BY TYLER DURDEN
FRIDAY, JAN 23, 2026 – 07:40 PM
Trump wins again – or rather, Europe caves again. On Friday UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer was forced into an abrupt and humiliating retreat after his plan for the Chagos Islands detonated backlash in Washington.
Starmer had been preparing to ram the controversial legislation through the House of Lords on Monday, only for the bill to be yanked late Friday on growing fears it could unravel a 60-year-old US-UK treaty, which is the foundational Cold War-era deal that allows the US to operate the Diego Garcia military base on the Chagos Islands, or what’s known as the British Indian Ocean Territory.
The chain of events this week kicked off early Tuesday with President Trump’s Truth Social onslaught. Among several geopolitical-related messages, mostly on Greenland, he went after the Starmer government.
Trump took aim at the proposed new deal under which London would surrender sovereignty (to Maritius) while leasing back the strategically critical military base on the islands, including Diego Garcia – where US forces also have a strategic Indian Ocean base, which has been used especially for Middle East operations going back decades.
Trump attacked the plan to hand sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago to Mauritius as an act of "great stupidity" and "total weakness." He further took the opportunity to say the move underscored exactly why he wants the United States to take control of Greenland.
"The UK giving away extremely important land is an act of GREAT STUPIDITY, and is another in a very long line of National Security reasons why Greenland has to be acquired. Denmark and its European Allies have to DO THE RIGHT THING," Trump wrote as his concluding sentence in the message.
The Telegraph late Friday is confirming the U-turn:
Sir Keir Starmer has been forced to pull his Chagos Islands bill in the wake of a US backlash over the deal.
The legislation was expected to be debated in the House of Lords on Monday, but was delayed on Friday night after the Conservatives warned it could violate a 60-year-old treaty with the USthat enshrines British sovereignty over the archipelago.
Sou