Britain needs its transatlantic alliance but could play a unique role as peacemaker
Boris Johnson’s comments on Qassim Soleimani’s death reflect Britain’s ongoing effort to bridge a widening rift between Europe and the US over Donald Trump’s hard line and increasingly erratic Iran policy.
That was on display yesterday as the EU invited Iran’s foreign minister, a man the US sanctioned this summer, for talks in Brussels to try to defuse the crisis. Europe remains desperately committed to diplomacy, even as Mr Trump blows up Iranian generals.
Ever since the president took the US out of the 2015 nuclear deal, Britain, France and Germany have been trying to square the circle of relations with Mr Trump and their belief that ripping up the deal was short-sighted, counterproductive and dangerous.
In killing Soleimani, Mr Trump made the balancing act more precarious – for Britain more than most. Like its European allies, the UK opposed Mr Trump’s decision last year to quit the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran. Diplomats were appalled by the destruction of a painstakingly built international agreement, and thought the hawks in Washington who sought regime change were being naive about the Iranian regime’s lack of resilience.
They were also alarmed by the implications for Britain’s interests, including securing the release of prisoners such as Nazanin Zagharirat cliffe. But Britain has recently found itself edging away from its European neighbours, slowly, if reluctantly, siding with Washington. That process included seizing an Iranian tanker off Gibraltar, which sparked a tit-for-tat seizure of UK vessels in the Gulf and led to Royal Navy vessels being sent to join a mission in the Strait of Hormuz.
There are several reasons for the shift. For one thing, Britain has far fewer economic and business links with Iran than France or Germany. There is also a reluctant recognition in London that there is possibly a case for having a bad cop in the room. When Britain and other Europeans complain that the Trump White House’s confrontational approach is unlikely to change Iranian behaviour, the Americans ask them what, exactly, being nice has achieved. It is a question, a former minister once admitted to me, that can be difficult to answer. After all, Iran is still running proxies and shadow wars against Western interests across the region, and Mrs Zaghari-ratcliffe is still in jail.
Then, of course, there is Brexit. Outside the EU, Boris Johnson’s Government needs the transatlantic alliance more than ever. By swinging behind the US on naval patrols in the Gulf, he will hope to have won more credibility in the White House to speak on the Iranian issue.
Mr Johnson’s instinct to side with the US over Europe has been noticed in Washington, and the Americans have provided both carrots and sticks to prise the UK away from the European consensus.
In August, a month after Mr Johnson became PM, Mr Trump’s then-national security adviser and legendary Iran hawk John Bolton showed up in London to announce the president would “enthusiastically” support a post-brexit free trade deal and praised the Government’s decision to send warships to join operation Sentinel, the US naval security mission in the Persian Gulf, instead of a European-led mission.
He denied a quid-pro-quo linking the issues. But Mr Johnson knows it is in his interests to try to bridge the gulf between Europe and the US before he is forced to choose between them.
After all, if America gets involved in a more serious conflagration with Iran the Prime Minister will have to decide if Britain will follow its ally into a war it has no wish to fight.