Has Daniel Hannan joined the 'anti-Trump Eurosphere'?

“Trump has betrayed Ukraine, making the world immeasurably more dangerous,” ran the headline in the Daily Telegraph this weekend over its latest offering from Tory peer and star columnist Daniel Hannan. “No US president has done more to make the West weak again than the current incumbent,” it went on. “It will take decades to repair the damage.”

Hannan was fuming over Trump’s invitation to Vladimir Putin to take part in bilateral talks in Alaska this coming week and the likelihood he will agree to the ceding of Ukrainian territory to Russia. “From the moment he took office, Trump has been wheedling and conciliatory with Putin, aggressive and bullying with Volodymyr Zelensky,” he wrote. “Whatever his motives, Trump has behaved exactly as a Russian asset would, not only vis-à-vis Ukraine, but also by making aggressive territorial claims against Denmark and threatening Canada with annexation.”

The ardent Brexiteer concluded his article by writing that “when Putin gets to keep the better part of his spoils, and furious Ukrainians eject their regime, every tinpot dictator in the world will get the message. Nato, the most powerful alliance on the planet, would not protect one of its friends. The old order is over. The world of the Atlantic Charter has gone. Something altogether colder and darker is on its way.”

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Perhaps Hannan should direct some of his anger at another Daily Telegraph columnist who, just six months ago, penned an article headlined ‘We can’t let Labour drag us back into the shrinking orbit of the anti-Trump Eurosphere’, arguing that “Britain can no longer avoid the choice between the EU and US” and urging the government to ditch its erstwhile European allies and getting fully on board the Trump train.

“The US economy is outperforming Europe’s on every metric,” wrote the columnist. “American freedom and innovation is plainly working better than EU regulation and censorship. And, indeed, Brexit Britain has taken some tentative steps to align with the US on issues such as AI, as well as seeking a comprehensive trade deal.”

And the name of this sage? Baron Hannan of Kingsclere, aka, er, Daniel Hannan.