This time, there was no kissing, hugging or planting trees. Less than two months after Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron
displayed mutual affection in Washington, their encounter at the G7 meeting in Canada was marked by angry rhetoric on US trade tariffs and a white thumbprint left on Mr Trump’s hand by a firm squeeze from the French leader.
Mr Trump’s weekend onslaught on the postwar multilateral order has cooled his bromance with Mr Macron and reinforced the French leader’s determination that the EU should stand its ground on trade, seen by the EU as a defining transatlantic issue. For Mr Macron and Angela Merkel — who described the G7 outcome as “sobering” and “depressing” — the Quebec debacle also emphasised how much the EU’s two dominant leaders will have to rely on each other in a colder multilateral era.