, the President’s warm embrace of Rishi Sunak is a case study in knowing where power lies. His handshakes for Keir Starmer and the Shadow Cabinet after his speech suggest he knows where future power may lie too.
After Starmer’s recent jibe to Sunak that the job of Prime Minister may be “just too big for him”, Zelensky is living proof that global stature can dwarf a diminutive height. Shots of the PM alongside the “short king” of Ukraine can’t do him any harm. The irritation with Johnson among Sunak supporters is heightened by his record. They can’t help but notice that the man who, as PM,for arguing tanks still had a role on the European battlefield, is now calling for more British tanks to go to Kyiv. When he was in No 10, Johnson never showed the passion he now does for “planes for Ukraine”.
However, in the UK, Johnson seems to be using his strong link to Zelensky as a vehicle for his own plans to take revenge against the man he sees as a “backstabber”. The spectacle of a global crisis being used to settle petty personal scores may leave a nasty taste in the mouths of Tory MPs who want their old boss to just get behind the new one.