Ignore Nigel Farage’s pontifications about Russia and Ukraine. He has not said anything particularly outrageous. I have long been frustrated by the omerta on suggesting a Western role in the conflict’s origins by those still pining for the Cold War. As ever with Farage, it is quite refreshing to see the bubble of consensus pricked. Putin apologist, Kremlin stooge, and so on. Judas was paid!
But while his comments have provided an excellent chance for his opponents to try to stall his momentum, the row is as pointless as the rest of this election. Reform UK will win, at best, a handful of seats. As with his proposed tax cut bonanza – based on maths that would make Liz Truss blush – Farage is not to be taken seriously. He will not be our Foreign Secretary on July 5th.
Even if he was challenging for government by 2029, one hopes international pressure and war-weariness will have long brought Kiev and Moscow to the negotiating table. All that Farage’s views can do right now is raise the blood pressure of a few armchair generals and shake Taylor Swift off the front pages.
Instead, readers worried about Britain’s foreign policy should be paying more attention to one Keir Starmer. On July 9th, our next Prime Minister will attend a summit marking NATO’s 75th anniversary. Other than platitudes about Ernest Bevin, what can we expect from Starmerism abroad?
It’s a vital question.World events have played an outsized role in scuppering Labour governments: Ramsey McDonald and the depression, Clement Attlee and Korea, Gordon Brown and the financial crisis. And when Tony Blair is dead and opened, the pathologist shall find Iraq inscribed upon his heart.
The last five years have proved that the world can set the best-laid schemes of mice, men, and Dominic Cummings awry. Our armed forces plan for a big war by 2030. AI continues to fester. Taiwan, Iran, North Korea: the lights on the geopolitical dashboard are flashing red. Other cliches are available.
Unfortunately for those of us not hoping to spend our thirtieth birthday sinking with HMS Queen Elizabeth in the Taiwan Strait, the available evidence of Starmer’s foreign policy fails to generate much confidence. From Labour, we can expect the same, but worse: continuity with added virtue-signalling.
Being charitable, Starmer has never needed to be interested in foreign policy. His time as Shadow Brexit Secretary was spent very determinedly trying to stop Britain from thinking about its place in the world. Appropriately for a former Herr Direktor of Public Prosecutions, “the essential basis of…Starmer’s foreign policy is legalism and process”, according to a Henry Jackson Society study.
Characteristically, Starmer has chosen to outsource his thinking. Since Sue Gray’s experience doesn’t stretch beyond the Irish Sea, Andrew Marr suggests the Labour leader is consulting a smorgasbord of big New Labour names: David Miliband, Jonathan Powell, Tom Fletcher. John Bew – like Henry Kissinger, but Northern Irish, and nice – could stay on. His Attlee book was very good.
As with Rishi Sunak summoning David Cameron to eat Ferrero Rochers for him, Starmer has also put a good deal of trust in his outward-facing Shadow Ministerial. With John Healey – the well-liked Shadow Defence Secretary, in place since 2020 – this seems reasonable. He has promised a habitual review of Britain’s security capabilities and pledged to raise defence spending.
However, one cannot help raise an eyebrow at Starmer’s other international bod: David Lammy. That our next Foreign Secretary struggled with basic history on Celebrity Mastermind does not overburden me with confidence. Nor does his ministerial experience hitherto being in domestic departments, or his having called the man likely to be the next President a “neo-Nazi sympathiser”.
But whilst I still can’t imagine Lammy on my pub quiz team, he seems to be working hard to build up his international credibility. He has visited at least forty countries in his role and become pally with Republicans in D.C. How long until he kisses the ring at Mar-a-Largo? Everything Cameron can do…
Lammy has also rendered unto us his own Long Telegram – a piece in Foreign Affairs outlining Labour’s new doctrine of “Progressive Realism”. In a world where the “global order is messy and multipolar” as the “rise of China…has ended the era of US hegemony”, “democracies have become more economically dependent on authoritarian states”. History kept on rolling.
He pledges to support Kiev “for as long as it takes to achieve victory”, which seems a tad optimistic in the face of waning American interest. Nonetheless, British foreign policy will remain “founded on the country’s relations with the United States and Europe” – no Anglo-Gaullist he. He promises to cooperate with China “as appropriate” and place “climate diplomacy” front and centre.
All worthy stuff. But is there any meaningful way that differs from the COP and cope of the past two decades? As Aris Roussinos has put it, “Progressive Realism” is “merely Blairite liberal internationalism from a position of relative weakness” – “anodyne political messaging rather than hard-nosed strategic thinking”. It rightly criticises Tory “nostalgia” but proves just as unworldly.
Since we cannot expect the material realities of Britain’s inability to influence world affairs to change, we can hardly expect Labour to change much except the emphasis of our posturing. Rachel Reeves will loathe hiking defence spending any time soon. Our military impotence will continue.
Nonetheless, Starmer will immediately have to fall back on his Foreign Secretary, since his visit to NATO will soon be followed by a meeting of Emmanuel Macron’s European Political Community at Blenheim Palace. This will be his international coming out party. It will also be a chance to schmooze EU leaders ahead of a Brexit renegotiation – if he even knows what he wants from one.
Labour will struggle to win a hearing from a Europe distracted by its problems, evolving against their ideals, and hamstrung by events. A hard-right French government, a continuing Russian advance, an Israeli invasion of Lebanon, a Trump return: reopening Brexit will be, to coin a phrase, back of the queue. Despite his big victory, Starmer will also be constrained domestically.
If the Tory MPs’ view of the word is indelibly frozen in 1989, for Labour, it is forever 2003. Add to that many MPs reliant on growing Muslim electorates, nervously looking over their shoulders at the spectre of George Galloway. Finish with an electorate – Ukraine asides – rather cool on international engagement, according to UnHerd polling. But Trotsky’s dictum on war is inescapable.
You might expect a supermajority – stop groaning at the back! – to allow Starmer to sod them. But a majority of 200 is not what it was, especially with a payroll vote of only 100 or so. Chart Starmer’s tergiversations over Gaza to see how quickly he caves to backbench pressure. Weak, weak, weak!
This could be a virtue, if it keeps Britain out of stupid wars, and provides breathing space for an honest reassessment of our strategic priorities and military (in)capabilities. But it won’t. Starmer will be spooked as soon as the first crisis of his premiership develops. Trump and he won’t be bosom buddies a la Blair and Bush Jr. But he will trot just as meekly along the Yankee path.
Playing Scrappy Doo to Washington’s Scooby is a role our tame political class has long become used to. Starmer will not rock that boat, whoever wins in November. That doesn’t inspire confidence in the man leading us through the world’s most dangerous period in decades. Starmer will be overwhelmed.
Whatever progress on his domestic priorities he manages, foreign affairs will still play a large role in hastening the implosion of Starmer’s government. War, recession, domestic unrest: the perfect trifecta to marshal Labour towards the exit door – and break Farage’s current ceiling of support. If you’re worried about him and foreign policy now, wait until it puts him in Number 10.
He’d be inheriting a situation even bleaker than that which Starmer faces come July 5th. Say it loud, say it proud: things can only get worse.