Sir, Your leading article “Deep Freeze” (Jan 7) suggests two explanations for the Trump administration’s interest in Greenland: geopolitics and territorial expansion. I would suggest a third: domestic politics, specifically President Trump’s intention to create authoritarian conditions in the US. The illegal abduction of Nicolás Maduro is the strongest demonstration yet that Trump’s degrading of civil-military norms has yielded an officer corps ready and willing to follow unlawful orders.
The invasion of Greenland as a fait accompli military intervention would be a far more dramatic demonstration that Trump, backed by the world’s most powerful concentration of force (the Department of War), is no longer constrained by the rule of law and can use the incredible power of the military to achieve his personal ends.
Thomas Crosbie
Associate professor of military operations, Royal Danish Defence College
Sir, Nato is an alliance founded on trust between members that, if one were to be attacked, the others would rally to their defence. That trust would be broken, probably irreparably, if the US annexed Greenland by force. The structures of Nato would not disappear but the elaborate political and military organisation built up over 75 years to underpin treaty commitments with real muscle would be at grave risk of becoming a shell.
The Europeans and Canada would be left scrambling to develop other ways of working together while keeping bilateral links with the US where they could. Before it’s too late, Donald Trump should be persuaded to use the existing rights under the US-Denmark treaty to rebuild troop numbers in Greenland towards the 10,000 they had in the Cold War. The UK, France and others should deploy forces as well. Arctic security should be made a truly shared Nato endeavour.
Lord Ricketts
UK national security adviser 2010-12, London SW1
Sir, European heads of government were rightly very clear in Paris on Tuesday that Greenland’s future was for Greenland and Denmark to determine. The US does not need Greenland for its national security, as it already has treaty-based permission to install whatever defence facilities it needs there. Unilateral US action to annex the sovereign territory of another Nato member would destroy the moral and legal arguments the free world uses against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, or might wish to use in defence of Taiwan. But America’s allies have to get used to the idea that Trump believes that might is right. The challenge for them is to find ways of harnessing that might to the common good, and to show that they too have the capacity and will to act, not just to debate, when their security is at risk.
Sir Peter Westmacott
British ambassador to the US 2012-16, London SW1
Sir, If troops are indeed required to protect Greenland they should be Nato troops. This would be cheaper for the US than a takeover, although the US would need to provide the bulk of the forces, and would show Russia and China that Nato is alive and well. The only conceivable reason for the US going it alone, and thereby breaking its Nato obligations, is that it wants to seize Greenland’s minerals, just as it wants the oil in Venezuela.
Lorna Jackson
Strathtay, Perthshire
Boots in Ukraine
Sir, The undertaking by the government to contribute to a peacekeeping force in Ukraine in the event of any peace agreement is to be welcomed (“UK agrees to boots on the ground in Ukraine”, news, Jan 7). However, the task must not be underestimated. Any peacekeeping force must be able, if necessary, to fight against a further Russian advance. Given the length of the Ukrainian frontier, this will require huge numbers of troops. It will also require substantial air, artillery and logistic support over a long period of time, well beyond anything Britain and France can produce.
Even European Nato as a whole would find it difficult today. Anything less would almost invite further Russian aggression. Meanwhile, we continue to threaten a potentially formidable enemy with words rather than deeds, and the UK is now among Nato’s backsliders in adequate defence spending, with our forces continuing to decline. This is no way to embark on a most hazardous venture that could, in extremis, present an existential threat to the UK.
Vice-Admiral Sir Jeremy Blackham
Former deputy chief of defence staff, London SE13
Sir, I note with concern that Sir Keir Starmer and President Macron have committed to putting “boots on the ground” in Ukraine to help to preserve peace in a postwar scenario. In reality there is little likelihood that Russia will agree to any of the optimistic peace plans being “agreed” by European and US negotiators, not helped by the woeful lack of experience of foreign affairs and politics in the latter. Is this not yet another example of grandstanding by our prime minister?
Even if this government could negotiate a deal with bootmakers while avoiding supply scandals similar to the PPE one, I question whether we have the feet to put into those boots. The present rundown state of our armed forces could not sustain such a commitment without leaving the UK unacceptably exposed on other fronts.
Richard Mangnall
Dorchester, Dorset
Sir, Britain and France have said they “will not tolerate” further Russian aggression in Ukraine after any peace deal. Is this the same intolerance that was shown towards Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its invasion of Ukraine in 2022?
The Rev Dr Peter Mullen
Eastbourne
Driving reforms
Sir, David Argent (letter, Jan 7) seems to be unaware of the welter of evidence showing that even small amounts of alcohol impairs a person’s ability to drive. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, in its response to Sir Peter North’s review on drink and drug-driving, concluded: “There is strong evidence that someone’s ability to drive is affected if they have any alcohol in their blood.” The question is not whether tinkering with the existing legal limit is appropriate, but whether we should adopt a “zero tolerance” approach to drink-driving. The message from the research could not be clearer.
Dr David Jeffrey
West Malvern, Worcs
Sir, All drivers should have a regular eye test. How many under 70s are driving with undiagnosed conditions such as diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma or early macular degeneration?
Dr Alan Grundy
Surbiton, Surrey
Sir, As someone over 70 I strongly support the plan to make eyesight tests for the over 70s compulsory. However, who will ensure that the prescribed glasses are being worn? I know of many people, some much younger than me, who won’t wear glasses for reasons of vanity.
Barry Malin
Barmby Moor, East Riding
Sir, It’s hard to argue against the proposed regulations being introduced to improve road safety. There is a further measure that would definitely reduce road deaths. The most dangerous drivers are young men, so the legal driving age for men should be raised to 20. I speak as someone of 83 who remembers how he drove at 18.
Peter Fattorini
Conistone, N Yorks
Prostate procedure
Sir, Giles Coren (Notebook, Jan 6) suggests that he may receive superior treatment in Harley Street for an image-guided biopsy of his prostate than he would get on the NHS. He claims that a Harley Street MRI system may provide “higher definition” and suggests that the NHS uses “something more like a 1970s Xerox machine”. In fact many MRI machines in the NHS are of the very highest specification, particularly in centres of excellence where radiologists, radiographers, nurses and physicists, working with specialist urologists, have developed the very technique that he is about to undergo. Indeed, it is highly likely that members of the team that he is seeing in the private sector have been trained at such NHS centres of excellence.
Adrian Dixon
Emeritus professor of radiology, Cambridge
Winter warmer
Sir, A design feature of housing to mitigate the discomfort of cold snaps in the weather has been lost over the centuries. Our home, built in the early 1600s, has a door at the bottom of the stairs that, when closed, prevents warm air downstairs from rising by simple convection to the bedrooms. It was striking this morning to feel the difference in temperature either side of the door.
Timothy Rimmer
Stamford
Online hospitals
Sir, Further to your report “‘Online hospital’ will see patients at home” (Jan 6), making a diagnosis depends on taking a history, examining the patient and if necessary arranging appropriate investigations. How will specialists “anywhere in England” treat patients with nine common conditions (including menstrual disorders, iron deficiency anaemia, inflammatory bowel disease, cataracts, macular degeneration, glaucoma and prostate problems) without examining the patient and making the correct diagnosis? I despair.
David Thrush ret’d neurologist
Newton Ferrers, Devon
Sir, The guideline by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence still recommends digital rectal examination (DRE) as part of a thorough assessment of prostate symptoms, something that cannot be done online. Even if you do away with the DRE in favour of scans, at some point this person will need to be examined. The online appointment is an extra appointment, not a saved appointment. My concern is that later examination will mean therapeutic delay, and will cost lives.
Dr Rachel Turner
GP, Overton, Hants
Shooting of hares
Sir, I suspect there will be many others who, like me, will have been shocked to learn that brown hares remain the only game species in England and Wales that can be shot all the year round (news, Jan 3). You report that the government has pledged to right this “wrong” in its animal welfare strategy. It is to be hoped that, like the hare, ministers will be fleet of foot in changing the law.
John Cotton
Wingrave, Bucks
Stung in devotion
Sir, Like Mark Lowe (letter, Jan 7), I suffered an early January wasp sting. In my case, the offender was hibernating in a deep corduroy trouser pocket and I disturbed it reaching for a handkerchief during a particularly solemn moment during Sunday Mass. I narrowly avoided profanity, and also crushed the beast.
Ben Cooper
Barrowden, Rutland
Transport of prayer
Sir, Our disabled son, when in church, enjoys loudly reciting his own version of the Lord’s Prayer (letter, Jan 5): “Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our bus passes.” This always cheers me up.
The Rev Claire Wilson
London NW3
Dormant wisdom
Sir, The 19th-century psychologist William James had a similar experience to that of the TV host Richard Madeley, who thought he had found the meaning of life in a dream, although perhaps James’s vision was nearer to the truth (TMS, Jan 6). He woke up after a deep sleep, possibly enhanced by nitrous oxide, to find that he had written that the secret of life was: “Hogamus, higamous/ Man is polygamous/ Higamus, hogamous/ Woman monogamous.” Well, it was the 19th century.
Dr Jonathan Bird
Clifton, Bristol
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