The spectacle of a President being slapped down by his own party is a rare joy; a moment of sanity amidst the lunacy. Yesterday’s report that Donald Trump’s proposed ‘Iran war bill’ was unceremoniously rebuffed by Republicans in Congress is, on its surface, a cause for cautious celebration. The bill, a piece of legislative arson disguised as national security, would have authorised military action against Iran with the barest of oversight. But before the champagne corks pop, let us examine what this really means – and what it does not.
First, the rebuke. That a handful of GOP senators balked at handing the President a blank cheque for war is a testament to the residual institutional memory of the party, a ghost of the days when Republicans were the party of sober foreign policy. John McCain may be dead, but his spirit – that of intervention with restraint – briefly animated figures like Lindsey Graham, who demurred from the bill’s most extreme provisions. It is a reminder that not all Republicans are frothing neocons, even if many seem to be.
But let us not be Pollyannaish. This is not a triumph of pacifism; it is a triumph of procedural cowardice. The bill was too nakedly aggressive, too brash, even for a party that has spent four years stroking Trump’s bellicose ego. It was not rejected because of moral qualms about bombing civilians, but because the cost – electoral and strategic – was too high. The Republicans are not converts to diplomacy; they are calculators. They know that a full-blown war with Iran would make Iraq look like a garden party, and that it would likely cost them the next election. So they played the long game, not the virtuous one.
Enter the UK, that ageing guardian of the middle path. The British government, ever the pinstriped diplomat, has been quietly working the transatlantic phone lines, urging restraint. Boris Johnson, a man who loves a grand gesture, has instead pursued the quiet art of persuasion. This is the old British game: pretend to be the wiser cousin to the American cowboy, while reaping the benefits of their power. Johnson’s recent phone call with Trump, wherein he stressed the need for ‘de-escalation’, was a masterclass in diplomatic vagueness. It means nothing, except that the UK wants to be seen as above the fray.
But is the middle path really so noble? It risks becoming a path to nowhere, a treadmill of negotiations that achieve little while Iran’s centrifuges spin ever faster. The JCPOA was imperfect, but it worked in the sense that it bought time. Trump’s withdrawal was a catastrophic act of intellectual vandalism, and Europe – including Britain – has been scrambling to piece together a fragile peace ever since. The rebuff of the war bill is a momentary victory for sanity, but without a coherent strategy, it is just a pause, not a solution.
The danger now is complacency. We must not mistake the absence of immediate war for the presence of peace. Iran’s regime, sensing weakness, will continue its provocative behaviour: the missile tests, the harassment of tankers, the creeping nuclear enrichment. The Republicans’ refusal to give Trump his war does not mean they will resist future provocations. Indeed, a more insidious approach may emerge: the slow-burn conflict, the targeted assassinations, the cyber attacks. Trump’s approval of the killing of Qasem Soleimani was a dress rehearsal for a new kind of war, one without a formal declaration.
And where does the UK stand in all this? As usual, torn between its ‘special relationship’ with the United States and its European conscience. Johnson’s hope is to avoid choosing, to be the bridge between two worlds. But bridges get trampled. The UK’s diplomatic survival depends on its ability to steer America towards moderation, while maintaining enough independence to criticise when necessary. It is a delicate minuet, and one false step could plunge us into the abyss.
In the end, the rebuff of Trump’s war bill is a reminder of a truth we forget at our peril: democracies can be just as reckless as dictatorships, but they have the one saving grace of internal checks. The system worked, for now. But it worked out of fear, not principle. And that is a fragile foundation for peace.
So let us not celebrate too loudly. The fall of Rome was preceded by many such moments of temporary sanity. The empire did not collapse in a single day; it frayed, thread by thread, until the whole garment came apart. The Iran bill’s defeat is one thread saved. But there are many more waiting to be undone.
