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- [01:30]
Christiane Amanpour
Hello everyone and welcome to Amanpour. Here's what's coming up. Reporting from Windsor, a royal welcome for President Trump on this historic second state visit. I speak to Trump's supporter Gordon Sondland, who served as the U.S. ambassador to the EU under Trump 1.0 and Britain's former ambassador to the U.S. serving Peter Westmark. Plus, as the U.S. and UK agree on a tech pact, the inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners Lee tells Walter Isaacson why he's optimistic about AI welcome to the program everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour Windsor Inside the castle grounds where Britain is throwing all the royal pageantry that it can muster at President Trump for the US Leader's unprecedented second state visit here with national anthems, military parades, aerial fly pass and a state banquet to be hosted here at Windsor Castle with which is decked out in stars and stripes. The President and the first lady were greeted earlier by the King and Queen, the Prince And Princess of Wales were there as well. Then a procession of carriages made its way through the Windsor Estate. The President and the King riding in the first, the Queen and First lady riding in the second. One thing the US President won't see much of, though, the British people. For the public here, Trump is unpopular, according to most polls. But over in London, protesters did make their voices heard. Royal correspondent Max Foster is here with me and we're just going to discuss this first day of this incredible state visit. So nobody can be, you know, sort of unimpressed by what or jaded by what this event actually is. It's so unbelievable the way the British do it. But what is the underlying hope for them, for Trump?
- [03:50]
Max Foster
That he had a good time, Literally, that's how the palace described it. That's their job today, to show him a good time and frankly, to ingratiate him and to show him that he is the most special visitor that there's ever been to this castle. I mean, literally, in terms of numbers, we've never seen military, you know, pomp and pageantry on this level, in terms of how many people were on the sovereign, were on the. The escort, but also in the, in the welcome and in the bands. And so much of America was integrated into it all as well. This was an interesting moment, looking at the Royal collection, because normally you would see actually the King showing all of the positive parts of the British American relationship, but they went right back to early colonialism, the earliest records of that, and then moving into how they lost the fight for independence, of course. So saying it's a complicated pass, but. But you can't actually beat the bond that we've got right now.
- [04:45]
Christiane Amanpour
And as we look at these pictures, this is earlier in the day when, as I said, the carriages took the President, first lady, the King and the Queen through these incredible grounds. They didn't meet with or interface at all with the British public. There were protests in London. They were expected. But here's the thing, apart from the pomp of the pageantry, apart from making sure he had a good time, and he did say to the traveling press with him, just enjoy yourself, okay? This is going to be great. You know, he really likes the Britain, the British Royal family, the pomp and the pageantry, but it's also about deals, it's also about the economy, it's about investment into this country. What do you think when they really talk business tomorrow between Trump and Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister?
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Max Foster
Well, I think the main issue has obviously been the trade deal that's what Keir Sama has been desperate to bring in. He's very weak, as you know, politically. So to bring something in would be great, the outline deals there. But they wanted to flesh out the details and Downing street are very much playing that down now. So that's not really going to happen. We don't think the tech deals you talked about are interesting then possibly something on Ukraine, you know, or even a commitment to NATO, just something. That's what Keir Starmer needs is a win. And this is part, it is part of the warm up. I mean, they are a tool really, the monarchy for the Foreign Office. Right.
- [06:07]
Christiane Amanpour
But it's been written, you know, it's so interesting. Tina Brown, who's a longtime royal observer and writer, editor of the most storied magazines in the United States, she wrote in the New York Times today that, you know, in our world of total chaos and shambles and unbelievably poisonous political divisions from the United States all the way across the world, the king, King Charles really stands out as, as a force for stability, a force for history, a force, you know, for really experience in the world. You know, he's, what is he, over 70? He's been king in waiting for so many years. And he comes to it really seasoned, having seen the whole world and met with so many different kinds of political leaders, including many U.S. presidents. And he has his own views, doesn't he, on the environment, on supporting Zelensky and Ukraine. Exactly.
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Max Foster
Yeah.
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Christiane Amanpour
And this is the warrior nation, Churchill's warrior nation.
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Max Foster
Yeah. And there's this deference you see in our White House team has been talking about this, that with Trump, with British royals, there's a particular deference. And in all of the moments, if you show any of them, he's allowing Charles to take the lead all the time and he never does that with any other leader in the world. So I think that's really interesting. But you know, the queen, when we talk about the royal collection, she wouldn't really gone. She wouldn't have gone right back to the neighbors. Course of parts, you just celebrate the positive parts. Charles does step a bit into this political territory and I wonder in his role as head of the Church of England, he might speak like the Pope to Trump about peace in the world and talking about that perhaps intimating, as you were talking about earlier, the Middle east, possibly even speaking to that stuff that, you know, won't really resonate coming from Starmer. But it will be interesting hearing that. We will get some speeches coming up. We've got the state banquet about to start. But I think again, that's going to be about the long term relationship between these two big nations away from all the politics and frankly, a bit of.
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Christiane Amanpour
Frocks and rocks indeed, which everybody loves. Just has to be also said that this isn't again, just a sort of a Kumbaya. And President Trump is a very controversial and divisive figure inside and outside the United States. He comes at a time when things are so difficult in the US Highlighted by the assassination of a close ally, the youth conservative leader Charlie Kirk in the United States. Before that, the murders of Democratic politicians back in June in Minnesota is a terrible, you know, moment. The mayor of London wrote also an op ed today in which he saidand he, Sadiq Khan is well known to President Trump and a real bete noir. There's no love lost between them that Trump is a figure who's been fanning the flames of, you know, political, political divisiveness and, you know, and hatred. And I wonder how that that will go down because I think a lot of people hope and expect the president, particularly out of this moment in the US to pour that sort of balm of unity, not just national unity, but global unity. And I think people do hope that that will happen.
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Max Foster
I think there's people on Nigel Farage's side that are hoping he will speak to freedom of speech, which is a sense to issue and quite a confusing one. I mean, it's a different view, don't you think, in America?
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Christiane Amanpour
Well, I just think that freedom of speech as it's used by politicians today is very much, you know, it's my freedom of speech versus yours. In other words, what I think, and if you criticize me, that, etc.
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Max Foster
But I don't see Donald Trump being held up as a pin up for the far right in the UK for example, the same way as he might be in parts of Europe. And I think that he, it's really about Elon Musk and how he's found the flames of all of that here. I think, you know, there's a deep love for America in this country and I think the public separate Trump from that. So I think the palace has been allowed to do this. But if you look at the streets of London, there's a real frustration that they're not getting to be seen by him as well. So what sort of state visit has this been when it's in such a private setting, when really it's meant to be be shared by the whole of the United Kingdom? I think that's one of the debates that will come out of this, but the politics will be tomorrow. And I think it'll be tough for Starmer.
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Christiane Amanpour
Exactly. Well, we will see. We'll keep watching this and obviously tomorrow and the days after, because again, there's one most powerful person in the world, and that is the president of the United States. And all of these issues we've been talking about, you know, really depend on his engagement and him using his unique leverage of the world's only superpower. Now, as we said, tomorrow, the real business begins when President Trump will meet Prime Minister Keir Starmer, our next guest. He knows personally what it's like to deal with President Trump. He's Gordon Sundland. He served as Trump's ambassador to the EU during his first term. That was before he was fired in the wake of testifying in Trump's first impeachment trial. And Gordon Sunderland joins me now from New York. So welcome to the program. With all that build up and I guess you've been watching the incredible, really, the hosting that Trump has really received here from the king of England. What do you think Britain can expect out of all of this having, you know, gone the extra many, many miles?
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Gordon Sondland
Good afternoon, Christiane. I think what Britain can expect is the warmest of relationships with the United States. Remember, it was President Trump that really supported Nigel Farage and the entire Brexit movement. He was behind that all the way. He has his own issues with the EU writ large. And I think he feels a special affection and kinship not just for the UK but for the British people and particularly for the monarchy. And one of the reasons you mentioned that he allows the king to sort of take the lead where he wouldn't do that in any other country, even in the face of that particular country's leader, where you would think he would do that, but he wouldn't. In the case of King Charles, he views the king and his late mother, Queen Elizabeth, as the real deal. He doesn't view all leaders and all monarchs as the real deal. But when it comes to the UK monarchy, to President Trump, they are the real deal. They've been around forever. They'll be around forever. And he has a special reverence for that institution.
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Christiane Amanpour
Gordon Sondland, you mentioned Brexit as if it was something that the current government here, or even the royal family, as far as we know, liked. They didn't. Certainly the government of Keir Starmer and most of the, you know, Labour politicians didn't like it and didn't want it. And the Polls here have changed. So. But having said that, there is a very significant likelihood that Trump politics, that is MAGA style politics, could find their way into leadership here in the UK Right now, Nigel Farage's party is called Reform is ahead in the polls. Obviously it's a long way from any election, but it's ahead of in the polls. What do you make then of that? Of the sort of transportation of American policies over here in terms of populism and nationalism, frankly.
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Gordon Sondland
Well, a couple of things to unpack there. While I understand that the current government does not like Brexit because it was successfully executed, I think that Trump felt, feels sort of a special, I don't want to use the word responsibility because that's probably too strong of a word, but I think he feels that it's now, he now has a role to play in making sure that the UK Is successful independently and also that the UK US Relationship is successful because, you know, it's sort of the old story. Well, you encouraged us to leave, we left. Now you need to make sure that this works out for everyone. And I think that that's always on President Trump's mind. I'm sorry, I don't recall your second question.
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Christiane Amanpour
No, don't worry, I'll continue. That's an interesting way of putting it because I think I may be wrong and I'll go back and look. But I think Trump actually said that it hasn't been very well implemented. And certainly in terms of the economy, Britain is suffering for many aspects, aspects of what Brexit brought in. But what I want to ask you is we've seen the many of the major tech firms, the AI and you know, chip firms and this and that, saying that they will put tens of billions of dollars of investments into this country and make sort of like a joint, sort of a hub or platform between the US and the UK that is happening, but on the same, same, same stage. We have not got the trade deal. It's said by the government here that they hope to have, you know, the steel tariffs and things sorted out before this visit, but it didn't work. The US didn't bend on these huge tariffs they put on UK steel. So again, where do you think Prime Minister Starmer can try to again, soften the edges, try to use this trip, hey, you know, we want to have a good relationship with you, but we also don't want to crash our economy for you.
- [15:27]
Gordon Sondland
Well, I think the trade deal is absolutely on track. We've all of a sudden changed our perception of how Quickly, these things move. If you remember T tip from way back, that just collapsed of its own weight. It took forever and it got nowhere. President Trump has only been in office for what, nine months? Barely nine months. And the amount of progress that's been made in terms of fleshing out some of the details has been extraordinary. These things normally take years. So I think you have to allow the momentum to slow down, speed up, just let the thing happen. And I think that Keir Starmer does not need to take any edges off. I don't think there are any edges. I think this second visit that was proposed by King Charles, or I should say proposed by the government and agreed to by King Charles, I think is extraordinary. And yes, it is a suck up to President Trump, but it's also a suck up to America. And I say that in the best possible way. We should suck up to one another. We are the closest of allies and always will be. So no matter what happens and how many barbs we exchange in the course of a business negotiation, that doesn't change the special relationship. So I think what's happening and what's unfolding, Christiane, is superb.
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Christiane Amanpour
Look, again, I take your point. Maybe Britain doesn't need to rub any edges off or soften any edges, but they do have differences. They want to make sure that President Trump is 100% rock solid for their major existential security issue, and that is Russia's unprovoked aggression against Ukraine. And up to this point, President Trump has tried to use his personal diplomacy with Putin, but the view is that he is constantly being essentially dragged along by Putin, strung along as he once said and as others have said, and he's still not implemented and imposed the strong punishments that he said are already lined up against Putin. Let's just take sanctions, for instance, whole raft of them with bipartisan approval in the US Congress could be level leveled, but haven't been. So why do you think that's not happening?
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Gordon Sondland
Well, let's look at it from the United States perspective for a moment. The United States previously has always been asked to shoulder both the financial and the military liability on any skirmish happening in Europe. And what President Trump is doing is working on two fronts. First of all, he's trying to free up military resources to deal with the China problem, which is a problem for both US And Europe. And it's not a problem that Europe can handle. It's only a problem that the US can handle as the tip of the spear. What he's trying to do is transition the role of tip of the spear to Europe and let Europe take the lead. He has been ping ponging with perspective Putin back and forth for the last, say, six months, trying to give Putin enough quarter to see if Putin is actually willing not just to make a deal in Ukraine, but actually to come westward and deal with the United States as a partner against China. That appears not to be happening because Putin wakes up every morning trying to figure out how to take more of Ukraine. And I think Trump has finally had his fill of that and is now going to push Europe to do as much as it possibly can with the United States backing in both intelligence, potentially air support and logistics, and let Europe be the boots on the ground in Ukraine. And I do believe it's going to be vital to have European boots on the ground in Ukraine, which Putin has.
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Christiane Amanpour
Said is a non starter. But look, President Trump, according to the White House readout, didn't get much from Putin when he gave him all the honors in Alaska. And then of course, Putin and Xi and Pezeshkian of Iran and Kim Jong Un of North Korea did that thing in Beijing where they really challenged the world's superpower, basically saying, hey, you know, we want, why should we listen to your rules of the road? We want our own rules of the road. It's time. So there's that part of it. But then there's also again about Ukraine and, you know, a lot about Ukraine that even before this trip, I think President Trump said, you know, it takes two to tango. Every time he's asked about the Putin, Zelensky, Russia, Ukraine, you know, debacle here, the terrible war, he tends to equate, he tends to equate responsibility for it and for ending it.
- [20:12]
Gordon Sondland
Well, I think he's trying to give Putin every possible off ramp to make a deal with Zelensky by not appearing to be 100% in Zelensky's pocket. Look, Trump knows exactly who invaded whom. There's no question about that. What he's trying to do is deal with a peer nuclear power and not drag the United States into what quickly could go from a conventional kinetic war into some kind of a nuclear conflagration, even if it just involves tactical nuclear weapons. So now he's been at a situation where the North Koreans, the Chinese, the Russians have had their party in Beijing. You noticed he snarkily tweeted, I'm glad you're all there conspiring against us. He knows exactly what's going on. And I think what you're going to see now is if the Europeans step up both with arms, with boots on the ground. I think the United States will be right behind them in terms of providing money, weapons, air support, intelligence and other help without putting American soldiers on the ground. We need to save those for the Taiwan problem.
- [21:28]
Christiane Amanpour
You know, the Europeans have said they will do that. But I just want to move on to one other thing which is kind of critical because this visit is happening in the wake of that terrible assassination in the United States of a key ally and friend of President Trump and the Trump administration. We've heard many of them, J.D. vance and many, many of them saying that had it not been for Charlie Kirk, maybe the president wouldn't have got all the, well, he wouldn't have got the youth vote that he did get. Some of them say that they owe their jobs to Charlie Kirk, et cetera. So, and this is, you know, again, flaming a lot of division in the US and there's a fear in the US that this could be used to really crack down on Trump or, you know, the administration's opposition. But so I want to read you something that the current mayor of London wrote. Of course, he's no friend of Donald Trump's, the Labour mayor, Sadiq Khan, who even from the first administration was calling out Trump for various policies. He's just written President Donald Trump has perhaps done the most to fan the flames of divisive far right politics around the world in recent years. Years scapegoating minorities, illegally deporting U.S. citizens, deploying the military to the streets of diverse cities. These actions are straight out of the autocrats playbook. And of course, we know the White House recently welcomed Nigel Farage, you know, who's supported by, you know, many of the far right and two senior leaders of Germany's far right. AfD. What do you make of this warning by the London well, first of all.
- [23:02]
Gordon Sondland
I'm a center right and I support Nigel Farage. I like Nigel Farage very much. Do I agree with 100% of what he says? Absolutely not. As far as Sadiq Khan is concerned, he's emblematic of the problem that we have in a lot of US Cities that are run by far left mayors. The cities just don't do well in the long term. Their people don't do do well. The economy doesn't do well. And it's not a good look for most of our cities that are run by people who have the same political views as Sadiq Khan. I don't think that President Trump gives a rip about what Sadiq Khan thinks.
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Christiane Amanpour
Do you think the president cares about his allies because I happen to be one of those who believes that when the U.S. you know, leverages its unique leverage and when it uses it for, you know, to resolve global issues, to help bring world peace, it can actually make a huge difference. So some have said, many analysts have said, including, you know, people in, who've written in the New York Times that he seems to be Let me just get this straight so I can write it so I can read it properly. When allies and adversaries alike appear to be ignoring him, he adopts a what can you do? Shrug as if he's an observer with minor stakes in the outcome. And they, you know, they refer to Putin, they refer to Netanyahu, essentially appearing to get his way all the time, even when Trump says, I'm not happy about certain things that he does.
- [24:34]
Gordon Sondland
It's a brilliant strategy. It's a brilliant strategy because at the end of the day, you've seen a binary response from the US under pressure, previous presidents. You've either seen one extreme, which is they have to own every world problem, whether it's our problem or not, or they're completely uninvolved in the world problem at hand. They have nothing to do with it, they don't want to talk about it, and we're not involved. Those are the two binary extremes. What President Trump does is he continuously toggles between, yes, we have an interest in this problem, but we're not the only ones that have an interest in this problem. And there are some problems, like the Ukraine problem, where, frankly, if you want to grade interest on a scale of 1 to 10, Europe is at a 10 and we're maybe at a 6 or a 7. So Europe needs to take the lead. And that's why he toggles between, you know, there's nothing more I can do. This is really their place problem. I've tried to all of a sudden intervening when he sees an opportunity to, you know, fix the train car that's gotten off the rails and put it back on the rails and see if it can, you know, proceed down its journey. But this is a very, very wise way of negotiating when you own part of a problem, but not the entire problem. And the United States has rarely done that.
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Christiane Amanpour
Gordon Sondland, Trump's former EU ambassador, thanks for joining us. And we'll have more on the UK State visit here in Windsor after this break.
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Christiane Amanpour
Now as the grand banquet gets underway in the castle. The it's not all pomp and ceremony on this visit. Among many urgent issues are Israel's war in Gaza, Russia's war in Ukraine, as we've been discussing. So what can this visit achieve on those fronts and more generally in US UK Relations with such a transactional president? Well, Sir Peter Westmark served as UK Ambassador to the US and also once worked as private deputy secretary to then Prince Charles, and he's joining us right now from London. Welcome to the program. I wonder what you must be thinking already of this state visit. What is going through your mind, as you've obviously been watching all the pageantry, knowing that there's going to be, you know, real political meetings tomorrow. What, what, what should Britain expect?
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Sir Peter Westmark
Well, the first thing is it's too bad that the sun isn't shining and the sky is in blue. But leaving that to one side, what strikes me is that this is a pretty special bit of pageantry that has been put on for the president of the United States. It's a shorter state visit than we sometimes get, but there are elements there, as you know and you've been commenting on, which we don't do for other people. And I think this is partly because we know that for President Trump, this is special. He regards his relationship with the royal family as something unique. And so we are putting on a show for him where which makes him feel very positive about the United Kingdom, very positive about the royal family. And I would hope positive about the United Kingdom more generally and his talks tomorrow with the Prime Minister. So I think so far, it's exactly the kind of, you know, pageantry and protocol and special treatment which the president, I hope, would have wished. On the substance, Christiane, I mean, there is a great deal there, but I suppose just picking out a couple, couple of the most important points. One, of course, is trade. Now, the UK Is fairly pleased that it's got a better deal on tariffs after Keir Starmer's successful visit at the Oval Office back in February than a lot of America's other trading partners. But it's still a good deal worse in terms of terms of trade than what we had beforehand. It's better on aerospace, it's better on automotive, but there's plenty more to be done. So I think on trade policy, partly in exchange perhaps for tech cooperation and stronger investment coming into the UK Economy from US Firms, I think they will be hoping that there is progress there on the foreign policy side. I mean, there's lots to talk about. You touched on it just then. I would have thought the area where the UK Will most want to make progress is on Donald Trump's approach to Ukraine. From the Western point of view, European point of view, it looks as though every time there's been an opportunity or a deadline or which Trump has set for Putin to behave better, it passes and there is no sanction and nothing happens, and he gets more red carpet in Alaska or wherever it happens to be. And I think the message that the UK Will be wanting to try to get across is not that this is just Europe's security problem. This really matters for the United States as well. And I'm not sure we've done a good enough job about convincing the president that that is the case.
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Christiane Amanpour
Okay, so, Peter, that's interesting. So you know King Charles, you knew him as Prince of Wales, you worked for him, as I said. And I just wonder, do you think that even though it's not his role to have political discussions with the president, that one he might be able to do, what you just said make it much clearer why, for Britain and for Europe, the issue of Ukraine and making sure that Ukraine does not get swallowed up by Russia is so vitally important for both the U.S. and U.S.
- [31:09]
Sir Peter Westmark
I mean, it's partly about Ukraine not getting swallowed up by Russia, which would only encourage Putin to go still further into the territories which were once, sadly for them, part of the Warsaw Pact. But it is also reminding him that the United Kingdom, in particular of its European partners, does a great deal for America's global security interests. American bases on British territories around the world are enormously important. And American military bases and intelligence cooperation with the UK are very important, too. They're important for America's security, not just for ours and for Europe's. And we've got to get that point, I think, across, which is hugely important. Is this the job of the King or the Prime Minister? Well, you know, the King is somebody who has his own very well informed views on a lot of issues. You will have seen that without saying anything, he showed what he thought of Trump's attempt to say Canada is for the United States by making quite a public fuss of Mark Carney in Canada. And you've seen also that he made a point of seeing President Zelensky not very long after he was treated not very kindly, shall we say, in the Oval Office. So I think there may well be ways in which he can, if you like, nudge the President in a different direction and perhaps help him to see some of these really important international security issues in a slightly different light. Will the King want to do that as well as the Prime Minister? You know, I can't predict, but, you know, I do know that he is not a shrinking violet.
- [32:37]
Christiane Amanpour
And do you think the King will speak to President Trump about his love of the environment, his, you know, lifelong attempt to, you know, rectify the terrible pollution and environmental degradation of climate change? As we know, President Trump has pulled the US Again out of the Paris climate Accord and actually not only rolled back protections in the US but also basically calling on the rest of his allies and around the world to roll back their green agendas as well.
- [33:09]
Sir Peter Westmark
I mean, he could. And we all know that there are a number of major multinational companies, companies which are paying less attention to ESG and the green agenda, partly because that's what their investors want, partly because the desire for economic growth and prosperity at the moment in the short term is overtaking companies desire to do the right thing. All that said, and we know what the King's views are on this subject, and they are deeply felt. And he was way ahead of the curve 40 years ago on a number of these issues. But I would say that he's also conscious that as monarch, there are a limited number of issues where he should get into governmental business rather than just express a personal view. So it wouldn't be surprising if he touched on it. But my guess is that he will probably prefer to focus on issues where there's a chance of moving Donald Trump in a different direction, rather than one where he would just be speaking for the record, but to no effect.
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Christiane Amanpour
Yeah. Now, look, you wrote recently in anticipation of this visit you've done. It's, I think it's in today's newspapers that essentially Britain also needs to get more transactional. Trump is transactional. Britain needs to do the same thing. What do you mean by that?
- [34:23]
Sir Peter Westmark
Well, it's partly what I was just saying, Christiane, which is to remind the United States that Europeans are not all just a bunch of freeloaders, least of all the United Kingdom. Now, actually, I happen to think that the President slightly excludes the UK from his more general view strictures on the European Union. But I think we need to make sure that he realizes, for example, that the British taxpayer is going to be spending billions of pounds to ensure that American strategic bombers can continue to use Diego Garcia, a British overseas territory where Brits will be picking up the bill. It's important to remember that there are very important American defence and intelligence facilities in places like the Falklands, like Cyprus, certainly Diego Garcia, Ascension island in the Atlantic, and of course, in the United Kingdom as well. I'm not suggesting there are quid pro quos that we need to be demanding in exchange for this, but I think it's important that, that we counter the idea that it's all take by the Europeans and that the Americans are doing all the giving. Trump likes to do deals. He likes to be transactional. I think we should not be shy in reminding him of the importance of the United Kingdom's contribution not only to American prosperity, and we are, after all, the biggest foreign investor in the US economy and vice versa, but also to the security of the United States. You know, there are nuclear bases and Princess Scotland, which are very, very important for American submarines. There are early warning systems on British territory. There's a lot of stuff that matters. And I sometimes wonder whether President Trump is adequately informed about the real contribution that we all do make.
- [36:06]
Christiane Amanpour
I want to play this little bit of a sound that, I mean a soundbite from President Trump earlier, when a gang of European leaders, a group of European leaders, went to the White House and he was talking about how he was being called sort of King of Europe or President of Europe. Here's what he said.
- [36:26]
Walter Isaacson
I think our nation now is the most respected nation anywhere in the world by far. You saw that with the European leaders on Friday. You saw that with NATO, where they agreed to go from 2% no pay to 5% full, fully paid up, trillions of dollars paid, where they respect your president to A level that they jokingly call me the President of Europe. They call me the President of Europe, which is an honor. I like Europe and I like those people.
- [36:56]
Christiane Amanpour
I'm going to ask you what you make of that. But also in conjunction with the fact that President Trump has alienated a lot of allies, not just adversaries, but allies as well. So I'm trying to figure out when the President, the United States needs to get stuff done. Let's just say, you know, standing up to China, it'll need its allies to do so. And yet in Japan and South Korea, not to mention in Europe, you know, there's a lot of anxiety, let's say, and a feeling of being alienated by the United States.
- [37:29]
Sir Peter Westmark
I think that's right. And the reason why so many of the European leaders rushed off to Washington after the Putin red carpet treatment in Alaska was not just because they all regarded President Trump as the President of Europe. It was because they were worried that he may be giving away the shop, if you like, in exchange for nothing, to President Putin, who, after all, had made virtually no concessions or no reasonable proposals about ending the invasion of Ukraine. So I think it was as much concern as just respect. Of course, we have to appreciate that Donald Trump is somebody who likes to. He likes the attention, and he likes the European leaders to take him seriously. And one of the reasons why we are, I think, very well placed to have a good relationship is that he likes the idea that he's not just the opposite number of an elected prime minister, he's also the opposite number of a king, a king who has been there, the monarchy has been there for centuries. And he likes to. Likes the relationship and he likes treatment, and he likes that specialness. So, you know, that is all part and parcel of dealing with this particular president. But you are right, a number of the European governments, some of them more outspoken than others, have been concerned about the attacks on free trade, about the undermining of international institutions, about what he's been doing to the rule of law, about the politicization of. Of many of the institutions in America, and indeed the checks and balances being rolled over with a compliance Supreme Court and a Congress, which on many issues isn't really doing what it's supposed to do in terms of standing up independently to what the executive's up to. So I think a lot of America's allies, while dying to see America exercise its rule as the leader of the free world, effectively is concerned by some of the direction of travel, not least on these issues of free trade. And prosperity and international security, which matters so much to all of us.
- [39:25]
Christiane Amanpour
Sir Peter Westmarkop, thank you so much. And we will be right back after a break. Just ahead of President Trump's unprecedented second state visit, the US and the UK Unveiled a transatlantic technology pact, with top tech companies including Google, Microsoft and others, pledging some $42 billion in investments, all to develop Britain's AI infrastructure. Meantime, in the age of social media, the online landscape is more challenging than ever for civil society, a far cry from what the inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners Lee, intended to create. As he lays out now in his new memoir, this Is For Everyone, he joins Walter Isaacson to explain why he's still optimistic about artificial intelligence.
- [40:32]
Walter Isaacson
Thank you, Chris, John and Sir Tim Berners Lee, welcome to the show.
- [40:36]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Thank you for having me. It's good to be here.
- [40:38]
Walter Isaacson
You know, I teach the history of the digital revolution here at Tulane University, and my students are always surprised that the Web didn't all just spring out of nothing, that a real person invented it, and that person is you. You did it 35 years ago. Tell me what it means to have invented the Web.
- [40:56]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Yeah. And they say they're amazed that I'm an inventor and I'm actually alive as well, so they can put me in their projects. So inventing the Web, you have to remember that the Internet and Web are different. The Internet is the underlying network, which was invented around 1969. And then 20 years later, it was the network was all over America creating different universities. But the programs that would use the Web were pretty crummy, and you had to be an expert, really, to use the Internet. So there was no Web. And so when I was working at cern, inventing the Web meant taking this idea of links and clicking on links and then combining it with the idea of the Internet so that you end up with a concept of a link that could go anywhere.
- [41:47]
Walter Isaacson
You were talking about cern, which is the particle accelerator in Geneva where you worked. And you invented it because you had to organize all the information there and make it collaborative. Tell me about how that environment led to the web.
- [42:00]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
CERN's great pace, because people come from all over the world. They have this huge challenge. They have a huge accelerator which is 27km long in a tunnel under the local mountains. And so it's a huge project, people coming from all over the place, and they bring all kinds of different cultures, all kinds of different computers and so on. So when I tried to help them put the whole thing together, then I found that Just the state of information was really was. It was tricky. I found that in fact, even though they had some documentation systems, what was crucial was actually bringing people to coffee, getting, inviting people to coffee. There was a coffee place, coffee area, which was where if you stood there long enough, people walked by. There was an intersection of various corridors. And so people would walk by and then you could puck them out of the dream and say, hey, tell me about your stuff. How does it work?
- [43:04]
Walter Isaacson
So you were born in 1955, same year as Steve Jobs, same year as Bill Gates. Both of all three of you invented something. You invented a way to navigate the Internet. Bill Gates invented the whole software industry. And Steve Jobs invents the notion of an easy plug and play personal computer. They become billionaires. You don't. You put it all in the public domain. Was there something in the environment that you decided not to commercialize it the way they did?
- [43:37]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
The point is the web is a protocol. The web is, you know, it's a standard. It's not just a program, it's not a product. It's a. Is when. When the web works, all of the computers have to speak the same language. And that's the big ask. You have to. So they all have to speak HTTP, they all have to speak HTML and so on. And so that is a huge ask. You can't also ask to send the click. So I wanted the web to take over the world. I wanted to be used by everybody. If it was going to be by everybody, it had to be free or it wouldn't have worked.
- [44:17]
Walter Isaacson
We've seen some really results of this horrible toxic environment you find online. Of course, we've gone through a really horrible week the past week. And you write in the book that the web sort of moved away from what you wanted and it became a place for a culture of grievance, of hostile activism. And you even say harassing people online and threatening or even committing violence is what's happened on the social media part of the web. Explain how that happened.
- [44:52]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Well, I think part of it is the way the social media systems are defined, the way they write the code inside things like Facebook. And they do it in such a way that as to keep you on the platform. And that means they do it on such a way as to be that they make the systems addictive. And so I used to be on Instagram when it was ran differently, when I could catch up with my friends and family on it. But now, then they changed it deliberately. The people who built Instagram make it more, make it so that you stay on the platform and they do it, but like that, by feeding you things which make you feel emotional. And that emotion isn't always love, it's often hatred.
- [45:43]
Walter Isaacson
Now you're talking about the algorithms which amplify things, and you're saying that the companies amplify things that engage you, which basically means what enrages you. Is there any way to do ethical algorithm design to make a social media that would more unite us rather than divide us?
- [46:03]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Absolutely. Instead of optimizing for people being angry, you optimize for people being creative, constructive. In the book there's a two page map of all the things on inset, and most of them are good. Remember those are things like Wikipedia which are wonderful. And so the problem is that people get stuck on the addictive things because they're addictive.
- [46:24]
Walter Isaacson
Well, what if a company can make more money by doing these addictive things, as indeed is true, as you say of Instagram or X or Facebook and all of them. Should the government or somebody try to say you should not do these type of algorithms?
- [46:43]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Well, there are places that don't. Pinterest, for example. Pinterest is a social media placement.
- [46:48]
Walter Isaacson
Yeah, but Pinterest has been left behind by all the ones that are more enraging and engaging.
- [46:54]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
We're supposing the ones that are actually deliberately addictive.
- [46:59]
Walter Isaacson
Yes, you could legislate, but didn't the way you invent the web make it very hard for it to be controlled by governments and central authority?
- [47:07]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Yes, but you can still make things illegal. And there are lots of things which are illegal. I mean, fraud is illegal on the web. It was illegal before the web and it was legal on the web. So lots of things. There are lots of things where we decided it's illegal. Some people have suggested that because just as you make certain drugs are just too addictive to allow, say you make them illegal, you could do the same thing with certain algorithms.
- [47:32]
Walter Isaacson
Well, let me paraphrase what Cassius said to Brutus, which is maybe the fault's not in the algorithms, but it's in ourselves that people are in this decentralized Internet posting what they want to say, looking at what they want to be enraged by. And this is just part of human nature that's being amplified by the web.
- [47:56]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
And to a certain extent that's true. But when you see something which makes you angry online, then maybe so you could blame the person who posted it. But also if in fact that post was circulated in a million people's feeds, then you can blame the Algorithm, So there's both sides.
- [48:19]
Walter Isaacson
So in other words, you try to restrict a company not from allowing posts, which it should do under free speech, but from amplifying it through the algorithm.
- [48:28]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Yeah.
- [48:29]
Walter Isaacson
You talk about the toxic environment of social media, all built on the web architecture that you invented. Do you think artificial intelligence, the advent of AI, gives us a chance to hit a reset button on the toxic nature of what's online?
- [48:49]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Yes, I do. Yeah, because we're thinking, we're rethinking everything. So, yeah, AI gives us a chance, as you say, to hit a reset button. So when you figure out how AI works, then we can insist on, for example, an AI who works for me. I wrote about that a few years ago, and now we've made one. If an AI works for you, Siri doesn't work for me. Siri works for Apple and Alexa works for Amazon. And so when Alexa makes a choice, I say, I want to buy some running shoes. Alexa will go through the process of selling me running shoes, just like Amazon does by operating a market, but where Amazon is the one that's going to gain the most from that transaction. So I wanted AI that was for, not for Amazon or Apple, buy one that works for me. And I wrote that up. And we've actually, my, my company Interrupt in the labs, we've actually demonstrated that you could do that. You can make an AI, which you trust. It works for you because you trust it. You give it all your access to all your personal data. And so when you do that, then it's very much more effective in answering questions, working in your interests.
- [50:10]
Walter Isaacson
When you invented that thing and you wrote about it, you wrote about a few years ago, you called them agents, and that's what they're being called now, which is an AI agent that's going to be my agent that'll book my holiday or book my. Or buy my running shoes if indeed I needed them. Why would that agent. How would you make it different from the agents that we're getting now from our AI systems?
- [50:35]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
We make it different by when you set the app, you set it up, and you train it to be helpful to the individual instead of. You don't. Particularly when you make a commercial decision like what car to buy or what holiday to go on or vacation to go on, you make sure that it is working as your agent. So with the way the agent works is that you have all your data in a solid data wallet. Solid is the protocol, which I've also described in the book. Solid is a way of allowing you to have data that you control. Then when you start an application, then it asks you where you want to store the data and it gives you complete control over that data. So it's a very different world from the current one.
- [51:27]
Walter Isaacson
Well, the current world, instead of having this solid data wallet in which all my data is in my control, we now have a web that has cookies where Amazon knows what I've done, what Apple knows what I've done, and they can use that information to market things to us. Isn't that a good business model though, to make the companies be able to thrive?
- [51:56]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Yes, yes and no. I prove targeted advertising is. Yeah, is typically more efficient than other advertising. And so the whole advertising based business model on the web, I think is something there is a threat to it that people are not using search engines so much, they're starting to use AI instead. So that's a bit of a threat to the advertising based model.
- [52:22]
Walter Isaacson
You talk about taking the web back. What are you and your teams developing in terms of protocols or ideas that would make the web a little bit less toxic and more useful to the ordinary people?
- [52:42]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
We're pushing digital sovereignty. So digital sovereignty is, you know, originally when the web was young, anybody could start their own website. And so that power that people have, your sovereign as an individual sovereignty, digital sovereignty. So we're pushing digital sovereignty. We're building systems where it's like having your own website. We're building new systems where you have a. It may be a data wallet or it may be a pod, a personal online data store, but is something that you completely control, building apps that work with that so that you can build. We're building apps which are collaborative as a center or for collaborative communication, building things which give you back your sense of purpose and being a peer to other people on the web and gives you back an ability to collaborate with them.
- [53:43]
Walter Isaacson
Sir Tim Berners Lee, thank you for joining us.
- [53:46]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Thank you for having me.
- [53:50]
Christiane Amanpour
And finally, wrestling with tradition. Young girls in Japan are entering the sumo wrestling ring for the first time. A sport that for centuries had been exclusively men only. Now over 600 women compete on an amateur level, with many traveling from all corners of Japan to attend week long training camps in West Tokyo at the nation's largest girls sumo club. Getting stronger and kicking higher together, even bandaging each other's wounds as they build a real sumo sisterhood. But women are still barred from the professional league. The 2023 Female Sumo World champion, Eri Hisano hopes that too will change soon. And that is it for now. If you ever miss our show. You can find the latest episode shortly after it airs on our podcast. And remember, you can always catch us online, on our website and all over social media. We'll continue covering President Trump's visit. Thank you for watching and goodbye from Windsor.
- [54:59]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
I'm Dr. Sanjay Gupta, host of the Chasing Life podcast.
- [55:03]
Gordon Sondland
All of the transformations and changes that I've made in my life have been a consequence of pain. Trying to tell me something?
- [55:10]
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
That's my friend Rich Rolle. He is a podcast host and an Ultraman who is no stranger to pain. We're gonna get into the science behind this so that suffering does not have to be an option. Listen to Chasing Life streaming now. Wherever you get your podcasts.