“I love that word “relationship.” Covers all manner of sins, doesn’t it? I fear that this has become a bad relationship; a relationship based on the President taking exactly what he wants and casually ignoring all those things that really matter to, erm… Britain. We may be a small country, but we’re a great one, too…And a friend who bullies us is no longer a friend. And since bullies only respond to strength, from now onward I will be prepared to be much stronger. And the President should be prepared for that.” – ‘Love Actually’ 2003
It’s a long remembered scene. Not always for the reasons the writer intended.
Hugh Grant, twenty years younger, as the bachelor British PM, really socks it to the American President who’d been a little too handsy with the PM’s secretary and soon-to-be girlfriend. His press officers smile smugly at their US counterparts. Patriotic cheers and tears in cinemas across the land. Actually.
A plucky Brit tells the pushy yanks where to get off. ‘Hoorah! At last’ said Guardian readers everywhere. The words of course were crafted by the talented, very middle-of-the-road left-progressive Richard Curtis.
If it was a film title to reflect all his oeuvre it might have better been called:
“Why can’t everyone just love everyone, actually”
Of course it was all nonsense. Even back then.
At the time, 2003, the real PM, Tony Blair was completely behind an American president in going to war in Iraq. Partly why Curtis wrote the scene. The words “special relationship”, however dated, were used all over the media and in the corridors of power. New Labour Britain had not done “a Hugh Grant” and what’s more it wasn’t going to. We never really have since because in the words of the previous Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken:
“The UK is our partner of first resort”
Until about 10 days ago, we like every other European state counted on the US to guarantee our security, in the last resort.
This week in Washington, President Macron, and our Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, riding on the public goodwill he has so far had from President Donald Trump v2.0 come face to face with him. Macron has to his credit already pushed back. Will Starmer? There is a real scenario where unlike the syrupy wishful thinking of an old film, he may need to try and say ‘no’ to a man whose opponents would brand him ‘a bully’.
The problem is Trump’s least favourite word, whether President or not, is being told ‘no’. Vast swathes of American voters said ‘yes’ and he clearly has a mission, whether anyone else likes it or not. He’s still wrong about Ukraine, and johnny-come-lately British MAGA supporters should acknowledge that.
So, actually, Starmer’s unenviable task is really the epitome of the diplomatic code:
“The art of diplomacy is to persuade people to do something in your own, or others’ interests, they don’t want to do – and convince them it was their idea all along.”
You’ll hear words to this effect a lot in the corridors of the Foreign Office. Easier said than done.
For reasons that have been left to many others to interpret, Trump says (whether he believes it or not is anyone’s guess) that President Zelensky of Ukraine is a ‘dictator’, started the war that’s raged for 3 brutal years, and needs to make peace on his terms – the ‘his’ being Trump’s.
The British Prime Minister is going to have to decode how much the new administration really means to get Ukraine to buckle and ‘reward’ Putin and Russia, but he’ll try to sell some guarantee that if Europe – with France and the UK in the lead – steps up on defence and a peacekeeping force, the US will be its backstop, and that the right way forward is to:
“Put Ukraine in the strongest possible position”
Like many of Starmer’s soundbites in recent years this phrase is loaded with ambiguity. The word ‘possible’ like the word ‘change’ he’s so fond of, is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. Always builds in plenty of rhetorical ‘wriggle-room’ does our PM.
I’ve said before I genuinely wish him luck on Thursday, we all should, for Ukraine’s sake, but never mind the Lady, Trump does not seem for turning.
Baroness Thatcher had no problem with the word no. As long as she was saying it. Three times famously. She did however command great presence in the room with Presidents, Kings and autocrats, and her influence on American handling of Russia forty years ago is clear. Even the Labour lite Curtis gives Grant the throwaway line when looking at a portrait of her in Downing Street (you know – the one Starmer had removed):
“You have this kind of problem? Yeah… of course you did, you saucy minx!”
Before anyone asks, I will: Would Kemi Badenoch, in the same situation this week, have the steel and charm to win over a reluctant Donald? Presumably Nigel Farage wouldn’t try. But anyway it’s purely subjective, because of course she, and he, aren’t the one going.
Hoiwever the one who is going, gives me cause concern.
For all the post “we had lunch together” bonhomie Starmer has described about his first contact with the now President, the real question is does he have what it takes? Kevin Hollinrake used the pages of ConservativeHome last week to suggest, on the evidence so far, no. Lord Ashcroft has polling published here today, saying a number of the public feel a similar way. Chagos, China, re-alignment with the EU we voted to leave nine years ago – so far suggest that in negotiations Starmer is more yes man than no man.
The one elephant that should muscle its way into the room that is the Oval office on Thursday, is a fact that has been true for three years.
On this day three years ago the ‘Special Military Operation’ – or ‘illegal invasion and war’, as the vast majority of the world call it – was stopped by Ukrainian forces at Hostomel airport from being what Putin planned. A three day event.
What could also have stopped it, and secured peace, on every single day since, is if the real dictator in the equation, Vladimir Putin, had just ended it and gone home. Perhaps our PM will mention that when he’s ushered in.
Though, if you are going to attempt being ‘the bridge’ between Europe and the US, be careful you don’t get thrown off it.