NOT since Labour PM Harold Wilson clashed with Democrat President Lyndon B. Johnson over Vietnam has the Special Relationship been so strained.
That needy expression, so loved by leaders to stress the closeness of the and Britain, is under its heaviest assault in decades after actively undermined strikes on .
Sir Keir Starmer actively undermined Donald Trump’s strikes on IranCredit: Reuters
Devastation in central Tehran following US and Israeli strikes on the Iranian capitalCredit: Getty
Remember that this party, and Starmer, had the audacity to tell Britain that putting Jeremy Corbyn in No10 was a good ideaCredit: Alamy
Back in 1967, Wilson wrote to Johnson that his refusal to send British troops to the Far East was “dictated not by political pressures but by what I know to be right”.
Can his successor really say the same thing 59 years later after blocking US bombers from using British bases to take out ?
wants the public to think he’s walking a moral tightrope, beholden to his own : The sacred texts of international law.
But forgive me if I’m a little cynical . . . there’s clearly politics at play too.
With Labour bleeding out to the hard Left — hit by a toxic combination of — it’s obvious is dancing to a new tune.
The shadow of the also lingers long over the party that dragged Britain into the conflict on a tissue of lies and spin.
Ironically, some of the same cast of characters involved then — like deranged spin doctor — are now heaping praise on prevarication.
For a Labour leader with a problem on his left flank, a bit of bashing and distance from the US is always going to play well to the home crowd.
Don’t forget that this is a party — and a PM for that matter — who had the audacity to tell Britain that putting in No10 (so he could creep up to and , abolish the , leave and scrap the Bomb) was a good idea, just a few short years ago.
While this may help interests, does any of this serve the national interest?
The USS Winston S. Churchill firing a Tomahawk Land Attack Missile in support of Operation Epic FuryCredit: AP
Well, there it gets complicated, especially with a that does not play by normal diplomatic rules.
But knows this.
That’s why he spent the first 18 months as PM sucking up as a “Trump whisperer”.
As “a bridge” between Europe and the United States at a time of strife.
As the man who could work with his polar opposite as a leader for the good of the nation and the , not least in getting tariffs down.
And for a while they put on a pretty good show of it.
The unlikely bromance of Mr Rules, a soft leftie pragmatist beholden to every passing treaty, doing business with right-wing Mr No Rules, who insists the only guard rail is his own morality.
There were love-ins, and endless chit-chat about their shared love of the .
Plus, because of , Britain ended up getting a better hand from Trump than .
But behind the scenes, foot-dragging on increasing defence spending and, once again, putting the mythical international order before Britain’s interests set the pair on a collision course that has now exploded with spectacular bad blood.
As the President told me on Monday evening, the Special Relationship is “not what it used to be” and Britain is “not a recognisable country” any more.
In a late-night phone call from the White House, an exasperated riffed on his British counterpart, sighing: “He has not been helpful. I never thought I’d see that. I never thought I’d see that from the UK. We love the UK. It’s very sad.”
Deranged spin doctor Alastair Campbell is now heaping praise on Starmer’s prevaricationCredit: Alamy
When the interview dropped yesterday morning, — who remains the most unpopular Prime Minister in the UK since polling was invented — had a few friends shoot the messenger.
As if I had somehow oversold the depths of anger in aimed at the Prime Minister.
Breathless biographers of the PM tried to explain away the President’s seething anger as a win for Labour and dismissed it as bluster over the .
Well, I hope they were watching as the President doubled down last night in one of his most vitriolic Oval Office press conferences yet.
Sitting in front of a bust of Britain’s wartime hero, Trump declared: “This is not the age of Churchill. I would say the UK has been very, very uncooperative with that stupid island that they have. They ruined relationships.”
And in a zinger that will haunt Starmer’s remaining time in office, he added: “It’s not Winston Churchill we are dealing with.”
The British public don’t tend to like an American bossing the UK around — not least when Obama intervened on Brexit.
But I do hope embattled No10 feel their party-management tactics were worth the biggest rift with the US in 50 years.
And I do wonder whether this time that wisecrack might just cut through to a nation who — if the polls are to be believed — have also seen through this PM.
Eze Chidiebere Paul
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