Don’t mourn for NATO, it’s already dead

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0:42A US withdrawal would defang NATO. It would be a truly enormous moment in the history of post-war Europe. Vladimir Putin is having the best day of his life right now. NATO is the single most effective military alliance the world has ever seen. And it has kept us safe for many decades. And we are fully committed to NATO. Secondly, that whatever the pressure on me and others, whatever the noise, I'm going to act in the British national interest in all the decisions that I make. And that's why I've been absolutely clear that this is not our war, or we're not going to get dragged into it. But I'm equally clear that when it comes to defence and security and our economic future, we have to have closer tries with Europe.

1:33That is Keir Starmer this morning extolling the virtues of NATO and what it has done and what it has brought and the stability it has given. But the noises coming from the other side of the Atlantic suggest that someone else thinks that NATO is done. Trump told The Telegraph this morning when asked if he'd reconsider the US's membership of NATO, oh yes, I'd say it's beyond reconsideration. Is he actually about to pull out? Welcome to The News Agents.

2:11The News Agents. It's John. It's Malis. It's Goodall. Lewis Goodall. Since we're doing surnames, I just thought... Shaken or stirred? Well, I think a bit of both, actually. We're all a bit shaken this morning, frankly. OK, well, James Bond would struggle to rescue the situation that we currently find ourselves in because Donald Trump overnight has kind of gone further than he's done before in just saying that he thinks that NATO is nothing. It's a paper tiger. It doesn't step up when America needs it. Leaving to one side that this was a defensive alliance that has only ever invoked Article 5 once.

2:45And that was when America came under attack after 9-11. and Donald Trump is clearly positioning America to pull the United States out of NATO, which is extraordinary. It would require legislation. It's a treaty obligation of the United States. So there would have to be legislation passed through Congress to take America out of NATO. It's not a simple we're out, we're off. Given the fact that Donald Trump rules over Congress and they didn't do anything to stand up to him, it probably would happen. Yeah. I mean, look, this follows hot on the heels of him lambasting his allies yesterday with those famous sort of Arnie words.

3:27I'll be back. I won't forget this. I'll remember. And it turns out that Trump loves his vengeance served hot. So it's not a question of whether he's going to forget or remember. He's actually talking to the Telegraph now and saying this is coming. This is coming down the line at you. And if you want to get a sense, I mean, I was trying to work out like, what are people thinking about this? What is what is at the heart of this? And I clicked on an article this morning called What Does NATO Actually Stand For? It just said North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's not wrong. It's not wrong, which is maybe where we ought to start, because we do bandy around a lot of these terms and we talk about defence.

4:09And I guess it is helpful to understand the sort of construct of NATO broadly, which is 32 countries. I think 32 member states, 30 of them are European. And then there's the US and Canada. Right. So it is a North Atlantic Treaty organisation. And the whole purpose of it is to come to the defence of each other. If they're attacked. In the face of war or opposition or attack. Exactly. It was looking to contain the Soviet at a time when things were very, very precarious towards the end of the Second World. Yeah. And it has been the cornerstone. It's no exaggeration to say. I mean, Starmer's right.

4:45It has been the most effective security alliance in the history of the Western world, the history of the world, arguably. And it has been the cornerstone of Western security, our security since the end of the Second World War, initially, as you say, Emily, against the Soviet Union. But also, obviously, NATO, it's coming up in the context of Iran now, because Trump, as we were saying yesterday, is so piqued that in his mind, we've not been there for the United States. Why should he and they be there for us? but obviously is deeply embedded in the Ukraine war because one of the origins of the Ukraine war is that NATO has been expanding eastwards since the end of the Cold War.

5:22It has taken in many of the old states of the former Warsaw Pact in or adjacent to the Soviet Union. Many of those countries like Poland, for example, the Baltic states are now in NATO. And Putin has long argued that that is encroachment on his borders and on Russian borders. And that is one of the origins of the Ukraine war because Ukraine, Zelenskyy, wanted to join NATO. So a US withdrawal, they are the linchpin of the alliance. They provide the bulk of the military power. A US withdrawal would defang NATO. It would be a truly enormous moment in the history of post-war Europe. Because for the first time since the end of the Second World War, and really, really since during the Second World War, since American entry anyway into the Second World War, Europe would be without the US defence umbrella.

6:10and there is therefore be a massive question mark as to whether Putin would choose to use that moment, this unique moment when he knows that the Americans are not going to be there for us to try and pressure or puncture or make an incursion somewhere else on the EU's or NATO states, eastern frontier, the Baltic states or wherever it happens to be. And just, you know, you talked about the success of NATO and it just is worth underscoring that, that since the Second World War, you know, from kind of 1945 onwards, there has been peace in Europe on a continent which has seen endless wars in the previous 150 years, the Napoleonic Wars and then the Franco-Prussian Wars, all of that, and the First World War, obviously, and then the Second World War and the carnage that brought.

6:59And the only thing that you've had within Europe until the Russia invasion of Ukraine was the breakup of Yugoslavia, which was very bloody, And that did cause a civil war within Yugoslavia. And NATO came to the rescue then. Yeah. And NATO did come to the rescue to a certain extent in terms of, you know, forces in Kosovo and the like. Then you come to the present day. The sole ambition of Vladimir Putin is to undermine the solidity of the Western alliance. And look at what's happening. I mean, it's just if you're Vladimir Putin and you're sitting in the Kremlin today and you're seeing the price of Russian oil go up because of Donald Trump's war in Iran.

7:42And you're thinking happy days and you're seeing Donald Trump saying, I'm going to bust up NATO even happier days. Vladimir Putin is having the best day of his life right now with the stuff that Donald Trump has enacted and is saying and the direction of travel right now is just every Russian dream come true. Look, we used to laugh at all the kind of conspiracy theories that suggested that Trump was actually a Russian agent because of all the Putin compromise. And I'm not going to go down there as to the veracity of that. But if you look at where we were a year ago more, when Trump came into office and said, I'm going to end the Ukraine war on day one, right?

8:22That's what I'm going to do. I'm going to be the peacemaker. I'm going to be the one that tells Putin to end his war with Ukraine. And you look at where we are today. Arguably, Trump could not have done more to weaken the entire Western Hemisphere and to embolden Putin. I mean, it's as simple as that. If you are looking at the world one year on, He hasn't created peace. He has created war and he's left all of us more vulnerable. And I just think, is that actually a legacy that he would be happy to go away with? And would would those around him, would would the rest of America be happy with that?

9:03Because, yes, OK, at the moment, Putin's on our doorstep, right? He's on Ukraine's doorstep. He's on Finland's doorstep. He's on Poland and Estonia's doorstep. But actually, if Putin is then emboldened to a place where it's Putin and China organising the world because America's just left the scene, that's not so great for everyone else. The thing is, is that I mean, I felt this for a while anyway, but I think the Iran war has has taken it to a place where it's even more certain and even more black and white. Everyone's talking now. Is he going to withdraw from NATO? Does he have the legal power to withdraw from NATO?

9:35So you're right, John, he can't actually do it alone. The US Constitution is pretty murky on whether he can do it alone anyway. It's a treaty obligation. Congress would probably have to get involved. And actually, I actually think just in terms of the votes, I don't actually think he would even be able to get it through Congress if he actually tried, even though he does have tremendous power over the Republican Party. I think the numbers in Congress are so dicey that there would just about be enough resistance within Congress to withdraw it. But he doesn't have to do that. He doesn't have to do it.

10:00Because ultimately, Trump can destroy NATO with a single sentence, which is he just says, look, whatever the legal position, if an Eastern European state, a NATO state, were to be invaded, I ain't going to be there. And he is basically there already. He said that. Fully enough, he said that. I don't know if you remember, but in 2015, and it was an interview that the New York Times did when they asked him if he would respect Article 5, which has come to the defence of all... He probably didn't know what Article 5 was. Well, they put it very clearly. Would you come to the defence of a Baltic state?

10:32And I think he said no at the time. So there is a, weirdly, there is a consistency to his hatred of NATO and to his fact that America first means sod the lot of you. There absolutely is. And that's the thing. This is not coming out of nowhere. And, you know, this has been going on for 10 years now. This was a huge point of concern during the first Trump administration. I remember Theresa May going over and her first visit and coaxing him to say, Mr. President, well, you're supportive of NATO. So this is definitely building on a very, you know, long running, consistent point of scepticism that Trump has had.

11:03But this is clearly taking it one step further, because as we were saying in a show yesterday, Trump's contention has long been that he thinks that this is an asymmetric deal, the sort of deal that he loathes, which is basically he's there for Europe, but Europe's never there for us. He thinks that this current crisis is proof positive of that. Now, as we were saying yesterday, that is illogical because in this situation, he's not Ukraine. He's Putin. He's the one who is launching the illegal war or the special military operations, to use his exact term. Right. But nonetheless, that is how Trump sees it.

11:35And so I just think that if you're at a point now where he's basically saying it is beyond reconsideration, I think that this just brings us to a point to which we have long been coming, which is whatever the legal situation is. Who in Europe now, who, you know, us here, sat in Europe, or if you're sat in Eastern Europe or whatever, do you seriously think if Putin were to launch an invasion of Riga or Tallinn or Helsinki tomorrow, who seriously believes that Trump is 100 % certain, 90 % certain, 50 % certain, 25 % certain to come to those countries' aid? And as soon as you're asking that question, then it's over anyway.

12:09NATO's over anyway, at least for the time being. And I think what is so striking as well is you would have thought that in normal circumstances, European leaders would have been thinking, oh, my God, actually, we're going to have to get behind America. We're going to have to do what they say, because if we want NATO to survive, we've got to be with them. And instead of which, a sense that European leaders are moving further away from America the more this goes on. Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor, was on Jeremy Vine's show on the BBC this morning. Have they listened to her language? We now have that stability which has enabled inflation and interest rates to come down.

12:49I'm angry that Donald Trump has chosen to go to war in the Middle East, a war that there's not a clear plan of how to get out of. It's why we didn't want to enter this. Yes, it will have implications for our economy. I get that. We are monitoring very closely what's happening, trying to bring the oil and gas into the UK so that those supplies are there and to try and get the prices down. If you think of the language that the British government used, the ministers were using day in, day out to describe the Trump administration in the first year. The idea that you would have a minister standing up and saying, I am angry about what Donald Trump has done.

13:29I mean, if you think of what Rachel Reeves has had to contend with in terms of tariffs, she would always say, oh, no, it's for America to decide what it wants to do. We're going to try and look after Britain. We're going to mitigate, but we're not going to. Yeah, never tried, never offered a word of criticism. Now the British government is saying we're angry at what Donald Trump has chosen to do. Yeah. And if you look at the sort of trends in the forecast from the spring statement, you see why she's angry. But I would say there's this weird kind of silver lining emerging for parts of the government that are EU focused because Starmer has come out and said, and I think in the strongest language that we've heard so far, we need stronger ties now.

14:11He said Europe, not the EU. It's increasingly clear that as the world continues down this volatile path, our long-term interest requires closer partnership with our allies in Europe and with the European Union. So there will be some who are kind of hailing this as a blessed relief, frankly, that the blinkers have gone off. Those members of government who kept on going, oh, Trump's fine. It's fine. It's all going to be fine. He loves me. He fancies my wife or whatever, you know, was the narrative of the first year. We've got this. Don't worry. We'll be fine. And now they're kind of going, hello, like Trump has left the reservation, as one sort of former NATO person said to me last night.

14:52That is the feeling. Trump has left the reservation. In other words, we're on our own. And this is when you really need to work out who your allies are. And right now, that's Europe and possibly the EU. It does feel like both for Britain and for European governments that this is a sort of new stage in a decade long story of handling Trump. because I think we'd say right up until this crisis, the prevailing view, we talked about it a lot last year, is that you basically do whatever you can. You ignore him when he's sort of sounding off against you. You hold his hand. You do a state visit. Yeah, you do another state visit.

15:26Yeah, exactly. That was, you know, you remember all of last year, right up until very recently, Starmoor was repeatedly asked this question about US or Europe. And his fundamental contention was there is no choice. It is US and Europe. You wouldn't hear him say that now. And likewise with European governments. And by the way, I don't necessarily think that's a failure on Starmer's part. I can understand why he tried and they tried because the Americans are so fundamental or have been so fundamental to European security for 10 years now during the first Trump term. That has been the approach. Now you've got a situation where the Italians, the Spanish, you know, other European governments are now outright denying the use of bases to the Americans.

16:07You see what Rachel Reeves has said there. It feels like this is a real fork in the road. My question is, is whether the Europeans, ourselves included, are serious enough to seize what could be an opportunity out of this crisis, which is to finally get real about pan-European defence. It probably will take a crisis like this to do it, but you've still got two big problems. One is the same problem there's always been, which is the old Henry Kissinger problem, is who do I call when I want to speak to Europe? because the fact is, we're so many different competing member states who even when we were in the EU found it difficult to sort of reach consensus on foreign policy matters and defence matters.

16:44That's number one. Number two is, we've got to do this at a moment when Europe is heading into the worst energy crisis since the 1970s and possibly ever. Right now, the EU, Ursula von der Leyen yesterday, the EU Commission President, was talking about needing to have energy conservation measures throughout Europe. In Europe, in Brussels right now, as they are talking about in Australia and in East Asia, they're talking about almost energy-style lockdowns, you know, having to impose conservation. Stay at home today if you want to drive tomorrow. Work from home, all of this sort of stuff. So to deal with that problem and potential economic tsunami and then get serious about pan-continental defence, that is a scale of challenge we haven't seen for a decade.

17:24Just before, I know you're going to wrap this, but I was speaking to one EU foreign minister about a month ago and I said, is it time for, you know, your countries and others to start pivoting away from America to Canada? And like everyone laughed, right? Because it's like Canada's got no military, they've got no nuclear, they're not a substitute for America. But then after the laugh, he kind of went, well, yes, I think that is where we're looking now. So I think to your point, it's not just Europe on its own with defence. There are other, you know, there is a strong Canada under Mark Carney. There is kind of Australia, even Japan now, you know, I mean, there are places where you can rethink a body that is about defence that maybe doesn't focus entirely on America.

18:07Well, all that European army stuff don't sound too bad now, does it? But this is the ridiculous position that Britain now finds itself in. You know, 10 years after Brexit, here we are with a crisis having bet that we would have the close relationship with the Americans. And that there would be free trade that would, you know, be a great supporter and all of this. and neither of those bets have come right and we're out of the European Union therefore we're struggling to get European defence agreements and America doesn't love us anymore We used to think our big problem was chlorinated chicken Turns out it's slightly bigger Do you remember all those people who told us that Donald Trump would be our best friend Yeah, even I'm old that Donald Trump would be our best friend and it would be great news for Britain and Joe Biden hated us Well, it's early days Three years to go In a moment we'll be back with a special investigation by Andy Hughes from the Crime Agents on a terrifying story about unregulated children's homes and what little is being done to clamp down on them.

19:10From a range of trusted voices and award-winning journalists. Good morning, I'm Nick Ferrari. It's time to get to your calls. Find out the latest news and hear every side of the story. We're dealing with some people that I find to be very reasonable, very solid. We have a very serious chance of making a deal. The day on which almost all of the world recognized that Donald Trump is a deranged liar. So what on earth happens next? The fallout of the Iran war. Follow it live on LBC. Listen on our free global player app or the LBC app. This is Bethany Frankel from Just Be With Bethany Frankel. Let me be blunt.

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20:34The News Agents. We want to bring you an investigation right now that Andy Hughes of the Crime Agents has been working on for, what, nearly four months now, Andy. And this goes to a big question, which is about kids in care. At any one point in the UK, there are an estimated 100 ,000 kids, young people living in care. It's too big a number in the first place. And it can be all types of care. It can be homes. It can be accommodation. It can be quite often accommodation that is not fit for purpose. But the stuff that you found out takes this whole question and this whole predicament of children in care onto a totally different level because you've discovered what 800 care homes operating illegally completely illegally that's right it was back in december where i spoke to a contact who works in the care system and he told me that um he was aware of illegal care homes which are unregistered and unregulated most care well all care homes have to be registered with Ofsted so care homes that aren't are illegal and it's a criminal offence to run one and he told me that many of these homes are employing convicted criminals to care for the children which obviously absolutely horrified me so I started off on this journey and the first thing I did was reach out to several people who work in the care system as well as local authorities now i contacted several local authorities to to ask them did do you know about this issue they came back to me every single one of them said no we're not aware of any illegal care homes so um i teamed up with the bureau of investigative journalism and what we did was we looked into this and we've discovered that there There are more than 800 illegal care homes in the UK.

22:39Andy, can I just ask you? I don't understand how they get their money. If they're illegal and they're not Ofsted regulated, where do they get their money from to run? They are getting their money from local authorities. So the demand for vulnerable children to be homed is so vast that there aren't enough registered care homes. There's not enough space. so what they're doing is they're shipping them out to pop-up care homes that's what they are unregulated and they're exploiting a legal loophole where a child can only be sent there for a maximum of 28 days but i've heard many stories where a lot of these kids are going into these care homes and they're just being lost in the system no one's checking up on them no one's checking if they're gone by day 29 they're just there and what we've found out is that these illegal care homes they're dotted absolutely everywhere what I wanted to do was find out who was actually looking after these kids and then I heard from someone who told me about a horrific case in the northeast and this was a care home in a small sleepy village in county Durham so I went up there to find out more and what I discovered was that this was just a normal home just on a normal street looked entirely unfit for purpose and I discovered that a 15 year old girl who was shipped there 300 miles away from her home in South Wales because her report said she was at high risk of sexual exploitation she was moved into this home and in this home there was two carers there who looked after her and these two carers were ex-military and they both had criminal convictions for violence one of them for violence against a woman and what these two carers did was they drugged this young girl and they assault sexually assaulted her over several several hours leaving her with horrific injuries now what happened was these two carers they were arrested and then they were later jailed for a combined total of 20 years.

24:52But what I wanted to find out was who was running this care home and who employed them. And I discovered that documents showed that this care home was being run by a company called Map Adventures. And the person running this company was a man called Paul McCrory. He is also an ex-serviceman. So what I wanted to do was find out where he was. I discovered he was in Cyprus. frankly the plan was to travel to cyprus and what we call doorstep and confront him about this but legally what you have to do is you have to reach out to them and offer them a right to reply an interview and to my astonishment he replied and said yeah i'll do the interview so he popped up on this video and the first image i saw was him swigging a pint of beer and um he was in a bar in Cyprus and here's how that conversation went.

25:45Stephen Hurst had two convictions one for a fray and one for battery one relates to beating up his wife Liam Ramsey two offenses of assault occasioning actual bodily harm drink driving and growing cannabis does that sound to you like a CV appropriate for caring for vulnerable children? I have friends that were sent to jail in there my regiments who are now serving captains and majors one's an Apache pilot in this modern day if you're going to go down that route then everyone's going to be unemployed. Yeah, but Paul, these two men went on to rape, drug a young girl. And you seem to be excusing yourself for employing them.

26:26The only apology that I'm going to give is that they were held in remand. Because if they were released, they were going to get removed and I was going to deal with them personally. And my justice would have been swift. I'll tell you that. Do you think I've been nice about that? What do you mean by that? Use your imagination. Well, why don't you enlighten me, Paul? It would have been swiftly dispatched. Do you take any responsibility for what they did to this young girl? I didn't interview them. I didn't, and this is not passing the bucket of any sort. It sounds like it. It obviously comes down to me.

27:01I was 3 ,000 miles away when this incident happened, because I lived away. Yeah, but you're responsible for this care home, Paul, aren't you? the bug stops with you I asked him on the inquiry and I said is there anything I could have done to have stopped this and he said no Paul well I'll tell you how you could have stopped it looking into these and not employing two convicted criminals to look after the most vulnerable children in society that's how you could have prevented it Paul I mean I've heard the rest of the interview actually he says if I didn't employ anyone with a conviction then where would I be essentially right he said the country wouldn't run if you couldn't employ convicted criminals but the point is there's a difference between being a lorry driver and caring for the most vulnerable kids in society and I did ask him did he do any checks?

27:55and he basically said yeah I rang round and all the lads who used to be servicemen told me they were good lads so the whole thing is just incredible The idea that, you know, I wish I'd have got my hands on them because I'd have beaten the shit out of them is what he seems to be saying in that interview that you play. But what about the council that has paid over the money or the councils that have paid over the money to this guy's company? He is not a fit and proper person to be running care homes. And they're turning a blind eye or they're not asking the right questions or what? Well, they're not doing anything by the sounds of it.

28:34if they'd looked into this care home they would have seen that this place was employing employing convicted criminals people and then i spoke to one of the neighbors when i was there and she told me that all the men there they were all big middle-aged kind of military looking men it's it's clear that this place was just employing them but the thing is a lot of these places they're seeing this as a way to make money because every child that gets sent there they make£10 ,000 every single week for one child that goes to these care homes. So they could be sending them to the Ritz right she would actually have been safer if she'd just been sent to the Ritz on taxpayer money.