A diplomacy tightrope for Britain’s Starmer after Trump’s tirades

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The dispatch

British diplomats have long prided themselves on the so-called “special relationship” with the United States.

The phrase was coined by Winston Churchill, Britain’s inspirational wartime leader, when in March 1946 he famously described how an “iron curtain” had descended across Europe.

His speech was delivered at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, home state of the then-U.S. president Harry Truman, who was shown a copy in advance.

Warning of the threat to democracy posed by the Soviet Union, Churchill said: “Neither the sure prevention of war, nor the continuous rise of world organization will be gained without what I have called the fraternal association of the English-speaking peoples.

“This means a special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire and the United States.”

Plenty of other countries pride themselves on their own special relationship with the U.S., including Israel and Canada, both of which have previously used the term.

France is often described as America’s “oldest ally” and former President Joe Biden used this phrase when, in December 2022, he hosted French President Emmanuel Macron at the White House for the first state visit of his administration.

But no “special relationship” is as formal as that between the U.S and Britain, which builds on the close security and intelligence links forged during the Cold War, to the extent that the pair enjoy a nuclear co-operation agreement and a deeply integrated defense industrial complex.

Ironically, while countless U.S. presidents have used the term, none have invoked it as often as President Donald Trump.

In September last year the White House even published a fact sheet headed “The Special Relationship” which declared: “The bond between the United States and the United Kingdom is like no other anywhere in the world, and we will always be friends.”

All of which left Prime Minister Keir Starmer walking a tightrope as he responded to Trump’s threat to impose further tariffs on eight European countries — including the U.K. — from next month unless they support his desire to buy Greenland.

Unlike French President Emmanuel Macron, who has urged the EU to deploy its “anti-coercion instrument” against the U.S. — something that seems inconceivable but nevertheless reflects the position in which the bloc finds itself — Starmer indicated he did not favor retaliatory tariffs should Trump press ahead with his proposed levies and insisted “a tariff war is in no-one’s interest.”

And, while making clear that “any decision about the future status of Greenland belongs to the people of Greenland and Denmark alone,” Starmer was also careful in his speech on…