Former British Ambassador to the US Lord Darroch says Boris Johnson is fascinated by Donald Trump, has probably been inspired by the US president, and is intrigued by his American counterpart’s patchy relationship “with the facts and the truth”.
In a new book serialised in The Times, Lord Darroch also said Mr Johnson must share the blame for his resignation as ambassador to Washington, which followed the leaking of diplomatic cables disparaging Mr Trump.
Lord Darroch wrote that Mr Johnson had been “fascinated” by Mr Trump on visits to Washington as foreign secretary before he became Prime Minister, with particular focus on the president’s use of language.
This includes “the limited vocabulary, the simplicity of the messaging, the disdain for political correctness, the sometimes incendiary imagery, and the at best intermittent relationship with facts and the truth”, the former diplomat writes.
In an interview accompanying the excerpts, Lord Darroch was asked if any of those characteristics had rubbed off on Mr Johnson.
“From what I hear from colleagues,” he replied, “this Government pays a lot of attention to presentation, to language.
“But if you go back through the current Prime Minister’s history, he’s often said quite striking things. And he never apologises.
“So, Boris might have done this anyway, but certainly, having watched Trump in action, he wouldn’t have been put off.”
Mr Trump had also considered Mr Johnson “a kindred spirit”, according to the former ambassador.
Lord Darroch also says he told Mr Johnson he was partly to blame for his resignation from his Washington post, following the leaking of a cable in which the ambassador said Mr Trump was “inept” as president.
Mr Johnson, who was then running for the Conservative leadership, repeatedly refused to say he would keep him in the post during a TV debate on July 9 last year.
Lord Darroch resigned the next day and spoke with Mr Johnson by phone.
“He said: ‘But why did you resign? Wouldn’t it all have blown over after a few weeks?'” Lord Darroch told the paper.
In answer to Mr Johnson’s question as to whether the resignation was his fault, Lord Darroch told him that “in part it was”.
After Lord Darroch left the diplomatic corps following a distinguished 42-year career, Mr Trump fired back with a range of epithets, calling him “the wacky ambassador”, “pompous”, and “a very stupid guy”.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel