I was in the room when Keir Starmer hit back at his critics on Iran | Politics | News
Sir Keir Starmer defended his leadership during Iran crisis (Image: Getty)
Sir Keir Starmer summoned the press to Downing Street as he tries to shake off his reputation as Chief Ditherer. Hours earlier, Reform UK leader Nigel Farage had issued a scathing assessment of his leadership during the Iran crisis, claiming Britain had been left “humiliated” and that the nation should have supported the US and Israelis in their attacks from “day one”.
When the President of the United States tells the world that you are not Winston Churchill and that the fabled Royal Navy cannot send a warship to the Mediterranean to defend Britain’s military presence in Cyprus until next week, it is not a good look – especially when former generals line up to warn that our armed forces are dwindling.
It was time to step forward. It needed to send a message to worried MPs, concerned military, worried allies and any enemies willing to exploit Britain’s weakness that Britain was not in a coma.
Standing between two British flags in the glittering briefing room in Downing Street, he sought to portray himself as the paragon of cool rationality in a dangerous and chaotic world.
“As the region descends into chaos, my focus is to provide calm and collected leadership in the national interest,” he said.
Read more: Nigel Farage predicts ‘the end of Keir Starmer’ as Labor heads towards massive loss
Did he regret his decision not to participate in the initial attacks on the Iranian regime? Not a little bit.
President Trump may have decided it was time to unleash the theocracy’s arsenal to end a superpower’s nuclear ambitions, but Sir Keir disagreed.
“Britain’s long-standing position is that the best way forward for the regime and the world is to reach a negotiated agreement with Iran under which they abandon their nuclear ambitions,” he said. “That’s why I took the decision not to participate in the UK, US and Israel’s first attacks on Iran. This decision was deliberate, in the national interest and I stand by it.”
The world has changed since then and Iran “fired drones and missiles at 10 countries that did not attack them.”
As soon as the attacks began, British jets were in the air and our forces were shooting down drones.
Prime Minister was verbally attacked by President Trump (Image: Getty)
So is Britain now on a mission to transform Iran into an Iranian democracy? Sir Keir has shown no appetite for the kind of regime change that captured the imagination of his predecessor, Sir Tony Blair.
“My strong view is that we need to de-escalate and that when it comes to some core issues like nuclear capacity, this should ultimately be a matter of negotiation,” he said.
In other words, his core belief has not changed. The Iran crisis will have to be resolved in a negotiating room; no matter how many lives are lost, ships sink and lives are lost in the meantime.
He did not lavish praise on President Trump or rush to reassert his status as the United Kingdom’s First Buddy. Sir Keir spoke of it being “a firm that remains committed to our values and principles, regardless of pressure to the contrary”.
He made the announcement on a glorious day in London, but the Prime Minister doesn’t look like a man who’s been feeling the sunshine lately. The world is in crisis and, in his own words, this “conflict may continue for a while”.
Sir Keir last spoke to President Trump on Saturday evening. Today’s cautious statement, in which he makes it clear that he believes jaw-jaw would be better than war-war, is unlikely to make the next conversation with the wartime president any less frosty.
