Last week, after a G7 summit dinner in Canada with Donald Trump, Sir Keir Starmer expressed his certainty that the President would seek to de-escalate tensions with Iran.
But Starmer is also powerless in a way few have yet considered. Parliament simply would not back military action on Iranian targets, even if the Prime Minister advised it.
“At the moment the ball is in Iran’s court. If, for instance, they were to strike RAF Akrotiri [Britain’s base in Cyprus], that would be different, we would be responding in self-defence and there wouldn’t be any legal argument. But otherwise, there is no appetite to proactively attack them; let America do it,” the source added.
Leaked advice from Lord Hermer, the Attorney General, warned that the UK should not join direct strikes by Israel against Iran as it might breach international law. But that’s not the only thing holding Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs back.
But there is also a wider reluctance to engage in any overseas conflict. This stems from the 2003 ill-judged decision by former prime minister Tony Blair to “sex-up” the dossier on weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq as he played the junior partner to another Republican president.
“The key difference is in those days when the British prime minister came to the House and said that there was a real threat to British national interests that we needed to commit forces because X country was a threat – in the case of Iraq, because it had a WMD programme – that the convention was that you accepted the word of the prime minister, and that on the whole, you backed him, unless you really had a strong reason not to,” according to Chris Doyle, director at think-tank the Council for Arab-British Understanding.
square ALASTAIR CAMPBELL Iran is not like Iraq in 2003 - we should be warier of Trump’s US
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Right now the Tories seem gung-ho, determined to support the US and Israel because they think the ends justify the means. Iran’s nuclear enrichment programme needs to be stopped, they argue: the world should thank them for doing the job. Meanwhile Starmer’s only tacit approval of the campaign is “pathetic,” former Tory defence secretary Grant Shapps told Times Radio on Monday.
Convention on whether Parliament should have a vote before deploying troops has ebbed and flowed in recent years. Former prime minister Theresa May didn’t consult Parliament over a deployment to Syria.
But the escalating situation – Israel sent a follow-up bombardment to the Fordo nuclear site on Monday – could yet draw the UK into a wider conflict it does not want. If Iran struck US assets, it could trigger Article 5 of Nato – where an attack on one is an attack on all – and draw the UK into military action. If Iran chooses to attack the US via proxies, then UK bases and assets could also be under threat. MPs would demand a say.
Iran may bide its time before launching a spectacular response. Meanwhile it could use asymmetric attacks and targeted operations against US and Israeli assets and citizens.
It’s not just in the UK where there is little appetite for conflict. Trump’s Maga base is spitting feathers about another foreign intervention. US Vice President JD Vance – an Iraq veteran himself – batted away concerns about another drawn-out war in the region with an amusing if unconventional analysis.
You could imagine a more diplomatic version from Starmer: Blair got it wrong, but I won’t, he could say.
The trouble is: no one is buying it. Unless Britain’s assets are attacked by Iran, Starmer won’t be able to convince Parliament to go to war. Not even if he wanted to.
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Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( The UK is a second-tier power – Starmer has no authority )
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