Though I’m a republican, I do feel for King Charles as he prepares to go to the unstable United Sates of America. He is expected to placate and win over the capricious, tyrannical Trump. How humiliating for him. How humiliating for us.

In 1946, Winston Churchill gave his famous Iron Curtain speech, which affirmed an indissoluble Atlanticist alliance between Britain and America. Every generation since then has held on to that idea. It’s a delusion. The truth is that after America gained independence, its previous coloniser became a supplicant.

After the British empire ended, our movers and shakers attached themselves to the most powerful Western nation hoping that would continue their history of supremacy. Pathetic really. Yes, Nato and military and economic challenges made co-operation with the US necessary. But our neediness and abject self-subjugation was and is exceptional and exceptionally damaging. It has stopped us from imagining a different, liberated future. The cringeworthy picture put out last week by Deputy PM David Lammy of him with his “friend” JD Vance said it all.

It’s time to face up to some hard truths. The much vaunted and flaunted “special relationship” between the US and the UK is a bad marriage. One side is dominant, too often coercive and controlling. Though Trump is the most aggressive and brutish, none of the presidents before him treated the UK as a respected, equal partner. No other Western power but Britain craves this much American approval.

We feel we must please the US, not answer back, adjust our behaviours like tradwives, live in fear and hope for the best.

You may think that being a leftie makes me biased. But here is what Mohamed Amersi, the wealthy businessman and philanthropist, also controversial funder of the Tory party, wrote last year: “The much-discussed, and often derided, ‘Special Relationship’ has been the guiding light of UK foreign policy since Britain lost its great-power status. However, in its eagerness to be seen as America’s fiercest ally, London has lost its voice in the relationship.”

If Tony Blair had refused to join George W Bush’s war on Iraq, he might have saved America from embarking on that calamitous conflict. But he couldn’t do the right thing.

Only Harold Wilson resisted US demands, but partially and warily. He offered some co-operation, but refused to send British troops to Vietnam. US president Lyndon Johnson’s administration even offered to rescue the UK from its economic crises if two British units were sent to fight. There was no deal.

Political submissiveness has led to economic and cultural submissiveness. TV programmes and newspaper articles rage about vape shops, kebab outlets and Turkish barbers blighting local parades and city centres. McDonald’s, Popeyes, Wingstop and other US franchises sweep into those spaces and no one minds a damn. Fast American food, a scourge, is causing an obesity crisis. But our independent nation can’t say or do anything about that. Amazon and other big tech firms seem to do as they please on our shores. Palantir, the US software company with deep ties to the US military and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, has a £330m contract with our NHS. And so on and on.

Many of us Brits admire American writers, love the country’s movies and music, appreciate the openness of many of its citizens, and its thriving, energetic cities. But, thanks to Trump, we now see clearly how one-sided the relationship is and how domineering the bigger, more powerful partner.

Pro-American public figures in Britain still noisily and irrationally hold on to old delusions. We must stay close to our better half, they say, keep on side forever. For America will always be the leader of the free world. And Europe sucks.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has just stated boldly that the long established close economic ties between Canada and the US have become a “weakness”. Our government needs to recognise that indisputable truth too.

Britain’s “special relationship” has weakened its courage and voice for far too long. It needs to stand up for itself. Maybe start by cancelling the King’s visit to the US. I wager the move would be popular with the majority.

After the bloodshed and disorder we are living through, a new world order will emerge. US power may well be tempered. The UK will be free to decide its future. Time to start now.

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