US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth says Donald Trump is “very encouraged” by Ukraine’s commitment to peace, and that America’s freeze on supplying weapons to Kyiv is only a “pause”. The US and Ukrainian governments will discuss a possible ceasefire deal in Saudi Arabia next week; EU leaders yesterday agreed to an €800bn plan to increase European defence spending. The Trump administration has backtracked on its trade war with Canada and Mexico, suspending the 25% tariffs previously imposed on a wide range of goods until the beginning of April. Trump says the reversal has “nothing to do” with recent stock market turbulence. Long Covid patients who lost their sense of taste and smell have had it successfully restored by doctors in London. The pioneering surgery, which worked on all 25 recipients involved in a new study, expands the nasal airways to allow more odorants to reach the roof of the nose, kickstarting smell recovery.

JD Vance’s “malign” agenda

Say what you like about JD Vance, says Gerard Baker in The Times, but six weeks into a job renowned for its pointlessness, he is already shaping up to be one of the most “consequential vice presidents in US history”. It’s just a shame those consequences exist at the “darkest end of a spectrum of malignity”. They include, among much else: trying to help a murderous tyrant triumph over a free nation; likely accelerating the slaughter of thousands of Ukrainian innocents; and working to destroy the “most successful alliance in world history”, which has kept the peace in Europe and enhanced America’s power for 80 years.

Vance demonstrates his absolute loyalty to the president with displays of sycophancy that might make even Trump blanch. “The reason the failed establishment hates President Donald J Trump,” he wrote recently on X, “is because he chooses his words carefully.” This of the man who said wind turbines cause cancer, and gave the world “covfefe”. He is also trying to build his own case for the presidency, though his nomination in 2028 is far from assured: if the Trump administration prospers, he will surely be elbowed aside by Donald Trump Jr; if not, Republicans may distance themselves from MAGA. Vance understands the “perils and opportunities of his post”. The list of US vice presidents includes men of such obscurity “you will think I’m making them up”: Hannibal Hamlin, Schuyler Colfax, Garret Hobart. Some, though, changed history: Thomas Jefferson, Richard Nixon; Lyndon Johnson. Vance clearly thinks his phosphorescent advocacy of a nasty new order will place him in the latter camp. “Most of the rest of the world is praying that he will live in the collective memory as long as Schuyler Colfax.”