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The missiles and bombs may have stopped, at least for the moment, but the war between the US and Iran continues. The Strait of Hormuz remains closed, the US sanctions remain in place, and the fundamental issues separating the combatants remain unresolved. The bilateral negotiations have gone nowhere, and the two sides remain far apart. This stalemate has puzzled observers since it’s not hard to see the outlines of a deal. For Iran, the minimum acceptable goal is regime survival. For the US, it is the end of the Iranian nuclear program, which poses an existential threat to America’s regional partners and, eventually, to Europe and South Asia. Since the regime’s survival and the end of its nuclear program are compatible goals, a deal should be possible.

President Trump lavished praise upon King Charles from the Oval Office at the outset of his four-day state visit to the United States. He called the monarch “a man of class” and said “it’s great to have a king in here”. A conspicuous absence of “No Kings” protests in the presence of a real king had not gone unnoticed. But it was Charles’s address to a joint session of Congress that was eagerly awaited on both sides of the Atlantic. His most substantial public speech since he acceded the throne in September 2022, there was a good deal riding on its success. His mother had addressed Congress in May 1991. Her text was an uncontroversial message of “collaboration and respect” between the two nations.

The evening had started pleasantly enough. The most alarming thing about the party I was attending in the Hilton Hotel where the Washington Correspondents’ Dinner was being held were the $18 martinis. Those, and the woman in the nice black dress screaming “criminals” at the police as they dragged her out the door as I arrived. Protesters had gathered outside. They chanted indiscriminately at guests filing through the entrance, calling for an end to the war in Iran and to free Palestine. I was one floor above the main dinner at a party hosted by ABC, engaged in the kind of self-congratulatory socializing this weekend was designed for, when heavily armed police officers started moving through the room. First one, then several – and they wouldn't explain why.

The Special Air Service, Special Boat Service and other elements of UK Special Forces are held in the highest regard by the Pentagon and by US special operators. British and American special forces have forged a bond of trust over decades with joint high-risk operations and combined training. A recent visit to Washington made clear that the American leadership on both sides of the political divide, and within the military and intelligence services, believe the current British government has broken that alliance. America views the SAS and SBS as equal to its own tier one special forces operators in Delta Force and SEAL Team Six. The eight saber squadrons of the SAS and SBS contribute a significant amount of the special forces’ manpower relied upon by both countries.

Tech companies like Palantir now find themselves in a bind. Wanting government contracts, they have a reason to stay politically neutral. At the same time, they rightly suspect that the greater part of the left has already marked them for destruction. The hostility has little to do with Silicon Valley’s enthusiasm for Austrian economics, or its occasional calls for a property-based franchise – an old National Liberal demand rather than a fascist one. Rather, the left is hostile to technology because it is America’s conservative party, suspicious of anything that threatens to undermine old solidarities.