefits with benefits that assist work.

TUC makes DWP PIP about work

The Trade Union Congress (TUC) called for ‘genuine reform’ of the DWP benefit Personal Independence Payment (PIP), as they say it enables many disabled workers to enter jobs. However, as Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) points out, PIP isn’t an out-of-work benefit and has nothing to do with employment.

Ahead of the TUC disabled members conference, the union submitted its response to the Timms review of PIP. In the submission, the TUC says that PIP is ‘crucial’ for disabled people to start and stay in work. However, the body warns that it’s not working as intended.

TUC General Secretary Paul Nowak said:

The government has a vital opportunity to support more Disabled people into work through the Timms Review. Right now, Disabled people are bearing the brunt of unemployment, low pay and insecure work – all while navigating a social security system that is not fit for purpose.

Only a genuine reform of PIP will ensure that Disabled people who can work, receive the support they need to move into and stay in work. But this must come alongside wider action too, like ensuring Disabled workers get the reasonable adjustments they need, stronger rights at work and reform of the Access to Work scheme.

Disabled people’s organisation DPAC are ‘disappointed’ that Nowak focused on work when talking about PIP and not on how it’s a vital benefit for so many.

They said in a statement:

PIP is paid to people who work and who don’t work. It is not paid on the basis of work – it is paid on the basis of daily living and mobility/ getting around. Work does not come into the assessment, nor should it. It may help people to access work, but that is not the primary purpose of it.

The TUC statement suggests that PIP reform and the Timms review is justified and should involve consideration of work. It is now being reported in the media as ‘PIP rules should be changed to get disabled people into work.’

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TUC is focusing too much on work

For what it’s worth, it seems like the TUC’s heart is in the right place. They consulted with many disabled members, and as a union body, employment is probably a priority for their disabled members.

And to some extent, disability employment does need to be improved.

As the TUC statement said:

TUC analysis found that the unemployment rate for Disabled people is 8.8% – it’s highest since before the pandemic – compared to 4.3% for non-disabled people. The situation is even worse for young Disabled workers – with an unemployment rate of 24.2%, compared to 12.2% for those who are not Disabled.

The stats for young people are especially worrying. However, the DWP’s solution isn’t to support young people but instead to force them into dead-end work. And the department is throwing under 24’s on PIP under the bus before the Timms review is even complete, with the extension of the assessment period not applying to young people.

The TUC has said that PIP can only help some disabled people into work alongside Access to Work, which the department is also cutting. However, the union body falls into the trap of putting the onus on employers for workplace adjustments, something the DWP has also been pushing.

The TUC said:

Disabled workers who took part in a TUC self-reporting survey (for its submission to the Timms Review) reported using PIP payments to cover for the cost of reasonable adjustments – many workers believed these costs should be covered by their employer or other support systems.

The TUC is calling on employers to do their part and implement reasonable adjustments to help keeping Disabled employees in work.

Whilst this might be possible for bigger companies, for smaller employers, it means they’re just less likely to employ a disabled person. It also wrongly lets the DWP off the hook, as this is literally what Access to Work is for.

TUC needs to focus on what’s important

Worryingly, the TUC said Timms Review is a ‘step in the right direction’, which isn’t exactly the words I’d use for an already determined farce of a review that pretends to be co-produced by disabled people, but each to their own.

That being said, the TUC is also urging the DWP to:

• Reform the assessment process, moving away from a one-off, snapshot assessment to start capturing fluctuation, fatigue and recovery time – and making the process more accessible and less burdensome.

• Improve assessor expertise and decision-making, ensuring that assessors have relevant medical knowledge and/or training, and that medical evidence is given appropriate weight in decision-making.

• Improve first decision accuracy and reduce reliance on appeals – as at present too many people are only awarded PIP when they challenge a refusal at tribunal.

• Ensure PIP payment levels reflect the true additional costs of disability  and the extra costs associated with working – such as travel, energy and support.

• Reduce unnecessary reassessment, limiting repeat reassessments where conditions are unlikely to improve.

It’s clear the TUC is focusing on work, because that’s important to their members, but by doing so it’s feeding into the DWP’s rhetoric that disabled people are only worthy of support if they contribute to the economy. It means many disabled people are left feeling betrayed once again.

It’s well past high time that we stopped putting employment on this pedestal. Disabled people should be supported to thrive whether or not they work. And however well meaning the TUC’s statement was, all it’s done here is put disabled people who can’t work at the bottom of the heap again.

Featured image via Getty/Alishia Abodunde

By Rachel Charlton-Dailey

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Hayden Panettiere, the star of Nashville, Heroes and the Scream movie franchise, has claimed that a “well-respected” Oscar-winning actor once exposed himself to her at a party.

In an excerpt of her new memoir This Is Me: A Reckoning published by People magazine, Hayden wrote about how when she was 19, she went to an event with a friend.

Making small talk with a group of men made her uncomfortable, she wrote, so she decided to call it a night.

That’s when an “Oscar-winning actor and director” came up to her as she was putting on her coat and pointed down to what he claimed was gum on his pants.

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“I looked down and recoiled,” Hayden recalled. “This well-respected, award-winning actor’s testicles were hanging out from his unzipped fly.”

Hayden said the stunt “hadn’t hurt me and I was sure it was a drunken joke, but I’d never seen a grown man do something like that”.

“I was shocked,” she noted.

Hayden also wrote about a sketchy friend who took her to a cabin on a luxury yacht where “a famous thirtysomething British singer-songwriter was lying in a bed” per Entertainment Weekly.

The now-36-year-old claimed: “He was shirtless and propped up on a few pillows with his arms positioned behind his head. From the waist down, he was covered by bedsheets, and I could see the outline of his body underneath.”

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She claimed her friend then pulled the sheet away and told her: “I want you to get in bed with him. He has a huge dick.”

“The shock was so great it didn’t even occur to me to say no,” Hayden wrote.

However, she said, she didn’t let things go any further and made arrangements to leave the yacht.

As for the identities of these famous men, the I Love You, Beth Cooper actor wasn’t about to name certain names in her book.

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“Things happened a long time ago, but it was to protect me and my company from being sued by some very pissed-off famous people,” she explained to The Hollywood Reporter.

Help and support:

• Rape Crisis services for women and girls who have been raped or have experienced sexual violence – 0808 802 9999
• Survivors UK offers support for men and boys – 0203 598 3898

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Robert Kenyon, Reform UK’s candidate in the Makerfield by-election, has had his X account suspended. Shortly afterward, likely reasons why started to surface, particularly his links to a British fascist and his sharing of extremist right-wing content.

Ironically, Kenyon kicked off his campaign by praising his party for supposedly weeding out racists. He also moaned that Reform doesn’t allow him to speak his mind about the Russia-Ukraine war. There was a hint, though, that he disagreed with boss Nigel Farage’s opinion that Russia was provoked into it. The one thing on which Farage has not been wrong — stopped clocks and all that.

Makerfield candidate denies far right exists

Among the found items in Kenyon’s social media history is denialism that the far right even exists. A denial that he made as the far right was engaged in the 2024 race riots.

And as race rioters filled streets, Kenyon claimed that white people are being “assaulted en masse” by Muslims.

Evidenced links to fascists

Kenyon’s links to fascism are disturbing, if unsurprising in an Islamophobic Reform candidate and they’re not being exposed for the first time. Kenyon stood, coming second, in the seat in the 2024 general election.

At that campaign, Searchlight Magazine pointed out his social media links to the leader of the British fascist movement.

MAKERFIELD: I suspect Robert Kenyon won’t last long as Reform candidate. When Kenyon stood here in 2024, the anti-fascist group Searchlight tweeted he was Facebook friend of Gary Raikes, leader of New British Union, reincarnation of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists https://t.co/6sEsa52izQ

— @Tomorrow’sMPs (@tomorrowsmps) May 19, 2026

And even more recently, Kenyon shared — and contributed to — posts by extremist right-wing Islamophobe and ‘anti-feminist’ Carl Benjamin, who calls himself ‘Sargon of Akkad’. Not just Benjamin, but also white supremacist Peter Imanuelsen, and convicted race-hate instigator Wayne O’Rourke.

But as one commenter pointed out, on far right Elon Musk’s X, that’s not likely to lead to a suspension. It raises the question of what must have been bad enough for his Kenyon’s account to be paused.

.@novaramedia say he had his account suspended by the owner of this platform
I’ve reported egregious racism on here and always been told it doesn’t violate the rules.
Hard to believe these posts were what precipitated a suspension when far worse have been deemed ok.

— Lucy (@lucyfyson) May 19, 2026

As awful as these racist posts are, Lucy is right that they don’t seem enough to be the reason X suspended the account. The suspension hides what else might be there.

But the bigger question, at least as far as the by-election is concerned is this: will enough people in Makerfield care enough to vote against Robert Kenyon again? Or will such presumed and actual views attract enough people in what has become a Reform heartland in a nation plagued by emboldened racists to get him into parliament?

Featured image via X/ reformparty 

By Skwawkbox

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(ZEN – Zaneta Razaite/Alamy)

6 min read18 min

The European Commission and national leaders can see the benefits of a rapprochement but Brexit scars, unresolved disputes and uncertainty over who will be in No 10 are tempering Brussels’ enthusiasm, finds Christian Spillmann

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The reset between the European Union and the United Kingdom was much ado about nothing.

Brexit was a tragedy. The ‘reset’ is a farce. ‘Breturn’ is a fantasy. The language of international relations is rarely so blunt, so unvarnished. Instead, pleasantries and embraces conceal a more awkward truth. The divorce negotiations left a bitter aftertaste on the Continent. Yet the return of Donald Trump to the White House has fractured the global order. His disdain for Europeans, and the consequences of his erratic decisions, have made closing ranks imperative. A rapprochement between the UK and its former EU partners is now vital to Europe’s security. Keir Starmer wishes to go further. The British Prime Minister is seeking a reset of relations, though he has drawn three red lines. The reception has been polite; enthusiasm conspicuously absent. In Brussels, the issue is not a priority, and mistrust among European leaders is real. How much faith can be placed in the contrition of a country that offers its former partners a fresh start while preparing to cast its votes for one of the architects of the rupture?

Brexit shattered the relationship between the UK and its EU partners. Negotiations were arduous, at times bruising, and strained relations among member states. Nowhere is the ambivalence more pronounced than in France. Emmanuel Macron has taken Keir Starmer under his wing. The two leaders have forged a privileged bilateral relationship. The French President is strongly in favour of resetting ties with the UK, and the British Prime Minister has become his interlocutor of choice on European defence. Paris regards London as a strategic partner and is acting accordingly. Macron and Starmer co-chair the ‘coalition of the willing’ for Ukraine and are co-ordinating the mobilisation of a naval mission to secure maritime routes through the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea.

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Yet the Franco-British relationship is not without strain. Beneath the cordiality lies suspicion. Paris refuses to allow London to enjoy the benefits of the single market without accepting its obligations. The UK has been unable to join Safe, the EU’s flagship rearmament programme, stymied by a European preference championed by France – at least 65 per cent of components must be produced within the bloc – as well as by Starmer’s reluctance to pay the entry price, a financial contribution estimated at between €4bn and €6.5bn. London’s defeat in this stand-off has underscored the difficulty of translating a political ‘reset’ into tangible integration.

All is not lost. Starmer has signalled his intention to negotiate participation in a second round of the Safe programme, should the financial terms become more ‘equitable’. A second EU-UK summit is scheduled for late June in Brussels, with the date yet to be fixed. Progress is expected on migration, with the Commission set to present a ‘Channel Plan’, as the issue has become a European one. But the Continent will press the UK to cease being “so attractive to irregular migrants”, citing its labour market, the absence of identity cards and the pull of community networks, as one European negotiator warned. Advances are also anticipated in aligning carbon markets (ETS), sanitary and phytosanitary measures (SPS), UK participation in the Erasmus programme, and the YES scheme for youth mobility.

These remain incremental steps, albeit useful ones. “We are identifying areas for co-operation. We are operating in the narrow margins between the Trade and Co-operation Agreement and Starmer’s three noes: no return to the single market, no customs union, no freedom of movement,” one negotiator explains.

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British officials have revived the idea of rejoining the single market for goods. Representatives of the 27 EU member states have unanimously rejected this notion of a ‘pragmatic Breturn’. It does not hold. The four freedoms are indivisible. British negotiators, their counterparts complain in Brussels, appear at times short of subtlety. “They no longer understand us,” comes the lament.

The reset resembles a diplomatic farce – replete with misdirection, half-truths, misunderstandings, slammed doors and sudden reversals. London seeks to escape its isolation. Continental capitals, confronted with a cooling of relations with Trump’s America, are in search of a reliable partner. Scenes of reconciliation multiply: summits, state dinners, grand declarations, smiles for the cameras.

Yet the misunderstanding endures. London appears to believe that a reset entails regaining the commercial and security advantages of EU membership without paying the full price. On the Continent, there is an expectation that the UK will finally accept EU rules and contribute financially to common projects. The result is predictable: when the moment comes to strike agreements and sign cheques, each side discovers it has been talking past the other. Doors slam, recriminations follow and disappointment prevails. The reset is a diplomatic vaudeville: frequent quarrels, regular reconciliations.

The reset is a diplomatic vaudeville: frequent quarrels, regular reconciliations

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For now, the reset has disappointed, constrained by the caution of Starmer and his Labour government. The Continent struggles to discern what, precisely, the British want. Their démarche is driven in part by the UK’s economic difficulties – Brexit has proved deeply damaging – yet the ambition of a reset is curtailed by Starmer’s red lines. The mantra ‘Brexit means Brexit’ has become a straitjacket. The EU has other priorities; in Brussels, the matter is viewed as secondary. 

European commission president Ursula von der Leyen has entrusted it to the commissioner Maroš Šefčovič, tasked with managing and deepening the EU’s global trade partnerships.

The stance that the UK has not abandoned its status as the opt-out state irritates European partners. 

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“The British must decide: either we proceed with incremental improvements, or they opt for a broader political debate on rejoining the single market and the customs union,” officials in Brussels argue.

At root lies the question of trust. What are Starmer’s chances of remaining Prime Minister until 2029, given Labour’s heavy losses in the wake of the 7 May electoral bloodbath? The British say they wish to reconnect with the EU, yet Nigel Farage, a leading architect of Brexit and an avowed Eurosceptic, tops voting intentions with his Reform UK party. A paradox – and a nightmare – for the EU.

“The British have paid to discover what Brexit entails,” says an official involved in negotiations with London. “It has plunged the country into a hole. Many now recognise the error and want to end their isolation. Yet a majority appears ready to vote for the man who put them in this predicament.” 

In that contradiction lies the essence of Europe’s bewilderment. 

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Christian Spillmann is a former AFP correspondent in Brussels and co-founder of La Matinale Européenne/Il Mattinale Europeo

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