Yves here. One can wonder whether Trump was responsible for Starmer’s exit, as opposed to getting in front of the announcement to make it seem as if he played a central role. Alexander Mercouris has pointed to earlier inflection points, particularly the Mandelson scandal, where he then thought Starmer’s departure was imminent. But having doubts about that issue does not invalidate the rest of Helmer’s take on the very much fallen state of US-British relations.
By John Helmer, the longest continuously serving foreign correspondent in Russia, and the only western journalist to direct his own bureau independent of single national or commercial ties. Helmer has also been a professor of political science, and an advisor to government heads in Greece, the United States, and Asia. He is the first and only member of a US presidential administration (Jimmy Carter) to establish himself in Russia. Originally published at Dances with Bears
When President Donald Trump (lead image, 3rd left) announced the resignation of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (right) to make sure he would announce it himself without delay, he threw overboard the special relationship. He also declared that British foreign and domestic policy is to become – already has become — a colonial one.
In the history of British empire that hasn’t happened for almost two thousand years. Not since the Roman Emperor Claudius, accompanied by 40,000 troops, declared the island a province of his empire in 43 AD, and Emperor Hadrian followed in 122, ordering the construction of his defensive wall against the Pictish north. Today, Trump has pushed further northwards than the Romans; bought the rebellious Picts off; and constructed a golf course 230 miles north of Hadrian’s Wall.
“The special relationship is in operation right now,” Starmer had claimed in March. “We are working together in the region, the U.S. and the British working together to protect both the U.S. and the British in joint bases, where we’re jointly located and we’re sharing intelligence on a 24/7 basis in the usual way.” /
Trump began declaring otherwise when he issued Starmer his first marching order on the Indian Ocean island base of Diego Garcia in February.
“Our relationship with the United Kingdom is a strong and powerful one,” Trump tweeted, “and it has been for many years, but Prime Minister Starmer is losing control of this important Island by claims of entities never known of before. In our opinion, they are fictitious in nature. Should Iran decide not to make a Deal, it may be necessary for the United States to use Diego Garcia, and the Airfield located in Fairford, in order to eradicate a potential attack by a highly unstable and dangerous Regime — An attack that would potentially be made on the United Kingdom, as well as other friendly Countries. Prime Minister Starmer should not lose control, for any reason, of Diego Garcia, by entering a tenuous, at best, 100 Year Lease. This land should not be taken away from the U.K. and, if it is allowed to be, it will be a blight on our Great Ally. We will always be ready, willing, and able to fight for the U.K., but they have to remain strong in the face of Wokeism, and other problems put before them. DO NOT GIVE AWAY DIEGO GARCIA!”
A month later, replying to Starmer’s special relationship fealty pledge, Trump said: “The United Kingdom, our once Great Ally, maybe the Greatest of them all, is finally giving serious thought to sending two aircraft carriers to the Middle East. That’s OK, Prime Minister Starmer, we don’t need them any longer — But we will remember. We don’t need people that join Wars after we’ve already won!”
In April, Trump told Starmer he should not have sent Peter Mandelson to Washington as UK ambassador. “He ‘exercised wrong judgement’ when he chose his Ambassador to Washington. I agree, he was a really bad pick. Plenty of time to recover, however!”
Then on the advice of his banker and election financier Warren Stephens, the President’s ambassador in London, Trump decided that recovery time for Starmer had run out. He demanded he walk the plank. “Keir Starmer will resign as Prime Minister of The United Kingdom. He failed badly on two very important subjects- IMMIGRATION AND ENERGY (OPEN NORTH SEA OIL!). I wish him well!”
Starmer’s replacement is now a bidding contest for all aspiring British party politicians to receive Trump’s favour to take power in the next election; that must be held within three years, by August 2029.
In British voter polling of their party and prime ministerial preferences, this makes Trump more popular than Starmer of the Labour Party and Nigel Farage of the Reform Party. Actually, at minus 64 percentage points Trump is relatively less unpopular than Starmer and Farage. He is still ahead, negatively speaking, of former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn; he is trailing behind Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative Party leader.
By this measure, King Charles III is the frontrunner in the colony. He has a net favourability rating of plus 26%. “The King and Queen got me to do something that nobody else was able to do, without hardly even asking,” Trump patronised the monarch on April 30. “In Honor of the King and Queen of the United Kingdom, who have just left the White House, soon headed back to their wonderful Country, I will be removing the Tariffs and Restrictions on Whiskey having to do with Scotland’s ability to work with the Commonwealth of Kentucky on Whiskey and Bourbon, two very important Industries within Scotland and Kentucky. People have wanted to do this for a long time, in that there had been great Inter-Country Trade, especially having to do with the Wooden Barrels used.”
Wooden barrels for 2026 to send the same American message that teachests had in 1773.
Trailing far behind Charles III, Starmer’s likely successor, Andrew Burnham, former Birmingham city mayor, is starting at plus 4%. That is so low, the empire pollsters in the White House and CIA are calculating, that Burnham will have to follow the Trump line on boosting British defence spending on US arms procurement; on joining the permanent war against Iran; and on defending the US-Israeli genocide and redevelopment plan for Gaza.
Burnham has already made a record of his subservience on each of these issues. Click to view here, and here, and here. In the new podcast with Pelle Neroth Taylor (London) and Martin Sieff (Washington), we discuss the dire straits for the British and the Hormuz Strait for the Americans and Russians. Click to view or listen.
Burnham was mayor of Manchester, not Birmingham. Starmer is hugely unpopular, I do not think Trump’s opinion made much if any difference. He was a dead man walking anyway.
I agree. The writing was on the wall since the May local elections and the election of the Mayor of Manchester to Parliament was the final nail in the genocide and pedophile supporter Starmer’s coffin. He served his zionist masters well, a man without qualities.
This is Helmer’s weird idea of humor, presumably.
If not, I trust his reporting and theorizing on Russia a lot less.
Helmer had a run in with Lavrov for some reason and was kicked out of Russia as a consequence. Not sure where he is now, but he definitely holds a grievance against Lavrov, and by association, Putin. That appears to colour, if not cloud, his judgement.
Dead man walking – actually walking since the election.
Corbyn is still the only really popular Labour leader amongst potential labour voters
Votes and seats won
2001 Blair 10,724,953 votes 412 seats
2005 Blair 9,552,376 votes 355 seats
2010 Brown 8,609,517 votes 258 seats
2015 Miliband 9,347,324 votes 232 seats
2017 Corbyn 12,877,918 votes 262 seats
2019 Corbyn 10,269,051 votes 202 seats
2024 Starmer 9,708,716 votes 411 seats
It’s been the case since at least Suez, and probably going further back to Roosevelt, who given his Dutch ancestry had no reason to be anglophile, and in Keynes’ memorable turn of phrase, picked out the eyes of the British empire.
The only difference is that past American presidents have been careful to assuage the sensibilities of their British counterparts while insisting on iron subservience on matters of substance.
As the current British ambassador to the US improvidently blurted out to some US students months ago, the US only has one special relationship, with Israel, and Keir Starmer has been a dead man walking for months now, the only question was when he would be pushed given all the plausible contenders had baggage of their own, or logistical conundrums like Andy Burnham who first had to find his way back into Parliament and had been successfully stymied once when Starmer still had some residual authority left (with the result that a safe Labour seat went Green).
Starmer is one more emanation of the world’s worst political class, which has as its counterpart the U.S. elites, which are both depraved and prone to spontaneous kitschy displays of loyalty to the Crown. Didn’t the U.S.A. have a revolution to settle the issue? What wonders are wrought by power that corrupts absolutely.
Just as the U.S. Democrats and Republicans are interchangeable, you have Labour and the Tories. What’s particularly remarkable — and telling — is how politicians like Shabana Mahmoud and Kemi Badenoch simply replicate the same colonialism, oppression, and imperialism (for reasons Adolph Reed would easily explain).
Trump engaged in some loud talking, and as Yves Smith points out regularly, Trump’s superpower is sensing weakness. What’s fascinating is that Trump managed to sift through Starmer’s endless and egregious weaknesses to make a post with good timing.
And there’s this:
The special relationship is a combination of interlocking families (buccaneers according to Edith Wharton), feudal economic policies on both sides of the Atlantic, a hatred of work and the working class, colonialism, and the intense desire to keep the wogs down. It’s a poisonous brew, but large swathes in both countries benefit from the mutual abuses.
At least the Weird Sisters put healthy things in their toxic potion like eye of newt and toe of frog.
Starmer was almost universally regarded as departing inminently.
Trump, lacking either a filter or deference to convention, just didn’t bother to wait on the official announcement.
And to add insult to injury, not a single mainstream news outlet, that I saw, in the UK mentioned that Trump pre-emptively announced Starmers resignation on his social media platform FFS. It has to be rubbed into the nose of the British as to their place in the world pecking order.
Helmer links to a YouTube conversation in the last paragraph. Towards the end he makes an interesting point about our imperial and colonial era, which I admit is a little beside the Starmer/Burnham sucession issue. He said that for now we need to reverse the Clausewitz idea: Politics is an extension of war by other means. War is the purpose that politics serves. It was interesting.
Hmmm… The Trans Atlantic Whiskey Barrel Co-prosperity Bund.
Didn’t America have an early Whiskey Rebellion? Back when anyone and everyone could make it? (1791-1794.)
Why yes, it did.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whiskey_Rebellion
The “original” Boston Teaparty was over taxation. The Whiskey Rebellion was over taxation. Now Trump and the American Elites want to “tax” England and Europe to support the failing American Empire. Forget the “official” governments. The people themselves will lead the way to fight this latest overreach of the extant Elites.
Stay safe.
Trump is 3rd right in the image not third left or do Brits have a different way of numbering pictorially?