Starmer and Macron step up to shape European security as Trump roils relations
LONDON (AP) — The leaders of Britain and France are spearheading a desperate diplomatic drive to shore up Europe’s security, bolster Ukraine’s defenses and ensure the Trump administration doesn’t seek a ceasefire on terms that reward Moscow for invading its neighbor.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer and President Emmanuel Macron have been thrust to the fore by a U.S. administration that has embraced Moscow and derided Kyiv. Strikingly, their efforts are taking place outside the major institutions that have helped order Europe for decades: the EU and NATO.
“We are at a crossroads in history,” a somber Starmer said after a summit Sunday that he convened in support of Kyiv, three years into a grinding war.
A week of stunning reversals
Starmer spoke after a dizzying week in which Ukraine and its allies went from hope to gloom to grim resolve.
Diplomatic efforts to shore up American support for Kyiv appeared to be paying off as first Macron and then Starmer flew to Washington for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump. The meetings were cordial and Trump took a softer tone toward Ukraine, though he would not commit to providing U.S. security guarantees for Kyiv as part of a negotiated peace.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy agreed to sign a deal granting the U.S. access to rare earth minerals that, Kyiv and its allies hoped, would bind the countries closer together. But then came Friday’s extraordinary on-camera berating of Zelenskyy by Trump and Vice President JD Vance, who accused Ukraine’s leader of being insufficiently grateful for U.S. support. Zelenskyy was asked to leave the White House without signing the deal.
Starmer had already invited Zelenskyy, Macron and more than a dozen other leaders to London for a Sunday debrief. It now became a crisis summit. Starmer told them that European nations “must do the heavy lifting” to protect the continent’s security.
In addition to boosting defense spending, that means increasing support for Ukraine, drawing up a peace plan with Kyiv at its heart and bolstering Ukraine’s defenses after a ceasefire. As part of that plan, France and the U.K. are working to recruit other countries to send troops to Ukraine to protect a ceasefire in what Starmer calls a “coalition of the willing.”
In a stunning shift from just a few weeks ago, when the United States’ leading role in Ukraine was taken for granted, Starmer said “the U.K., France and others will work with Ukraine on a plan to stop the fighting” — and only then discuss it with the United States.
A new European order?
Neither the EU nor NATO — two pillars of the postwar European order — are well placed to help Ukraine forge a path forward right now.
The EU is due to hold a summit on Ukraine on Thursday, but efforts to support Kyiv are constrained by the 27-nation bloc’s need for unanimity. Hungary’s pro-Russia Prime Minister Viktor Orban is playing spoiler, opposing draft conclusions that center on the defense of Ukraine and its place at the negotiating table and urging the EU to follow “the example of the United States” and start direct discussions with Russia.
NATO, meanwhile, is facing a transatlantic rift as its most important member, the U.S., is led by a president who has long questioned the value of the alliance and now is pushing for a quick ceasefire that Ukraine and its allies fear will favor Russia.
Into the breach have stepped age-old frenemies, Britain and France — Europe’s only nuclear powers apart from Russia.
Their two leaders both face major domestic problems. Macron has no majority in parliament. Starmer won a a landslide election victory in July but faces a sluggish economy and plummeting popularity.
They make a contrasting team — Macron outspoken, Starmer more reticent. Macron has strongly criticized Trump’s statements that echo Russia’s narrative and American moves to negotiate with Moscow while sidelining Ukraine. Starmer talks of being a bridge between Europe and the U.S. administration and has refrained from directly criticizing Trump.
But they agree on the importance of supporting Ukraine against Russia in this moment — and there aren’t a lot of other leaders who could fill the role. Germany, the other EU heavyweight along with France, is in between leaders as the winner of recent elections, Friedrich Merz, works to form a coalition.
Macron has long called for Europe to take more responsibility for its own defense, and was the first leader to suggest European troops could be deployed to Ukraine after a ceasefire.
Pushing the narrative again, Macron suggested on Sunday that France and the U.K. were proposing a partial 30-day truce that would see fighting stop “in the air, on the seas and energy infrastructures.”
Starmer’s spokesman cautioned that is only one of “various options on the table,” and Macron’s office acknowledged there is no agreement yet on details.
A bridge to nowhere?
In some ways, it’s an extraordinary match-up five years after Britain left the European Union.
But even as testing times draw Britain closer to its European neighbors, Starmer still speaks of being a transatlantic “bridge.” He insisted Sunday that the U.S. remains an “indispensable” partner for Europe and that any Ukraine peace deal “must have strong U.S. backing.” British Defense Secretary John Healey plans to fly to Washington this week for talks with his U.S. counterpart Pete Hegseth.
“We must strengthen our relationship with America,” Starmer told lawmakers on Monday. “We will never choose between either side of the Atlantic.”
For many Britons and Europeans, that is currently an unpopular sentiment. But Leslie Vinjamuri, director of the U.S. and Americas program at the Chatham House think tank, said Starmer “understands the incredible significance of this moment for keeping the U.S. engaged.”
“The short-term urgent imperative is to keep America in, and to work with the U.S. to manage the future of a ceasefire, of a deal, of Ukraine’s position in Europe,” she said. “What’s the alternative?”
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Associated Press writers Sylvie Corbet in Paris and Raf Casert in Brussels contributed to this story.
By JILL LAWLESS
Associated Press
