‘We Are Learning to Bully Back’

The meeting, by the time it convened, seemed pointless. Some joked that it could have been an email. When European Union leaders agreed to gather yesterday, the plan was to ready their response to President Trump’s tariff threat, an outgrowth of his insistence that the United States take over the territory of one of their members. But the day before they met, Trump backed down, spectacularly. He swore off further tariffs and embraced terms for negotiations about Greenland, the Arctic territory he covets, that bear little resemblance to his maximalist demands for ownership. Instead, he accepted options that he likely…