BORIS JOHNSON: Starmer has made Britain something worse than a laughing stock – he’s made us a piffling irrelevance

So let’s consider for a moment the damage Sir Keir Starmer has done to this country’s global reputation in less than two weeks.

We are a nuclear power, a P5 country; We are one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council.

The UK has traditionally been the second most important player in NATO, which remains the most successful military alliance in history. We are in G7.

For all the financial vandalism of Starmer and Chancellor Rachel Reeves, the UK remains the fifth or sixth largest economy in the world.

We have superior security and intelligence services and enormous reach and influence.

But Starmer has somehow managed to make us not just a laughing stock, but worse, a baffling irrelevance.

By sitting on the sidelines and refusing to support our traditional friends and allies in their war against the ayatollahs, he has put on the biggest show of invertebrates since the Cambrian Explosion. And the world can see it.

Americans aren’t the only ones outraged (and appalled) by our initial refusal to allow them to use our military bases; This is the first time in my life that this has happened. Look at the worldwide reaction; Check out what our friends are saying about England.

Starmer sends Defense Secretary John Healey to RAF Akrotiri

We look like complete fools in Cyprus, where the Greeks and French are thought – rightly or wrongly – to have done more to protect the RAF base at Akrotiri than the Royal Navy. Apparently we have a ship (HMS Dragon) that was supposed to be on its way, but it turns out its voyage has been delayed due to operational disruptions, according to a syndicate.

If I said that these defense cuts were due to Reeves’ National Insurance hike, which hit the Ministry of Defense along with everyone else, that would give you a flavor of the madness of Labour’s defense policy. Remember, this was the very Cyprus base that was allegedly threatened by Saddam Hussein.

According to Tony Blair and Alastair Campbell’s famous ‘dodgy dossier’ in 2003, the Iraqi leader was capable of hitting Akrotiri with biological weapons and with only 45 minutes’ notice.

This turned out to be a lie. Saddam had no biological weapons and was certainly not capable of hitting Akrotiri within 45 minutes. But that country’s entry into war with Iraq was largely based on Campbell’s imagined threat to UK bases in Cyprus.

So it is surely one of history’s richest ironies that when the same base came under real attack – hit by a one-way attack drone on Monday evening – the Labor prime minister did absolutely nothing.

He dispatched Defense Secretary John Healey, who had to hide in a bunker on Thursday due to the threat of another (presumably Iranian) missile or drone.

Smoke rises after airstrike in Tehran… It was never realistic to think we could somehow escape the incident, writes Boris

Boris, HMS Dragon… was still in UK waters at the time of writing; not through any fault of the navy but entirely down to Labour’s indecisiveness and desperation, says Boris

We look like complete fools in Cyprus, where the Greeks and French are thought to have done more to protect the RAF base at Akrotiri than the Royal Navy, writes Boris

At the time of writing, HMS Dragon was still in UK waters; It was due entirely to the indecision and desperation of the Labor Party, and not to any fault of the Navy; The French nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle was patrolling the eastern Mediterranean.

Starmer of course (as usual) backed down on allowing the US to use our bases – weeks after this column called on him to do so – but it took too long. We still look like temporary twerps.

Why has it taken us so long to send forces to protect our friends and allies in the Gulf?

There’s a reason why there are so many Brits in Dubai, and it’s not just because they’re escaping the terror of the Labor tax. This is because these places are fundamentally pro-British and long for our greater involvement and support.

The UK flag was only lowered in the United Arab Emirates in 1971. Starmer is old enough to remember that we are effectively responsible for these countries.

They are our fastest-growing export markets and huge domestic investors in the UK, and now, in a completely predictable way, they are being ruthlessly bombed by Iran.

While the United States was building power in the region, it was never realistic to think that we could somehow escape intervention.

Why didn’t we send jets sooner to help protect them and the people of the UK? Can’t Starmer understand what a bitter disappointment they are feeling?

I sometimes wonder if he has looked at any British history or has any real understanding of the relationships we have around the world.

Then think of the Iranian people, that great and bright people. Ask yourself this question: What has been the West’s biggest foreign policy failure in the last 15 years?

Were we too bullying or too arrogant? Did we repeat Iraq’s mistake and try to impose democracy on countries that were not ready for it?

On the contrary, I think we have been too willing to step back lately. We, the West, were very weak.

You could argue that this fatal weakness began in 2013, when Barack Obama allowed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to tear gas his own people and then – despite his promises – did nothing to punish him.

Things got worse in 2014, when we effectively ignored Putin’s invasion of Crimea and Donbas; We have violated the promises we made to protect Ukraine under the 1994 Budapest Consensus.

In scenes that sent shockwaves around our friends in 2021, we were the ones who appeared weakest when the United States triggered a chaotic Western exit from Afghanistan. And of course our enemies noticed this weakness and tried to exploit it.

Why do you think Putin launched his large-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022? Why do you think Iran encouraged Hamas to attack Israel in October 2023? Because they thought the West was weak and they thought they could get away with it.

Finally, we have a US president who is ready to confront the enemies of the West, no matter what you think of him. Hamas handed over the hostages. Assad left Syria. Maduro left Venezuela.

We finally have a chance to end the terrifying reign of Putin-backed ayatollahs who execute women for not covering their hair properly.

It won’t be easy and it might not be quick. It is clear that there cannot and will not be Western ground forces in Iran this time, and Iranian protesters are clearly taking terrible risks in challenging the regime.

But there is a sense that the United States and Israel have already accomplished something remarkable. As a Gulf leader told me yesterday: ‘The Iranian regime will never be the same again, and that’s a good thing.’

Here’s the choice, friends. Would you rather have a chance to end the tyranny of the mullahs, or have no chance at all? Starmer took no chances – but why?

Not because of international law or because of his friend Lord Hermer, but because he suddenly feared the threat of a cabinet revolt from Ed Miliband, who had lost a hand-to-hand fight with a bacon sandwich.

This is not only embarrassing, but also impossibly poor.