The assertion from the Prime Minister he will stay in touch with the President will surprise those who wonder how such men have formed a bond, writes GB News Chief Political Correspondent Katherine Korster
“We’ll stay in touch”, Sir Keir Starmer said of United States President Donald Trump this afternoon, telling reporters at the Nato summit in Ankara: “We have got along really well; there’s no doubt about it."
The Prime Minister made the comments to political journalists in Turkey following a marathon three-hour meeting of heads of state.
And Sir Keir revealed Mr Trump showed gratitude towards the UK for his administration's contributions to the alliance, saying: “We were thanked by him, and we were thanked by Mark Rutte, the Secretary General.”
He added: “I had no discussion with Donald Trump in which he made any issue with me in relation to the defence spending of the United Kingdom."
This will come as a huge relief, given the dark mood of Me Trump earlier at the summit and the fact the UK is falling behind many allies in the rate of increasing defence spending.
There had been fears Mr Trump could single out the UK for criticism, given the long-delayed Defence Investment Plan (DIP), which was finally unveiled last week, aiming to spend 2.7 per cent of GDP on defence by the end of the decade.
More than half of Nato countries will already be at 3 per cent by then, with some, such as Poland and Estonia, already exceeding that figure.
At last year’s summit in the Hague, allies pledged to get to 5 per cent GDP by 2035 (3.5 per cent core defence and 1.5 per cent defence-adjacent).
Sir Keir explained: “We were thanked by President Trump, because he was looking not at the percentage, he was looking at how much have you actually put in.
"And he had a chart that showed how much the US had put in, had a chart showing that we were the second biggest contributor over the last 10 years; he was sitting next to me and to the group, he said thank you to the UK, and Mark Rutte also then thanked us for the extra money we put in in the DIP
"I think it's really important to see this through the eyes of Nato and President Trump, which is: what is the actual contribution you're making?”
Senior defence sources had earlier told GB News European allies were satisfied with the Dip, but added defence would be the “number one priority in the next spending review".
The UK today has announced the Deep Precision Strike Project: a £37billion joint venture with a dozen allies developing next-generation missiles which can hit targets up to 1,200 miles away with pinpoint accuracy.
Mr Trump’s kind words to Sir Keir perhaps reflect the fact this is Sir Keir's last major summit.
He knows in a fortnight the UK will have a new leader in Andy Burnham – a man he described as “mayor of a town” and “extremely liberal”.
The assertion from Sir Keir he will stay in touch with Mr Trump and have got along “really well” will also surprise those who wonder how two such different men could have formed a bond.
It is a bond which appeared to have stretched to breaking point this year: first with the president's demands to “have Greenland”, then in the UK’s failure to allow the US to use the military base in Diego Garcia for initial strikes in the Iran war.
Mr Trump repeated that complaint today and has taken to making more aggressive noises about Greenland.
The pair looked far from friendly in the family photo, with Mr Trump scowling and Sir Keir looking awkward.
Perhaps with the resumption of the war in Iran, Mr Trump has too much on his plate to pick a fight with a prime minister who is about to be replaced.
