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U.S. President Donald Trump arrives to attend the G7 Leaders' Summit at the Rocky Mountain resort town of Kananaskis, Alberta, Canada, June 15, 2025.
The G7: Now G6 + 1?
The G7 is no longer setting the table; it’s struggling to hold the cutlery. Once a pillar of the post-war world order, the group today is splitbetween the US and the rest, casting about for common ground. Before this week’s summit even kicked off in Kananaskis, Canada, host Prime Minister Mark Carney warned there would beno final joint communique. So what’s up for discussion - and what could be achieved?
The official agenda: Trade, defense, and AI
Trade trumps climate change. With US President Donald Trump back on the scene,tariffs are huge, while climate action takes a backseat. Leaders will try to defend existing net-zero goals, update plans to tackle wildfires, and boost clean tech cooperation. But the meetings’first focus is on trade, and striking deals. Countries will seek to defend themselves against Trump’s protectionist policies by both expanding trade with each other and getting Trump to lift tariffs on their countries.
Defense and Industry. Whilethe Iran-Israel war now overshadows existing conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine, support for Kyiv is still on the menu. The tone is shifting, however, to talk of pan-European defense against Russian aggression. Carney, French president Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz are expected to push fora “defense-industrial pact,” a long-term commitment to arms production and supply chains to “Re-Arm Europe”.
Artificial Intelligence and Misinformation Leaders are lookingat baseline safeguards around algorithmic transparency and deepfake detection, given the worldwide rise in election interference, cybercrime and cyberwarfare. While global AI regulation is unlikely, the G7 may commit to coordinating digital watchdogs and fighting cross-border disinformation campaigns.
The backstory: America alone
All these items are dominated by a larger issue: the widening gap between the US and its allies. Trump’s view of the world order diverges starkly from that of the other members of the group. His thin skin and volatility could also compromise the outcome of the talks, especially if hestorms out like he did at the infamous 2018 Charlevoix summit. Carney’smain tasks include preventing Trump from feeling disrespected, and navigating the divide between G6 goals and US ambitions such as Trump’s takedown of China.
What can this meeting achieve, then?
Expect no joint statement, but lots of bilateral action, with both Trump and other world leaders. On Sunday, for example, Carney and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a strengthened partnership on a range of issues including trade and defense. Carney has also invited a slew of non-G7 leaders, including Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, arguing thatthey are key to solving major questions such as energy security and AI. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will also be present, as willthe leaders of Australia, Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, South Korea and South Africa. In the end, the biggest achievement may simply be keeping the group alive to meet another day.A sign calling for the protection of ostriches at the Universal Ostrich Farms is displayed in Edgewood, B.C., Canada, on May 17, 2025.
HARD NUMBERS: Trump officials fight ostrich culling, Mark Carney wants to ReArm with Europe, Wildfires in Manitoba, Golden Dome price set
300: Senior Trump administration figures, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Mehmet Oz, are lobbying Canada to spare over 300 ostriches set to be culled due to bird flu concerns at a British Columbia farm. The farm’s owners dispute the extent of the outbreak, arguing most birds are healthy. Oz has offered to relocate the ostriches to his Florida ranch. Canadian officials insist they must be killed to protect public health and the poultry industry, as avian flu outbreaks spread across both countries.
5: Currently, 75 cents of every dollar Canada spends on defense goes to the US defense industry. But Prime Minister Mark Carney says he wants Canada to join ReArm Europe — a major European defense initiative — by July 1, in order to reduce reliance on US military spending. ReArm Europe aims to increase member nations’ defense spendings to 5% of GDP and, crucially, to do so without heavily importing from US arms manufacturers.
17,000: Over 17,000 people are being evacuated in Manitoba amid the province’s worst start to the wildfire season in years. There are 134 active fires across Canada — half of them burning out of control — in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Ontario, while the country braces for another deadly fire season.
$61 billion: US President Donald Trump says he has told Canada it will have to pay $61 billion to be part of his proposed Gold Dome missile defense system — or it can be included for free if it becomes the “cherished 51st state.”
US President Donald Trump announces he has selected the path forward for his ambitious Golden Dome missile defense shield, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., USA, on Tuesday, May 20, 2025.
Will Canada come under the Golden Dome?
Donald Trump wants to protect the United States from ballistic and hypersonic missiles with a “Golden Dome,” and Canada, officially, wants in. The details of the program and Canada’s role are still to be determined, but Trump says the total cost will be $175 billion (the Congressional Budget Office says more) and the project will be completed by the end of his term. Experts wonder whether such a defense system is even possible, given the technological difficulty of intercepting ICBMs and space-based launches. But the US president says Canada will pay its “fair share.”
Canada is reportedly integrating the dome talks into broader negotiations about trade and security. And it has some leverage — money, for starters, but also land on which to base missile detection equipment and over which to shoot down projectiles.
Trump has long maligned Canada for being a laggard on defense spending. Participating in the Golden Dome could serve to rehabilitate that image a bit, and nudge trade negotiations in the right direction. But joining the program could face opposition in Canada, especially after the Liberals have spent months bashing the Trump administration as unreliable partners and threats to Canadian sovereignty.
From left, FBI Director Kash Patel, Tulsi Gabbard, director of National Intelligence, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, testify during the House Select Intelligence Committee hearing titled “Worldwide Threats Assessment,” in Longworth building on Wednesday, March 26, 2025. The witnesses fielded questions on the Signal chat, about attacks against Houthis in Yemen, that accidentally included a reporter.
Will Trump find a fall guy for Signal chat revelations?
The drip, drip, drip of revelations about the Trump administration’s Signal chat continued Wednesday as The Atlantic published screenshots that showed senior officials sharing military plans on the messaging app. “1415: Strike Drones on Target (THIS IS WHEN THE FIRST BOMBS WILL DEFINITELY DROP, pending earlier ‘Trigger Based’ targets),” US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wrote at 11:44 a.m. on March 15, two hours before the United States bombed the Houthi rebels in Yemen.
The trick is not getting caught: Before The Atlanticposted receipts for its original article, Hegseth flatly denied that anyone had been “texting war plans.” Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said at a Senate hearing on Tuesday that the chat didn’t contain any “intelligence equities.” After the screenshots dropped, Gabbard denied lying to senators, telling a House hearing on Wednesday that her Tuesday testimony “was based on my recollection, or the lack thereof, on the details that were posted there.”
Deflect, deflect: President Donald Trump, meanwhile, said Wednesday that the intense focus on this chat group was “all a witch hunt.” He also suggested that the Signal messaging app was faulty and that his predecessor, Joe Biden, was to blame for not having struck Yemen earlier – but the US under Biden did lead allied strikes against the Houthis in Yemen last year.
Legal tactics: Rather than punish someone inside the government ranks, the Trump administration may instead go after The Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg, who was inadvertently added to the chat and published the screenshots.
“The Trump administration is very likely to target Goldberg with some legal repercussions, though runs the risk of keeping the story in the headlines as new angles emerge,” according to Eurasia Group US Director Clayton Allen.
For more insights on Signal-gate, check out Ian Bremmer’s latest Quick Take here.
Israel Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Itamar Ben Gvir shake hands as the Israeli government approve Netanyahu's proposal to reappoint Itamar Ben-Gvir as minister of National Security, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusaelm, March 19, 2025
Israel gets “budget of war” amid new plans for Gaza and West Bank
It also included a series of tax hikes that were heavily criticized by opposition parties. Outside the Knesset, demonstrators protested the government’s failure to secure the release of the remaining 59 Israeli hostages as well asrecent moves by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to dismiss the head of Israel’s intelligence agency and its attorney general.
For all the protests, the budget’s passage represents “a significant political win for Netanyahu,” according to Eurasia Group managing director Firas Maksad.
“With greater room to maneuver politically from here on, the big question is if the prime minister will be more flexible on moving towards phase two of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza, thereby beginning to bring the conflict with Hamas to close,” Maksad added.
A fund for war? Israel is reportedly preparing amajor ground offensive in Gaza after the end of the recent two-month ceasefire, includingseizing additional territories and potentially occupying the enclave. “If there are not renewed hostage negotiations, then the only alternative left is to resume the fighting,” warned Eyal Hulata, former head of Israel’s National Security Council. “And there are serious plans.”
Other plans include creating new settlements on the West Bank. Last week, Israel’s security cabinet greenlit a decision to split off 13 “neighborhoods” of existing West Bank settlements, established decades ago without authorization, from their “mother settlement,” creating independent settlements. The Palestinian Authority condemned the move as well as increased Israeli military operations in the northern West Bank as “an unprecedented escalation in the confiscation of Palestinian lands.”
Tensions in the West Bank have been escalating for months. On Monday, the Oscar-winning Palestinian director of “No Other Land,” Hamdan Ballal, was detained by Israeli forces on accusations of “rock throwing,” which he denied, after being attacked by settlers in the village of Susya. Ballal was released Tuesday and said he was beaten and blindfolded for 24 hours while in custody, and the Israeli military has not responded to the allegation.
National Security Advisor Michael Waltz speaks at the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Friday, March 7, 2025.
Signal failure: Trump team includes journalist in top secret plans
Washington is buzzing over a major security breach that saw the editor of The Atlantic magazine, Jeffrey Goldberg, mistakenly added to a Signal group chat that included US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, VP JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. The group coordinated a war plan and sent real-time operational details about US strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen, sharing classified information on an external app without noticing that Goldberg was on the chat.
The account seemingly associated with Vance wrote: “If you think we should do it let’s go. I just hate bailing Europe out again,” with Hegseth’s apparent account replying, “I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It's PATHETIC.” But Vance’s account also suggested that US strikes on the Houthis were a “mistake.” “I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now,” the account explained.
Was it genuine? Yes, a spokesperson for the National Security Council confirmed that the exchange was authentic. In a statement Monday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also appeared to confirm the story but said at the time that US President Donald Trump remained confident in his national security team.
Still, Waltz may have broken the law by including Goldberg, and the use of Signal for official communications may have violated the Espionage Act. Both Republican and Democratic members of Congress condemned the mistake, with Democrats calling for Waltz to be dismissed and demanding an investigation.
When he first heard about the incident from reporters, Trump appeared unconcerned, quipping that he wasn’t a big fan of The Atlantic. But later, White House officials said an investigation was underway and that Trump would decide Waltz’s fate in the next day or two as he took in reports of the incident.
When asked about the chat on Monday, Hegseth referred to Goldberg as a “discredited, so-called journalist,” adding that “Nobody was texting war plans and that's all I have to say about that.”
Is Europe finally ready to defend itself?
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from Tabiano, Italy.
How serious is Europe about really beefing up its defense and rearming?
It is very serious indeed, although it's different in different parts of Europe. If you look at the EU countries, they have been increasing their defense spending over the last few years by roughly a third. That's a hell of a lot of money.
And if you look forward, I think there's a division between, say, Germany, Poland, Nordic Baltic states. You will see substantial further increases in defense spending there. There's more a question mark in the Mediterranean region, Greece support, where there is more hesitancy to do the rapid buildup of forces that is required.
Then, there is the problem of integrating defense industries and integrating command and control efforts. But we are undoubtedly at the new stage when it comes to developing serious integrated European defense capabilities, hopefully, to operate them together with the United States. But, as things are, also have the ability to operate them in the future more independently.
President Donald Trump talks to the media next to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, with a Tesla car in the background, at the White House on March 11, 2025.
Report: Pentagon set to reveal secret China war strategy to … Elon Musk
Elon Musk may have a big day ahead. On Friday, according to the New York Times, he’ll reportedly be made privy to war plans for a US military conflict with China. But President Donald Trump has notably denied that Musk will be briefed on China during the visit.
While discussions about such a confrontation within the walls of the Pentagon are nothing new — defense officials have been war-gaming such a scenario for years — this would be a novel and expanded advisory role for the man at the helm of DOGE, the agency that has federal workers dodging pink slips.
The Tesla CEO was, according to the NYT report, invited to visit America’s five-sided symbol of strength by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who will lead a slide presentation detailing the operational plan, aka O-plan, from early indications of a possible threat from China through to full-on engagement.
Is there a conflict of interest? Good question. Pundits are wondering whether Musk, who helms both SpaceX and Tesla and has plenty of financial investments in China, should be let in on state secrets about how the US might fight a hypothetical war with China. Should Beijing get wind of the plans, it would help China prepare, giving it the advantage.
But, on the other hand ... the man who’s driving bids to reduce the federal deficit may need to know how much money is required to keep American war-fighting capabilities afloat. The White House has noted that Musk would recuse himself in the case of such conflicts of interest.
We’ll be keeping an eye on Musk’s visit and any fallout.