Her foreign policy speech has long since been overshadowed by the Prime Minister’s announcement that defence spending should rise to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027. The post Badenoch is not a realist. She is living in a fantasy land. appeared first on Conservative Home.

Kemi Badenoch has made a speech on foreign policy. It was so bland, formulaic, and unsurprising that it would have made Chat-GPT blush. Her commitment to never saying anything original, interesting, or newsworthy remains admirable, as disastrous as it is for the party that she has already taken to third place. Today was yet another fluffed opportunity to halt her downward spiral.

Of course, her speech has long since been overshadowed by the Prime Minister’s announcement that defence spending should rise to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027 and 3 per cent in the next parliament, through a cut to international aid. Since Badenoch committed to neither of these in her speech, it can already be said that Keir Starmer is more hawkish on defence than she is.

Nonetheless, I was dispatched to Policy Exchange for 10:30 this morning to hear her give her twopence on international affairs. The speech began only seven minutes late, which recent coverage of Badenoch’s enthusiasm for timekeeping suggests is something of a miracle. All our the Right’s top geopolitical brains were there: Niall Ferguson, John Bew, Iain Duncan Smith…

To the yesterday’s men and women of the Shadow Cabinet, mainstream media, and professional securocrats, Badenoch sought to outline “conservative realism” – a repudiation of David Lammy, Jonathan Powell, and all their works. The primary focus of our foreign policy should be on defending our borders, values, and people. The end of history has ended; it is no longer 1995.

The imposition of the Iron Curtain, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the 9/11 attack, and the invasion of Ukraine: each of these comprised a watershed moment for the post-war international order. With Donald Trump’s return echoing through the chancelleries of Europe, Britain can either face the challenge of rapidly shifting realities or endure a “bitter reckoning”. So far, so uncontroversial.

She promised that this would be a speech that would reject “vapid statements”. Splendid! Like most readers, I’m sure that if Badenoch told me one more time that she was here to tell the truth, that she had a plan and no one else did, or that this was the time for principles, not policy, then I would scream. Was this a new departure? Would we finally get some red meat? Some…policy?

No such luck. “Vapid statement” is a pretty good summary of the whole affair. The usual platitudes were out in abundance. “The Conservative Party stands for strong defence” was a statement hard to square with our slashing of the army by 30,000 men during our time in office. But that was a failure by her colleagues for which Badenoch was unwilling to apologise today.

“International law should not become a tool for…critics…to advance an activist political agenda through international bodies or our courts”. If the ECHR or another body is against our interests, would Badenoch be willing to leave? Well, “we will probably have to”. Probably? Anything more would spook the wets. If only, like Starmer, she was willing to stand up to her backbenchers.

We had a typical run-through of truths that needed telling, shibboleths that only she could tear down. Did you know that the war in Afghanistan ended badly? Or that young people shouldn’t be taught to hate their country? Or that the last Tory government did a half-decent job in supporting Ukraine? Or that soft power doesn’t mean a damn against a Russian tank brigade? No?

This all built up to Badenoch’s peroration – that “2.5 per cent by 2030 is now no longer sufficient”. Our armed forces need to be rebuilt as quickly as possible. Military procurement needs to deliver for taxpayers. A government should not be spending more on debt interest than defence. And the Prime Minister shouldn’t be sending billions to the Chagos Islands whilst we go undefended.

All perfectly sound. But if our armed forces are worn out, ill-equipped, and unready for our commitments, whose fault is that? If we are the party of strong defence, why weren’t we pushing for anything higher than 2.5 per cent in office? And why isn’t Badenoch calling for 3 per cent now? Starmer must have been cock-a-hoop watching, knowing he’d show her up two hours later.

It was a classic Badenoch speech. Nothing new was said. The same undisputed banalities were trotted out. A few notables were name-checked; no new policies were announced. Nick Timothy and Robert Jenrick have already covered the same themes with more eloquence and urgency – one inexplicably outside her Shadow Cabinet, the other the only member showing any sign of life.

For a speech that was supposed to be about facing realities, it only ended up underlining the fantasy land in which Badenoch operates. She is an irrelevance. She might still be able to summon a few hacks to listen to her for half an hour. But everything important is happening elsewhere: Washington, Number 10, or the ever-growing number of packed-out Reform rallies across the country.

Still. Got us all out of bed in the morning.

The post Badenoch is not a realist. She is living in a fantasy land. appeared first on Conservative Home.

View Entire Post