James Barr

Kim Darroch and the myth of the special relationship

Like a priest standing before the bronze gates of a temple, the British ambassador to Washington serves as the guardian of one of the great modern myths: the idea, conceived by Winston Churchill, that a special relationship exists between the UK and the US. The impression that British ambassadors can wield disproportionate influence in Washington is

Tory table talk

I bet that you are at best dimly aware of the Progress Trust, and that is what the members of this now-defunct fixture would have wanted. It was a misleadingly named group of comfortably off, often landed backbench Tory MPs, and its weekly discussions very rarely leaked. An unnamed member once explained why. ‘We have