Shortly before Christmas in 1984, Margaret Thatcher famously declared her liking of Mikhail Gorbachev, insisting “we can do business together”. Just three months after their historic London meeting, “the great reformer” became leader of the Soviet Union.
Together with the US’s then-president Ronald Reagan, the three plotted the ending of the Cold War. By the end of the decade, the Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain had fallen, Europe was being dramatically reshaped as the USSR dissolved and modern Ukraine emerged from the geopolitical maelstrom.
Roll forward 40 years from that historic meeting and Sir Keir Starmer finds himself in a strangely similar, albeit far more complex, position. Like the Iron Lady, the current Prime Minister is having to do “business” with a president to bring about global peace.
But rather than the Russian leader, it’s the supposed leader of the Free World who Sir Keir is negotiating with. Donald Trump’s “shock and awe” start to his presidency, coupled with his allegiance with Vladimir Putin, ripped up the rule book and left the world order, in place since 1945, teetering on the brink.
As well as trying to broker peace in Ukraine, the PM, along with French President Emmanuel Macron, is having to act as a transatlantic bridge to shore up America’s long-term commitment to European security.
The future of NATO as we know it is in jeopardy and we now have the previously unthinkable situation of America siding with Russia and North Korea at the United Nations vote on ending the Ukrainian conflict.
The saloon bar diplomacy of last week’s infamous White House bust-up between Mr Trump, his vice-president JD Vance, and Volodymyr Zelensky was indicative of how the tectonic plates are shifting.
So how did we reach this point and what happens next?
Following his stunning comeback victory in the US election, few would have been surprised that Mr Trump was intent on shaking things up during his second crack at the presidency.
The Republican strongman eventually rumbled into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC, during a January deep freeze, immediately signing a blizzard of executive orders that signaled he meant business.
But it was his unexpected call with Putin on February 12 which really sent shockwaves around the world as he offered the Kremlin tyrant a way back in from the cold.
Putin’s decision to launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 had turned him into a pariah, with the UN overwhelmingly adopting a resolution condemning Russia for its “unlawful use of force against Ukraine.”
Russia was hit by thousands of international sanctions.
The following year, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for the Kremlin leader.
As for the president of the United States – then Joe Biden – he left no doubt of what he thought of his Russian counterpart, condemning Putin as a “murderous dictator” and a “pure thug”.
There were no more telephone calls between Putin and Mr Biden.
Fast forward to 2025 and “that” call.
Mr Trump said he wants to “work together, very closely” with Putin to end the war in Ukraine. He hopes they will be “visiting each other’s nations”.
Clearly, so does Putin, who invited Mr Trump to Moscow.
If that visit goes ahead, it will signify a major shift in US-Russian relations. An American president has not visited Russia for more than a decade.
In many ways, Putin has already got what he wants – the chance to negotiate directly with the United States on Ukraine as well as the opportunity to put himself at the top table of international politics.
It remains unclear, though, how far Putin will be willing to compromise.
Russian officials claim Moscow is ready for talks but always refer back to Putin’s so-called peace proposal of June 2024.
Under that plan, Russia would get to keep all the Ukrainian territory it had seized, plus some more land still under Ukrainian control.
On top of that, Ukraine would not be allowed to join NATO, and Western sanctions against Russia would be scrapped.
Central to all of this is the rollercoaster relationship between the US president and Mr Zelensky.
The Ukrainian leader lavished praise on Mr Trump in the aftermath of his election victory.
But relations soured after the Putin call, with Mr Zelensky saying Mr Trump is living in a “disinformation space” fuelled by Russia.
Mr Trump fired back, branding the Ukrainian war hero a “dictator”.
Cue Mr Macron and Sir Keir, who launched an extraordinary charm offensive on the notoriously unpredictable commander-in-chief.
The Prime Minister, in particular, appeared to have won over Mr Trump, with a personal invitation from King Charles for an unprecedented second state visit to the UK kick-starting an unlikely bromance between the two leaders.
No 10 was relieved and quietly confident in equal measure following the Prime Minister’s visit to the White House.
But this was blown out of the water less than 24 hours later, when Mr Trump and Mr Vance had an astonishing Oval Office slanging match with Mr Zelensky – saying he risked inciting World War 3 if he didn’t sign a peace deal.
On his way back home, the Ukrainian leader stopped in London as Sir Keir convened European leaders for an emergency summit on the crisis.
With tensions sky-high, the PM put on a very public show of unity with r Zelensky, insisting Britain would always have his back.
But the fallout from the White House bust-up spilled into this week, with Mr Trump pausing military aid and intelligence to Ukraine and threatening to kick out 240,000 Ukrainian refugees from the US. He is reportedly planning to revoke their legal status.
On Tuesday, Mr Zelensky offered an olive branch to the US president.
In a conciliatory message, the Ukrainian leader said he “really valued” the US’s support and was “ready to work under President Trump’s strong leadership to get a peace that lasts”.
It came shortly after a phone call with Sir Keir in which the Prime Minister warned him he had to rebuild relations with the US to save his country.
Mr Zelensky, who is said to be poised to sign a minerals deal with the US, described the Oval Office row as “regrettable”.
The relentlessness and pace of change in Washington has been dizzying.
Europe is scrambling to react effectively.
There has been a frenzy of diplomatic activity: bilateral, late-night leader phone calls, European huddles in London and in Paris, meetings of NATO defence ministers in Brussels. An emergency security summit of EU leaders was held on Thursday.
It is a huge moment in European history.
Most European countries believe the security of all of Europe, not only the sovereignty of Ukraine, is at stake – with Russia looking to dismantle the Western-facing balance of power, in place since the end of the Cold War.
Washington, which has had Europe’s back in terms of security and defence since World War 2, now appears “not to care about the fate of Europe”, according to the man poised to be the next leader of the continent’s biggest economy, Friedrich Merz of Germany.
As the week draws to a close, and the likelihood of peace talks between Mr Zelensky and the US in Saudi Arabia next week, Sir Keir continues to drum up support for a four-point plan to end the war and defend the country from Russia.
Part of this could mean 20 countries supporting a “coalition of the willing” to keep peace in Ukraine. Ultimately, Mr Trump is a businessman and he wants a good deal for his own country.
That’s why he wants access to Ukrainian minerals, to get some of the US war money back.
And that’s why he wants NATO countries to beef up their defence budgets, like the UK has done.
The US has filled the yawning gaps in European defence, left by years of chronic under-investment after the end of the Cold War.
The number of troops in Europe diminished with the end of conscription in most European countries.
The US has roughly 100,000 troops and nuclear weapons in various parts of Europe under NATO’s nuclear sharing policy.
Many of them are in non-nuclear, major European power Germany, which fears being severely exposed to Russia should Mr Trump withdraw support.
If the UK and France manage to assemble the “coalition of the willing” – European countries that accept to send even a modest number of peacekeeping troops into Ukraine once a ceasefire is agreed – that could stretch European armies and expose gaps in NATO defences.
It’s not just NATO and the UN that could be changed forever but also geographical maps.
Mr Trump maintains he wants Greenland and the border of Ukraine will inevitably look different.
Then there are his threats of slapping tariffs on the EU, China, Canada and Mexico, heralding the prospect of an ugly and damaging trade war.
Britain is in a relatively strong position in all of this thanks to Brexit and the enduring “special relationship” we have with the US.But as former Trump whisperer Karen Pierce noted this week, there is no “standard definition” of the special relationship and the US is not “sentimental” about it.
The UK’s former ambassador to the US said: “I think it is in America’s interests. They’re not sentimental about it. I think we fool ourselves if we think they are sentimental.”
Security and defence are the “bedrock” of the relationship, she said.
And here lies the nub of all this, “America’s interests”.
But as another diplomatic source told me, Sir Keir, Mr Macron and Mr Trump – a 21st century version of the Thatcher, Reagan and Gorbachev Love Troika – need to ensure that the outcome puts “global interests first”.
