Chatham House, the British Monarchy’s leading foreign policy think tank, hails the U.K.-German Kensington Treaty in an article July 18, “After Brexit: E3. New Treaty Puts U.K., Germany and France Back at the Heart of European Security,” which has the sub-headline, “Friedrich Merz’s visit to the UK only a week after that of Emmanuel Macron symbolizes a return of the E3 format—France, Germany and the U.K—as the driving force of European security.”
The Kensington Treaty, taken in the context of the U.K.-France agreement signed in London July 10, which includes British-French coordination in missile production and nuclear policy and deployment, as well as other developments, is an unmistakable indication that the United Kingdom, joined by Germany and France, is preparing for a major war against Russia that would likely include the use of nuclear weapons.
The Chatham House article author Nicolai von Ondarza, a Chatham House Associate Fellow, writes: “German Chancellor Friedrich Merz was in London this week where he met with U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and signed a landmark U.K.-Germany friendship treaty. His visit follows that of French President Emmanuel Macron last week. These back-to-back visits symbolize and reinforce a return of the E3 group—France, Germany and the U.K.—as the driving force of European security. Despite Brexit, this configuration has the potential to tie the complex European security architecture together.”
Von Ondarza stresses that the Treaty’s “pillar on defense, which incorporates and extends last year’s U.K.-Germany Trinity House Agreement, is the most substantial of the treaty. It includes structured cooperation on defense industrial projects, such as a deep precision strike capability, defense exports coordination, cooperation on NATO’s eastern flank and in the North Sea, as well as a bilateral mutual defense clause on top of existing NATO commitments.” It also includes threatening clauses explicitly on nuclear weapons (see accompanying slug).
What is unusual for the bilateral Kensington Treaty is that it explicitly mentions the aim to intensify trilateral cooperation between the U.K., Germany, and France. Von Ondarza notes, “the treaty completes the triangle of previous bilateral treaties between the three countries, including the defense-focused U.K.-France Lancaster House Treaty and the broader France-Germany Elysée and Aachen treaties. As a result, the three major European powers are now linked through respective bilateral treaties.”
Therefore, the U.K.-Germany-France axis will constitute the leadership of the aggressive war drive against Russia, a steering committee leading the war-hawk NATO and EU. Chatham House rejoices: “Meanwhile, the E3 format is making a comeback as a primary framework for European security outside of the more traditional institutions. Over the past few months of geopolitical turbulence, when old certainties about the transatlantic alliance have been cast aside by the U.S. Trump administration, the E3 has provided a stable framework with very regular contact at the highest political level.”
Author von Ondarza is also the Head of the EU/Europe Research Division at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin.
Rounding out the picture is that the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), another British Crown asset, announced on July 3 that its Deputy Director-General Malcolm Chalmers will be leaving RUSI shortly, after 17 years, to take up his new position as Strategic Advisor to U.K. Defense Secretary John Healey and Head of Review and Challenge in the U.K.’s Ministry of Defense. Chalmers is on the record advocating the use of nuclear weapons against Russia as a live option to force a Russian capitulation to NATO. The British will be leading the E-3’s war planning.
Schiller Institute founder and chairwoman Helga Zepp-LaRouche on July 18 cited the danger that the Kensington Treaty represents. Addressing the International Peace Coalition, Zepp-LaRouche stated, “Last week there was a meeting between Macron and Starmer, where they agreed to better coordinate their nuclear arsenals, because after all, they are the two nuclear-armed powers in Europe. Now, yesterday, Chancellor Merz was also in London, signing with Starmer what they call a German-British friendship treaty—the so-called Kensington Treaty; Kensington being a reference to a palace and the role of Queen Victoria. Merz actually named her, which shows you this Chancellor has no sense. Victoria’s rule was the time when the British were actively planning World War I, mainly against Germany among others. To make that reference just shows you for sure that Chancellor Merz has a liking for the British Empire, which he is now gladly submitting to. But it also is an extremely worrisome development.”
