A view from the far side of Brexit

On British soil, Donald Trump applauded the Brexit verdict because he 'loves to see people take their country back', as he put it to an audience in Scotland, which had, ironically, just voted overwhelmingly to stay with Brussels.

NEW YORK // Great Britain or Little England? Those were the alternative post-Brexit futures presented to readers of The New York Times the day after the UK voted to leave the European Union.

It might seem obvious which scenario Americans would prefer for their old ally “across the pond”, but actually the reaction in the US to the UK’s impending withdrawal from Europe was rather more complex. After all, America is a country born out of resistance to overweening tyranny and some commentators viewed the British vote almost as a 21 century version of the Boston tea party.

None more so than ­Donald Trump, the presumed ­Republican candidate for the presidency. On British soil, he applauded the Brexit verdict because he “loves to see people take their country back”, as he put it to an audience in Scotland, which had, ironically, just voted overwhelmingly to stay with Brussels.

Other American politicians on the right also praised the British people for acting in the spirit of Churchill and Thatcher, without apparently realising that neither was as overtly anti-European as their historical reputations might suggest.

Trump, of course, sees parallels in the Brexit vote with his own presidential campaign. If an establishment proposal to take the safe course, on principles of sound economic self interest, can be overthrown in Europe, then surely it can in the US, too? His anti-establishment, iconoclastic appeal to US voters treads much the same ground the Brexiters did in the UK.

Hillary Clinton, his presidential rival in November’s election, must also be aware of the dangers of a populist, emotion-heavy reaction on the part of American voters. Her immediate reaction to the Brexit verdict “respected the choice” of the British people and underlined America’s “steadfast commitment to the special relationship”, both statements designed to appeal to the patriotic anglophiles among the US electorate.

But she went on to stress the need for careful management of the American economy in the difficult financial and market-related period Brexit would herald in – a thinly-veiled stab at Mr Trump’s inexperience and his shoddy business record.

There is no doubt that many Americans are bemused and worried by the Brexit decision. US markets fell in tandem with British and global markets and even the optimistic voice of some in the real estate business – who hoped that wealthy Chinese and Russians would look again at Manhattan rather than London – could not disguise the worries over global economic uncertainty.

The condition of the British and EU economies – vital trading partners for the US – are of great concern to American industry, its exporters and its financial powerhouses.

Wall Street in particular faces a period of extensive and expensive restructuring.

But maybe there is something more atavistic in the America’s shuddering reaction to Brexit. In the US deep psyche there is a memory of the attempt by the southern states to split from the north in 1861, leading to civil war, slaughter and economic devastation of large parts of the country.

Surely, Americans would be forgiven for thinking that nothing good ever comes from leaving a union.

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