Welcome to Trump’s America, The i Paper’s World Insight series presenting the sharpest, deepest thinking on an era-defining shift in history and politics, investigating how Donald Trump and his administration have changed the US and the world – and where we go from here.
• America can’t afford to retire
• The White House I worked for would have condemned this image. Trump refuses
• Trump isn’t damaging America. He’s reinventing it
• The US is becoming impossible to live in
• The Golden State is being left to burn – because it voted Democrat
•
• The rise of ‘Mar-a-Lago face’ – and what it says about sexism in America
With every day that President Donald Trump prolongs his war on Iran, his country becomes weaker, in at least three ways.
The first is the jarring fact that the United States, by most measures the most powerful nation on Earth, is losing a contest of asymmetrical warfare to a third-rate military power.
Second is the shocking number of high-tech weapons that it’s depleted in this war – more than half of its pre-war inventory of what Pentagon planners call “key munitions”. This leaves gaps, which will take three or four years to fill, in America’s ability to fight future wars that might truly threaten its security interests.
Finally, there is the geopolitical effect of those first two disasters. Military and intelligence officials worldwide are watching this war and adapting their strategies so they might better face down the West’s great superpower in a crisis and possibly, if it escalates to conflict, win a war.
How solo working is driving rising hours spent alone
Working from home and other solitary working habits are a bigger driver of loneliness than screen time, research suggests.
What you need to know
- The Resolution Foundation made the findings by analysing UK Time Use Survey.
- It found the average number of people doing paid work alone has nearly tripled in under a decade.
- Working from home accounted for roughly two-thirds of the rise in work done alone.
- The research found that “paid work is the biggest driver of rising time alone among working-age people”.
- Parth Pandya, researcher at the Resolution Foundation, said: “If policy makers are serious about improving young people’s wellbeing, then work needs to be part of the debate as much as screen time.”
The story in numbers
15%
Among 18 to 69-year-olds, the average proportion of people who were doing paid work alone in the standard working day increased from five per cent in 2014 up to 15 per cent in 2023.
90 minutes
The biggest change was among men aged 18-29, who spent an additional 90 minutes working alone each day.
This means they spend more than two-fifths of the hours they are awake alone.
What does this mean?
The research said: “It is more solo working, rather than screen time, that has driven the rise in reported time alone.
“Despite likely under-reporting of screen time, time alone for young people is still up. So, something else must be driving it – and the diary data points to a sharp rise in solo working.”
5 min read
Why you shouldn’t use your 1999 solar eclipse glasses
With a rare partial solar eclipse later today, many are casting their minds back to the last major eclipse over the UK before the turn of the century.
But experts have warned people not to re-use glasses bought for the astronomical event 27 years ago.
What you need to know
Many parts of the country will experience more than 90 per cent coverage of the Sun.
Depending on your location, it will occur between 6.15pm and 8pm. People in the south-west of England are likely to get the most coverage. For the best view, it is a good idea to head to high ground.
2 min read
When will this happen again?
There has been a last-minute rush for eclipse glasses, as many high street shops and online retailers have sold out.
The next total solar eclipse over the UK will not happen until 2090.
3 min read
5 min read
Put the old glasses away
- Only specialist glasses that are ISO 12312-1 certified should be used, experts said.
- People should only use glasses that are undamaged and no more than a decade old.
5 min read
Putin has a sinister new plan. We should all be worried
The last month has seen the fiercest exchange of missile attacks between Russia and Ukraine in more than four years of war.
But the fighting is in dynamic impasse, with a huge amount of killing and damage on either side with little to show for it. Russia now looks to be trying to shake that up.
What has changed?
In the past week, Vladimir Putin has urged new field commanders to get the job done to seize the whole of Donetsk by the end of the year.
Lithuania warned a few days ago intelligence services thought Russia could try to provoke allies in the region in the next few weeks. This points to a dangerous new phase of the war.
The sinister new plan
Russia is using three lines of attack to break the will of Ukraine: to bring misery, a lack of power and utilities with the onset of winter and to grind down the forces on the front line.
The new military appointments and exhortations suggest Putin intends to intensify ground attacks in Ukraine.
4 min read
What does this mean for Ukraine?
- The numbers look bleak for Ukraine going into the winter.
- The trashing of its cities, including the targeting of filling stations, aims at depriving Ukrainians of heat and comfort, and even adequate food.
- Ukraine is fighting back hard, but the next phase of the war could stretch it to breaking point.
Why billionaire Lord Sugar has hit out at American Express
Lord Alan Sugar has called American Express “a bunch of idiots” after he was denied an increase on his credit limit.
star, 79, who has a reported net worth of £1.138bn, said he spoke to someone who was aware of his “financial status”, but it made no difference.
What is the row about?
Lord Sugar wrote on X to complain he had been on the phone with American Express for an hour, and eventually “my request was refused due to their system”.
Replying to some criticism in his comments, the entrepreneur responded: “I AM NOT MOANING JUST EXPOSING WHAT A BUNCH OF IDIOTS AMEX ARE.”
3 min read
Council flat to billionaire status
Some in Lord Sugar’s comments accused him of “trying to flaunt your status” after championing his modest background.
- Lord Sugar was born in Hackney, east London, in 1947 and grew up in a council flat.
- He left school at 16 and briefly worked in the civil service as a statistician.
- He founded electronics company Amstrad at the age of 21 and found commercial success by mass-producing affordable consumer electronics.
- Sugar began hosting reality competition show in 2005.
- He sold his stake in Amstrad to BSkyB in 2007 for £125m.
- His net worth is reportedly £1.138bn.
When and where to catch a glimpse of Perseid meteor shower
Just hours after the partial solar eclipse, Wednesday night will see stargazers treated to yet another astronomical event.
But what is the Perseid meteor shower and where can you see it best?
Everything you need to know
The Perseids are seen as streaks of bright meteors across the night sky. They are caused by debris from the Swift-Tuttle comet and are seen in the UK every summer.
Its peak nights are 12 and 13 August this year. Much of the UK will have clear skies overnight, with a new moon meaning the display should also be more visible.
Where best to see it
- Try to go somewhere without light pollution, preferably away from cities.
- Allow your eyes to adjust to the darkness and gaze up towards the widest clear expanse of sky.
- You could see hundreds of “shooting stars”, with the best time between midnight and sunrise.
- Areas of the Highlands, mid-Wales and rural Northumberland are often cited as having the least light pollution.
5 min read
Timeline of recent Ukrainian attacks on Russian infrastructure
Ukraine has maintained near-daily attacks on Russian oil refineries, pumping stations and exports – targeting the lifeblood of Moscow’s war economy.
By some estimates, the campaign has knocked out a third of Russia’s oil processing capacity.
What you need to know
On 18 July, Kyiv ushered in a new era, targeting Wildberries warehouses – Russia’s equivalent to Amazon and one of the country’s largest companies.
For many Russians, the war now feels a lot closer to home, with social media filled with videos of explosions and business owners crying over their destroyed stock.
4 min read
The timeline of key events
Kyiv has raised the stakes in recent weeks with dozens of attacks. The logic is to aggravate economic problems and harm public support for the war.
- 30 April – Ukraine said it hit one of Russia’s largest oil refineries more than 1,500 kilometres from the front line.
- 24 June – A strike on an electricity substation took out the power in the Russian-occupied city of Sevastopol.
- 4 July – Ukraine hit a major oil terminal in St Petersburg.
- 2 August – Kyiv said it hit an oil refinery and airfield 600 kilometres from the border in Saratov region.
- 3 August – A drone hit a Wildberries warehouse in one of a series of similar attacks on the company.
- 6 August – Ukraine hit two oil refineries, trying to reduce the profits of Russian oil.
China, Russia, and North Korea have closely observed America’s wars over the past few decades and come away impressed, even daunted. Beginning with the first Gulf War in 1991 and accelerating with those in Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, as well as skirmishes in Panama, Syria, and various battlefields in the “War on Terror”, they’ve seen what the US military can do.
America had integrated its formerly disconnected branches into a seamless force; developed and then mastered the use of precision-guided munitions (“smart bombs”); woven the new technology into real-time intelligence networks and computerised command-control systems; and, more recently (though still at an early stage), fused all of these innovations with artificial intelligence.
Now, US rivals see the downside of that reliance on high tech. American commanders are so seized on lethal firepower as the measure of military might that they fired off more than half of their stockpile of cruise missiles – each costing between $1.6m and $3.6m – at as many targets as they can find, as if at some point, in Trump’s words, the Iranians would scream that they’d had enough and surrender. They are oblivious to the fact that Iran is fighting a different sort of war and has enough missiles and other weapons to win it – or at least, avoid losing, which amounts to the same thing.
US commanders have also found themselves firing $4m (£3m) Patriot air-defence missiles to shoot down $30,000 (£22,200) Iranian drones – a cost ratio that cannot be sustained. Even so, some of those drones have done considerable damage to energy facilities of US allies and even to US military bases in the Middle East.
This new twist – technology that can be built in great quantities for little money – has turned what was once the source of the US military’s edge into its gravest vulnerability. Ironically, the US invented the first armed drones back in October 2001, but its higher-ups didn’t take the new weapon seriously and assumed lesser powers would take decades to duplicate the feat.
This drone-dominant era plays to China’s strengths. About 20 years ago, Beijing’s military scientists started adapting to America’s technical innovations. They developed anti-satellite (Asat) weapons, which could disable the GPS satellites that guide smart bombs to their targets with pinpoint accuracy. They built “swarms” of cheap anti-ship missiles (and, later, drones) that, in a war, could disable aircraft carriers steaming into the South China Sea or the Taiwan Strait.
The war in Iran tells Chinese strategists that they’ve been on the right track. Asats can turn America’s smart bombs into dumb bombs. And launching swarms of cheap missiles will compel US commanders to empty their already-depleted arsenals of defensive missiles – leaving the fleet wide open to attack.
As for Russia, the idea of a Moscow-ordered assault against Nato seems remote. Vladimir Putin’s army can’t make much headway against Ukraine, much less pose a threat to nations farther west. But this is no longer a meaningful standard. By any measure, Ukraine is now the strongest army in all Europe. The front line in the Russia-Ukraine war is a massive “kill zone” in which no tank or soldier – Russian or Ukrainian – can advance without getting spotted and clobbered by a drone loitering overhead. But imagine Russia fighting a country that hasn’t built a million drones. Russian drones could pin the defenders in place, and then Russia’s tanks and infantry could mount an assault with little resistance.
None of this is to say that Russia, China or any other country is about to declare war on the United States or its allies – or that it would win if it did. For one thing, the fact that the US has fought so many wars in the past few decades is, itself, an advantage. Its soldiers, pilots, sailors, logistics units, intelligence adjuncts, etc – all personnel in a volunteer military – have amassed experience and expertise. This can’t be said of Chinese troops, none of whom have ever fired a shot in real battle. (China last fought a war in 1979 – a 27-day campaign against Vietnam – and didn’t do well.) Nor can it be said of the Russians, whose soldiers are mainly desperate draftees whose officers are discouraged from taking initiative, and whose supply lines can’t be held for more than a few miles.
Still, anyone looking at America’s performance in Iran these past six months sees a gold-plated military establishment unleashing firepower with stunning speed and accuracy but sluggish at adapting new technology or adjusting to an adversary’s innovations – thus ignoring the axiom that “the enemy gets a vote” in how to fight a war, even a war that you start.
Less than halfway into his second term, Trump has turned the United States into a country that its allies don’t respect and its enemies needn’t fear.
Fred Kaplan is ’s columnist, a former reporter (where he won a Pulitzer Prize) and the author of seven books, including The Wizards of Armageddon, , (a Pulitzer finalist), , and, most recently, A Capital Calamity (a satirical novel)