Annette Young is pleased to welcome Laurel Rapp, Director of the US and North America Programme at Chatham House. According to Ms. Rapp, the visit of King Charles to the US, planned prior to the outbreak of the US war on Iran, now unfolds with far higher stakes in the wake of an all-out diplomatic crisis. What was once regarded as a “special relationship”, the US and the UK are being increasingly tested, and shaped, by combative rhetoric amid an unprecedented divide on key strategic issues: Trade, NATO, Greenland, Iran, Ukraine, defence budget, and a host of other points of contention.