The transatlantic alliance has been knocked off its axis. The pronouncements by US Vice President J D Vance at the AI Summit in Paris and the Munich Security Conference, and the “stark strategic realities” outlined by US Secretary of Defence Peter Hegseth at the NATO headquarters — that the US “will prioritise empowering Europe to own responsibility for its own security” — have left no doubt that the alliance is considerably weakened. At the Riyadh meeting, US and Russian high-level officials, in the absence of Europe and Ukraine, have agreed that Ukraine cannot be a part of NATO, even while…