Let’s face it. What’s a bloke got to do to win the Nobel peace prize these days? I mean the much-coveted inaugural Fifa peace prize is all very well – The Donald is slated to win that one in perpetuity – but it’s the Scandi laureate that is the real deal. The one that people will remember. And what more could the US president have possibly done to secure the £1m prize last year than to end at least eight global conflicts. Including ones between countries that didn’t even know they were at war with one another. Still, the Albanians and the Azerbaijanis must be very relieved to have taken part in a war in which no shots were ever fired.
But Donald Trump is nothing if not a trier. He wants that Nobel prize badly. So his new year resolution for 2026 has been to adopt the Donroe doctrine of selective regime change. Start a small war in order to prevent a much bigger one. A service to the rest of the world. I mean, no one much liked Nicolás Maduro – least of all most Venezuelans – so he won’t be much missed when he is kidnapped and thrown in a New York slammer.
A few people might quibble that if the US was really cracking down on “narco-terrorism”, then The Donald might have gone after the former Honduran president who had already been convicted in a US court. Though for some reason, Agent Orange chose to pardon him instead. Probably just an oversight. An easy mistake to make. After all only a diehard cynic would imagine the coup had anything to do with Venezuelan oil reserves. Keir Starmer will be kicking himself. All he had to do to keep his promise of reducing everyone’s energy bills by £300 was to invade Venezuela, remove Maduro and install a more amenable government.
Fair to say that the US attack caught the entire world on the hop. And if it gave the Nobel committee plenty to think about ahead of this year’s deliberations, it also gave many global leaders a headache. Not least the UK prime minister. How to criticise the US without appearing to criticise the US? If the US can do this to Venezuela, what’s to stop The Donald from doing the same to us? In the new world order where American interests are all that matter, careless talk costs lives. The stars and stripes flies proudly over Downing Street.
So for the past few days, Starmer has been on full sycophant alert. Refusing to say whether he thought the US had broken international law by its rapid-fire invasion and kidnap. Even though the UN charter is completely clear that international law has been broken, Keir’s mantra has been ‘See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil’. He doesn’t know all the facts even though The Donald has been happy to share them with every visiting journalist. Trump has no qualms about what he has done. He’s thrilled to bits with himself.
But Starmer has gone out of his way to be as uninformed as possible. Whenever any of his advisers try to get him up to speed, he interrupts and changes the subject. Basically none of this is any of our business, he says repeatedly. If the Americans want to invade Venezuela then it’s their shout. International law can be whatever The Donald wants it to be. And yes, it is completely different to Russia’s war with Ukraine and China’s claims on Taiwan. How so? Because it is. Stop asking difficult questions. International law varies depending on whether we like the country being invaded. What’s not to understand?
Conveniently for Keir, the Tories also have taken to applying moral relativism to international law. The law can be whatever we need it to be at any given moment. All that matters is doing nothing that might upset the Americans. So Kemi Badenoch has also gone out of her way to take as little interest in the legal niceties. At times like these, a sensible politician learns to look the other way. And as Kemi herself has admitted, she hadn’t been entirely sure where Venezuela was on the map – somewhere in Africa maybe? – and she wasn’t in any hurry to find out. These things would work themselves out somehow. Far be it from her to cast judgment.
Other politicians were a little clearer-eyed. Labour’s Emily Thornberry – along with the Lib Dems and other Labour MPs from the left of the party – were adamant that two separate things could both be true. You could dislike Maduro and be pleased to see the back of him and be concerned that his removal had broken international law. If the law doesn’t matter then it’s a free-for-all race to the bottom which will be won by the US, Russia and China. Weirdly, Nigel Farage was also clear that international law had been broken. Though he seemed to think this was a good thing. A Brexit bonus was the destruction of a safe world order.
Monday was also time to spare a thought for the hapless Mike Tapp. The junior Home Office minister who is the Alan B’Stard of the 2024 intake. A man who is quite happy to say and do anything he is told by Downing Street. Even if it makes him sound like a complete halfwit. At best. On Monday, he ventured into quarter-wit territory in an interview with Sophy Ridge on Sky News as part of the morning media round.
What about Greenland? Ridge asked. What about it? Said Tapp. Ridge tried to talk him through it. After the success of the Venezuelan operation, Trump and his team were openly considering coups in Greenland, Cuba and a host of other countries. And Greenland was currently under the jurisdiction of the Danes. You could see the panic in Mike’s eyes. No one had given him a steer on Greenland and he wasn’t sure what to say. So he defaulted to his original brief not to say anything that might upset the Americans.
‘Er,’ he said. It was like this. It wasn’t for the UK to do anything about Greenland. Greenland could look after itself. And if the Americans did invade the country it wouldn’t be so bad. I mean, what had the Danes ever done for Greenland? The country couldn’t get by on bacon and Lurpak indefinitely. A few more KFC franchises and a Walmart would cheer the country up. So bring it on. You could see the light dying in Mike’s eyes as he said this. It will be a while before he recovers.
Sensing that throwing Greenland under a bus wasn’t quite such a good idea as first thought, Starmer rowed back a little in a later TV interview. He did have a line after all. And Greenland was it. But Venezuela was still America’s to do with as Trump chose. What a time to be alive. Happy new year everyone.
The Bonfire of the Insanities by John Crace (Guardian Faber Publishing, £16.99). To support the Guardian, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
