I think it would be suicidal for Apple to comply with that. It would open it to requests for many other countries demanding the same. Now this will create problems because now countries will start requiring Apple not to disclose their citizens information to any other party. Now you have two opposing requirements that will lead to Apple products to be banned in many countries if not all. I think Apple have much to lose by complying with UK that just withdraw and make UK users put pressure on their government.
And it is not classical west vs east. I think this is on much more fundamental concept of sovereignty. Many countries on both sides of ideological spectrum invest a lot on hacking and zero days exploits to obtain information on specific targets. UK is too lazy and demanding this privacy violation and internationally illegal action (just guessing) to be routine request.
It's not entirely clear to me what it really is that UK authorities have ordered Apple to do.
If this is just about iCloud advanced protection as some sources say then I don't see how it would be suicidal for Apple to comply by disabling this optional and off by default feature for UK users.
But other sources claim that the order goes a lot further and doesn't just affect UK users. Does it include E2EE for Apple's password manager for instance? Does it include E2EE for iMessage? Does it include 3rd party E2EE apps in the App Store?
And it is not classical west vs east. I think this is on much more fundamental concept of sovereignty. Many countries on both sides of ideological spectrum invest a lot on hacking and zero days exploits to obtain information on specific targets. UK is too lazy and demanding this privacy violation and internationally illegal action (just guessing) to be routine request.
edit: Fix typos