When the history of this century’s decline is written, the day British intelligence confirmed that Washington and Tehran had cut a deal over the heads of their European ‘allies’ will mark a pitiful milestone. It is the sound of an empire’s final exhalation. The secret talks, conducted with the stealth of a Victorian card sharp, reveal a truth too bitter for the chattering classes to swallow: Britain is no longer a player, but a pawn.
We are the Austria-Hungary of the 21st century, a once-great power reduced to a decorative footnote in a game played by the Americans and the Persians. The deal itself reeks of the Congress of Vienna, where great powers carved up continents without a thought for the smaller states. But here the carving is done not with pen and ink, but with oil profits and missile ranges.
And where is His Majesty’s Government? Gazing at the entrails of the Brexit goose, hoping for a miracle. It is a national humiliation, dressed up in the jargon of ‘pragmatic diplomacy’.
Let us not mince words. This is a strategic betrayal. The United States has chosen its interests over the alliance.
And why should it not? We have spent decades dismantling our military, outsourcing our defence, and begging for relevance like a spurned lover. The Iran deal is merely the final receipt for our intellectual and moral decadence.
The Victorians, who understood the iron laws of geopolitics, would have wept. They knew that an empire that does not expand decays. We have not expanded: we have contracted, shrivelled, and now we watch from the sidelines as the new Great Game unfolds.
The only question left is whether we have the courage to feel the shame, or whether we will continue to applaud our own irrelevance with polite Times editorials.
