A new US national security strategy represents one of the most profound crises for the Atlantic alliance since 1945

• Trump lambasts ‘weak’ and ‘decaying’ Europe

During Donald Trump’s first administration, commentators sagely advised that his words, were to be “taken seriously, not literally”. Experience suggests that formula puts the cart before the horse.

A new US National Security Strategy and a series of comments from US officials, presidential proxies and Trump himself, have culminated in what could be one of the most profound crises for Atlanticism, the security doctrine that has sustained peace and democracy in Europe since the end of the second world war.