British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer departs 10 Downing Street (Image: Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publis)
When you are in a hole, stop digging. Such was the advice of the old heavyweight Denis Healey, given after many years spent in top government jobs.
Perhaps our rookie is going to have to learn it the hard way. For he has just sent his key adviser to Washington on what already looks like a political mission impossible.
Powell’s job is to convince the incoming administration that plan to give away the in the Indian Ocean to Mauritius is a good idea.
But figures around – and almost certainly the president-elect himself – do not think it is a good idea. , who knows most of them well, tells us they are horrified by it. They think, perfectly reasonably, that it will acutely compromise the viability of the strategically crucial joint UK-US air base on one of the islands, Diego Garcia.
In opposing the deal, the team is lining up alongside a long list of those who think it an abomination. Chagossian exiles, some of whom were sent packing from Diego Garcia against their will when the base was set up, are furious at the idea of Mauritius being made a new colonial ruler of the archipelago behind their backs. British public opinion seems overwhelmingly hostile to the unilateral surrender of UK territory. Opposition parties including the and Farage’s have been knocking lumps out of for the agreement’s evident lack of patriotism.
Even the new government in Mauritius – elected since the deal was agreed in early October – has gone cold on it. Incoming Mauritian PM has told Powell he needs more time to “study the details with a panel of legal advisers”.
But it is in Washington that , who brokered the disastrous deal in the first place, is likely to face the biggest roadblock. Marco Rubio, pick for Secretary of State – the US equivalent to our Foreign Secretary – has publicly said it is a threat to US security.
A clause allowing Britain to lease back Diego Garcia for 99 years, supposedly ensuring the viability of the airbase, is seen as woefully inadequate by US experts. They point out that putting Mauritius in full control of the other islands in the Chagos chain – there are more than 50 of them – will leave the base wide open to surveillance by hostile actors, including . It is not even beyond the bounds of possibility that China could agree a deal with Mauritius to set up its own base on a neighbouring island.
As Farage told Newsnight this week: “Very senior members of Trump’s incoming Cabinet team are horrified. They know has extraordinary naval ambitions. This deal is totally unnecessary. There is no basis in international law that says we have to do this.”
And he is right. The whole rationale for , Powell and agreeing to hand over the Chagos Islands is a 2019 ruling of the International Court of Justice declaring Mauritius to be the rightful owner. But this court only has advisory status. It cannot order Britain to cede territory.
International law is a nebulous thing at the best of times. The exaggerated respect has for various multinational tribunals that are rife with ideological biases tells us he has not yet himself made the transition from human rights lawyer to seasoned statesman.
He has, for instance, also said he will never take Britain out of the jurisdiction of the whatever impact it is having on our national life – another ridiculous posture. He has also tamely agreed to open a “dialogue” with various grifting Commonwealth regimes about UK taxpayers paying them reparations for slavery.
Yet has the British government even bothered to ask for reparations for the enormous damage caused to our country by ?
Of course not. Because it knows it would be laughed out of Beijing. In international relations countries that won’t defend their own corner quickly get known as a soft touch. Britain is on the brink of this status. If we surrender the Chagos Islands then pressure will mount over , the and other overseas territories. International courts stuffed with developing country radicals can be expected to reach verdict after verdict demanding British concessions.
Instead of seeking to rush through the Chagos surrender – perhaps even before Team takes power in late January – Starmer should show he has learned on the job. A “review” of the deal that kicks it into very long grass without quite declaring it dead would be just the job. Either that or he can keep digging. And end up burying himself.