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“I do not accept that the US is an unreliable ally,” insisted Keir Starmer on Sunday.
“The US has been a reliable ally to the UK for many many decades and continues to be.”
Fast forward two days and the US has not just ceased to be that reliable ally, but is now actively co-operating with our enemies.
Donald Trump’s announcement overnight that he will indefinitely suspend all military assistance to Ukraine, which Starmer had denied was on the cards just yesterday, has made explicit what was merely implicit before.
By abandoning Ukraine to Putin, Trump has made it clear that the US is no longer an ally of either Kyiv, or the rest of Europe.
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As his humiliating treatment of President Zelensky last week also made clear, when it comes to Russia’s war against Ukraine, the Trump administration is now on the side of Europe’s invaders.
And it’s not like the Trump administration is even trying to hide it.
Interviewed by Fox News on Monday, Vice President JD Vance wrote off the UK as “some random country” which “has not fought a war in 30 or 40 years”.
Now whatever you may think of Britain’s involvement in recent US-led wars, for the Vice President to pretend that this involvement never even happened is a gross insult to this country and its soldiers.
It also follows a series of other insults against Britain by both Vance and Trump’s chief advisor Elon Musk, on everything from ‘free speech’ to last summer’s riots.
Of course insults are one thing, but full-scale abandonment is another.
And with Musk and other Trump allies threatening to pull the US out, not just of its involvement in Ukraine, but from NATO altogether, it has never been clearer which direction we are now heading in.
Yet despite all of this, the UK Government continues to insist that nothing has changed and that the US is still a “reliable” ally, whose president must be afforded all the honour of a state visit.
Pushed this morning on Trump’s betrayal of Ukraine, Starmer’s Deputy Angela Rayner repeatedly refused to criticise the President and instead insisted that the Prime Minister would remain an “honest broker” between Europe and the US.
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Yet the truth is that by refusing to face up squarely to the reality of Trump’s position, the UK Government is attempting to be, not so much an “honest broker”, as a dishonest one.
Because while Starmer’s attempts over the past week to somehow appease Trump with promises of state visits and tea with the King were well-intentioned, they are no longer tenable in the face of the US President’s abandonment of Europe to Putin’s armies.
Of course dialogue with the US must continue, even against all hope, but it must be based on an honest assessment of where the Trump administration is now heading, rather than where the UK Government would like it to be.
Trump’s Useful British Idiots
Yet while Starmer may be accused of naivety on Trump, he is at least trying to get a good result for both Ukraine and Europe.
The same cannot be said for Nigel Farage, or his fellow travellers.
Speaking on LBC yesterday, the Reform leader repeatedly refused to criticise his friend Trump, but showed no such reserve about Zelensky, who he labelled “rude” for showing “no respect” to the President.
“I’m not a huge fan of Ukraine” he told the station.
“It’s a very very corrupt country”.
He made no such similar statement about Russia.
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Farage’s comments immediately attracted condemnation, not just from the UK Government, but even from the previously Trump-supporting Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch.
Of course Farage’s positions on both Ukraine and Russia are not new. He has repeatedly stated his admiration for Vladimir Putin and sought to blame both Ukraine and the West for Russia’s invasion.
However, while Farage’s apologism for Putin and Trump may be unsurprising, what has been more surprising is the extent to which some British media outlets have been willing to go along with it.
The Daily Mail, whose Sunday sister paper did condemn Trump’s treatment of Zelensky at the weekend, published a piece today seeking to blame the President’s abandonment of Ukraine on a single comment by Zelensky.
It follows a similar article published by the BBC last week, which sought to suggest that Zelensky’s failure to wear a suit had somehow triggered Trump’s attack on him.
Of course what all of this analysis misses, intentionally or not, is that Trump did not abandon Ukraine because he didn’t like Zelensky’s outfit, or because of a single comment in the Oval Office.
He abandoned Ukraine because he is fundamentally in opposition to the country and its interests and has been for a long time, while being in increasing alliance with its enemies.
And while his apologists have long refused to admit this, instead predicting that the world would be a “safer place” under Trump, the reality of what is happening is now impossible for the UK, or Europe, to ignore.