With the world edging closer to a conflict of potentially seismic proportions, would it be too much to expect Keir Starmer to nail his colours to the mast? Short answer: it would appear so.
The Prime Minister’s desperately stilted address from Downing Street on Saturday left nobody any the wiser as to where he stands on the US-led strikes against Iran. He was at pains to condemn the Tehran regime as ‘utterly abhorrent’, but only after stressing that Britain ‘played no role’ in the assault.
Worse was to come when Defence Secretary John Healey declined on six occasions to give a straight answer today when asked if the Government backed the strikes. Bemused onlookers could be forgiven for wondering whether No 10 even has an opinion on the subject.
Meanwhile, reports that Sir Keir only had a brief conversation with Donald Trump after the attacks strongly suggest a lack of respect from Washington and go some way towards making a mockery of the ‘special relationship’ between Britain and the US.
Nobody is suggesting that these are simple matters. Bitter experience has shown that attempts by the West to overthrow despotic Middle Eastern regimes can go disastrously wrong.
But Iran has posed a deeply serious threat since the late Ayatollah Khomeini installed himself as its supreme leader in 1979. It remains at the centre of global terrorism and has the blood of countless thousands of victims on its hands.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer issues a statement at 10 Downing Street, London, on the latest developments in the Middle East
Scenes in Tehran following strikes on the city from Israel and the United States
With the real prospect of regime change in Tehran for the first time in decades, it is crucial that key Western powers send out a coherent message. Yet even though it was clear that these strikes were imminent, Sir Keir is seemingly still unable to state his position.
Reading from an autocue as he delivered his statement on Saturday, he sounded less like the leader of a great nation and more like a commentator on events that had no bearing on him or our nation. Except he’s so wooden and dull that not even The Guardian would hire him in that role.
Sir Keir seems to have forgotten that Britain is the second biggest player in Nato. With both Canada and Australia giving their support to the US strikes, there is a strong case to say the PM should have already announced the deployment of British squadrons to the Gulf.
While leaders of other countries clearly see the bigger picture, Sir Keir – true to his legal background – seems more intent on observing the small print of international law. He is also trying to keep restless backbenchers in check while, of course, appeasing Labour’s Muslim vote.
But Starmer’s refusal to stand up and be counted in this crisis makes him look like a man who is trying to be everyone’s friend. The problem is he’ll end up trusted by no one.
