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UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is batting on a sticky wicket, as the Brits might say, and has had a bruising few weeks. First, he was criticized [ [link removed] ] for his welcoming an antisemitic activist who had been released from an Egyptian prison back to the United Kingdom. Then US President Donald Trump called his plan [ [link removed] ] to hand the Chagos Islands to Mauritus a “great stupidity” which led the prime minister to scramble to hold the deal together. Further, the Economist notes that on the issues that matter most to UK voters, the situation is stagnant at best [ [link removed] ]. This is certainly true of the economy, and despite his valiant attempt to describe the gloomy economic data in a positive light [ [link removed] ], few seem to be buying his spin.
Things continue to deteriorate. Just last week, his hand-picked ambassador to the U.S. Peter Mandelson popped up [ [link removed] ] in the Jeffery Epstein emails released by the U.S. Department of Justice, and there’s a lot of speculation about what Starmer knew before nominating him. Starmer was forced to issue an apology [ [link removed] ], and the UK government has vowed to release [ [link removed] ] all of the files related to the nomination. The British police even raided [ [link removed] ] two of Mandelson’s properties, searching for evidence and further stoking the political uproar.
Not surprisingly, polls indicate confidence in Starmer has collapsed [ [link removed] ], and he appears to be fighting [ [link removed] ] for his political life. His fellow Labour MPs think his days are numbered [ [link removed] ] and it’s obvious to everyone he is battling [ [link removed] ] to keep his job.
Among Starmer’s missteps—somewhere between welcoming an antisemite and promoting someone with possibly deep ties to Jeffrey Epstein—was his misguided and counter-productive trip to China [ [link removed] ]. Like his Canadian counterpart [ [link removed] ] before him, Starmer made a pilgrimage to Beijing, hat in hand, in search of applause from left-wing European elites. Given the situation, it’s worth asking how cozying up to China will help the British population. Or was Starmer trying to draw the UK media away from his domestic challenges towards today’s overwhelming geopolitical uncertainty?
Starmer came back from Beijing with very little to show (The Guardian’s top takeaway from the trip was “Visa-free travel to China” for Brits [ [link removed] ]) and critics note he basically returned empty-handed [ [link removed] ]. In return, the Chinese received the green light to build a “super-embassy” [ [link removed] ] in the UK, making it the largest diplomatic premises in Europe—and probably the largest future spy station as well. There was a time when Britain’s greatness was measured by its presence in other countries; now, in the bizarro world [ [link removed] ] of London’s leadership, Britain finds prestige when other countries have a large presence in the UK.
Unlike the era in which history’s great European masters of statecraft navigated Cold War uncertainties with a moral compass, today’s leaders have a distorted sense of good and evil. They struggle to see black and white and only see shades of grey. They’re trying desperately to be relevant and friendly with all parties.
There was a time when countries sought relevancy by being on the right side of History, aligning with the Free World, and championing liberty. Now they somehow imagine that not choosing a side or being “neutral” (whatever that means), as if there was a moral equivalency between the U.S. and China, can somehow stave off their ongoing decline.
But the world is rapidly bifurcating into two separate political and economic ecosystems, one American and one Chinese; one free and one totalitarian. Without sufficient critical mass, “middle” countries must succumb to the gravitational pull of one or the other. The United Kingdom is a moon, and all it can do is choose which planet to orbit. Given the importance of technological innovation and military might, a collection of sub-scale economies and militaries cast serious doubt on Carney’s claims that middle countries can band together and function as a third center of gravity. As uncomfortable as it is to do so, countries must pick a side.
It must be tough, I imagine, to reside at 10 Downing with the ghosts of Disraeli and Churchill, soaking in the imperial splendor of a bygone era. The relative impotency must be difficult to accept. But moving away from the United States will only speed the United Kingdom towards irrelevance. As Paul Kingsnorth noted in Against the Machine [ [link removed] ], there was a time when the British Empire effectively ran the world; today, Britain can barely run itself.
The people of the United Kingdom deserve a leader that puts Britain first, someone who understands that London must choose between Washington and Beijing, and ultimately one who has the moral clarity to lead in a time of rampant uncertainty.
VIKRAM MANSHARAMANI is an entrepreneur, consultant, scholar, neighbor, husband, father, volunteer, and professional generalist who thinks in multiple-dimensions and looks beyond the short-term. Self-taught to think around corners and connect original dots, he spends his time speaking with global leaders in business, government, academia, and journalism. He’s currently the Chairman and CEO of Goodwell Foods, a manufacturer of private label frozen pizza. LinkedIn has twice listed him as its #1 Top Voice in Money & Finance, and Worthprofiled him as one of the 100 Most Powerful People in Global Finance. Vikram earned a PhD From MIT, has taught at Yale and Harvard, and is the author of three books, The Making of a Generalist: An Independent Thinker Finds Unconventional Success in an Uncertain World [ [link removed] ], Think for Yourself: Restoring Common Sense in an Age of Experts and Artificial Intelligence [ [link removed] ] and Boombustology: Spotting Financial Bubbles Before They Burst [ [link removed] ]. Vikram lives in Lincoln, New Hampshire with his wife and two children, where they can usually be found hiking or skiing.
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