Theresa May mentioned Donald Trump only once in her speech to the Republicans gathered in Philadelphia tonight, but its centrepiece was a gift to him. In his inauguration speech, he said that the US was now out of the business of liberal interventionism. She told Republicans that the same applies to Britain. Here’s the key quote:-
It is in our interests – those of Britain and America together – to stand strong together to defend our values, our interests and the very ideas in which we believe. This cannot mean a return to the failed policies of the past. The days of Britain and America intervening in sovereign countries in an attempt to remake the world in our own image are over.
Her comments will have been aimed at David Cameron, keen to intervene in Libya and Syria, as much as Tony Blair. She added the obligatory caveat – never say never, don’t “stand idly by when the threat is real and when it is in our own interests to intervene”. But the gist of the message is clear enough. Tony Blair came to Chicago to announce his doctrine of liberal interventionism, Mrs May had come to Philadelphia to bury it.
It was another excellent, substantial and coherent speech – of a piece with her two excellent Brexit speeches last week. She again dedicated her government to business and free trade. Like Blair on his trips to visit Bush, she said plenty that I suspect the Republicans would quite like to hear from their own president. She backed Trump on attacking Nato members who skimp on defence – leaving Uncle Same to pick up the bill.
She again mentioned Modern Slavery, an area where she has been a pioneer. And here, for example, is what she had to say about Islam vs Islamism:-
We should always be careful to distinguish between this extreme and hateful ideology, and the peaceful religion of Islam and the hundreds of millions of its adherents – including millions of our own citizens and those further afield who are so often the first victims of this ideology’s terror. And nor is it enough merely to focus on violent extremism. We need to address the whole spectrum of extremism, starting with the bigotry and hatred that can so often turn to violence.
And as I say in my Daily Telegraph column tomorrow, you can argue that her point about military intervention is pretty academic given that Britain’s dilapidated military wasn’t able to handle Iraq, even on a much-larger budget in 2003.
We no longer have the military resource or attention span to intervene successfully, as the Libyan debacle attests. But by making non-intervention into a doctrine, and doing so in Philadelphia, Mrs May married her position to Trump’s. Her hope will be that a trade deal is next.
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