To say this is not to fall for the notion that Brexit suddenly makes Britain insignificant, relegated to the second division, a quaint offshore island of little consequence. That’s not true. Britain remains in the top 10 of most global rankings, and the top half dozen of those that confer most weight – economic, military, education, stability, soft power. Beware the easy myth of terminal decline. [...]
Britain has nevertheless lost influence and will continue to do so because of Brexit. Boris Johnson went on the Today programme earlier today, partly to talk up Britain’s relationship with Trump, but also to claim that Britain’s long embrace of the US makes us the ally that can shift Trump’s America “into a better place” on issues such as Nato, climate change and the Iran nuclear accord.
To put it at its mildest, it was ironic that Johnson could make that tendentious claim on the day when Sir John Chilcot raised fresh criticisms of Tony Blair’s Iraq policy and Trump delivered a highly nationalistic speech in Warsaw. Blair too thought that Britain could shift the US into a better place – or at least that was what he said he thought. But as Chilcot said, the amount of effective influence exerted by Britain on America in 2003 was “very slight and short-lived”. Things do not change.
And it was doubly ironic that Johnson should make the influence claim on a day when one of his most recent predecessors as Conservative foreign secretary was knocking it down. Shortly after Johnson’s BBC interview, William Hague told a House of Lords committee that Britain’s influence over America and in world affairs more generally was being significantly weakened by leaving the EU. Hague made three strong points. Britain’s global clout has been amplified by EU membership. Britain’s self-image as a bridge with America mattered because it was a bridge that reached to Europe. And Britain’s role in Europe helped to prevent fragmentation within the Nato alliance. That influence will now inescapably diminish.
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