John McCain on David Cameron

30 September 2006

In this exclusive interview, the Republican presidential front-runner tells Matthew d’Ancona why he is speaking at the Conservative conference, and says that Cameron has the youth, exuberance and determination to be a Tory JFK

There is understandable concern among pro-Blair Americans that the Senator’s visit should not be seen as discourteous to the Prime Minister, who has been nothing if not a loyal ally of the United States. But Sen. McCain, who has often spoken warmly of Mr Blair, presents his visit rather differently. He sees Mr Cameron not as an antagonist to the outgoing Prime Minister but as a leader with ‘every potential’ to be a worthy successor to him — and even a worthy heir to Margaret Thatcher, whom McCain also hopes to see during his trip to the UK.

His grandfather ‘Slew’ McCain was an admiral, as was his father, Jack, the first time such a distinction had been achieved by an American family in successive generations. All three were midshipmen at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, where those with natural leadership are said to have ‘grease’. So, I ask the Senator, does the young Midshipman Cameron have the ‘grease’ to be prime minister? He nods emphatically.

‘Oh, sure,’ he says. ‘Probably the most respected — can I say beloved — leader of my time was Jack Kennedy, who brought youth, incredible youth, the Camelot era, to the American public.’ Cameron as the Tory JFK: it is every Labour spin doctor’s nightmare.

Should the Tory leader become PM, of course, spin and image will not be enough. If this burgeoning political friendship should ever turn into a fully fledged alliance between two heads of government, it will be the war on terror that dominates their discussions. On the day of our interview, there is more than the usual bustle in the Senator’s office (five doors down in the Russell Building from the suite once occupied by Lyndon Johnson). McCain and his fellow Republican senators, John Warner of Virginia and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, have been pressing the White House over the detention and interrogation of terrorism suspects, urging the President to respect the Geneva Conventions more explicitly in their proposals.