A global catastrophe made in the White House

The Iran war is Trump's greatest blunder - and his reputation will not recover

You probably won't agree with all of Mr Embery's policy prescriptions, but he will force you to think outside your usual political grooves — Wall Street Journal

Photo: The White House, via Wikimedia Commons

I WAS ONE of the few people on the political left who did not recoil in horror on either occasion that Donald Trump was elected as US president. I didn’t like the man and, if I were American, wouldn’t have voted for him. I found him crude, obnoxious and oafish. I still do.

But on some of the big questions confronting the West, he was undoubtedly on the right side of the argument. He understood the importance of the nation state and sovereignty. He saw that mass and uncontrolled immigration could be economically and socially disruptive. He spoke the language of reindustrialisation and was willing to face down the green zealots. He had no time for woke dogma and recognised the damage and divisions it had caused. He promised an end to US-inspired ‘forever wars’ which had caused death and mayhem across the globe. And he represented, for many, a welcome counterweight to the doctrine of technocratic liberal internationalism that had come to dominate Western political institutions. All of that was rather refreshing.