CAMERON MILNER: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s absence from battlefield of Iran puts AUKUS in deep trouble

Given UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s complete absence from the battlefield of Iran, AUKUS must now surely be in deep trouble.

Anthony Albanese was previously regarded as the partnership’s weakest link, given his equivocation on China and doubts over whether Australia would deploy its AUKUS submarines to defend Taiwan if China attacked.

Now it’s looking like Albanese has been trumped by an even weaker Starmer.

Of the many great lines US President Donald Trump has fired off in the last week, his best was saying of Starmer: “He ain’t no Winston Churchill”.

For Labor here and Labour in the UK, it’s all about chasing Muslim votes domestically, at the expense of being trusted allies of the US.

To be fair, Albanese came out early to congratulate Israel and US on their initial attack on Iran, but this tough talk was much to do with masking his own domestic vulnerabilities on the so-called ISIS brides.

Starmer’s craven chasing of Muslim votes in UK marginal seats extended to not even allowing refuelling of American planes at the joint US/UK base, Diego Garcia.

Iran is a vile regime that slaughtered at least 40,000 of its own citizens for daring to ask for democratic freedoms.

It has been a state sponsor of terrorist groups Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis who had vowed to destroy the state of Israel and make Yemen, the Gaza strip and southern Lebanon war zones.

The Iranians are currently firing whatever they can at anyone right now, such good neighbours they are to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, UAE and Oman.

Even Emmanuel Macron, the great proselytiser for Palestine, has sent an aircraft carrier and frigates to the eastern Mediterranean to defend France’s Arab allies.

Yet, Starmer was making a virtue of thumbing his nose to Trump while hoping the Muslims in Manchester notice.

See, Manchester was where Starmer’s Labour came third in a previous safe seat of Gorton and Denton, which it lost to the Greens, coming third behind Reform.

Starmer’s praetorian guards had used their numbers at national executive to block the pre-selection for Labour of popular mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burham — because if he’d got to Westminster he could’ve been a challenger to Starmer for PM.

This is the same brains trust who knew of disgraced former diplomat Peter Mandelson’s long history with sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, but recommended Starmer make him UK ambassador to the US anyway.

Starmer is badly damaged domestically and will likely be rolled after what is sure to be disastrous council elections to be held in May.

If the UK PM can tear up a long term special relationship, one sealed in blood and in the skies above London and the battlefields of Europe against the Nazi regime, how does AUKUS have any chance of surviving?

It’s not like the Ayatollah Khamenei was a moderate. He was an Islamic tyrant, yet Starmer is enfeebled, chasing Muslim votes and putting at risk the very core of AUKUS co-operation.

In Australia, our security services have identified the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps as sponsors of terrorist attacks in Australia including the Adass Synagogue fire bombing. Australia rightfully expelled the Iranian ambassador and listed the IRGC as a terrorist organisation last November.

In the UK security agencies have linked Iran to some 20 plots of assassination or kidnapping on UK soil since 2022.

Even the Europeans have listed the IRGC as a terrorist organisation, yet under Starmer the UK continues to drag its feet.

Trump is already under domestic pressure from his MAGA movement to stop being the world’s cop on the beat and use US military might for its defence only.

Equally, the AUKUS pact isn’t supported by key US hawks on Capitol Hill as it will diminish the US’s supply of Virginia Class submarines to use as a China and Russia deterrent.

Australia has run its military into the ground and is left selling real estate to buy bullets under Defence Minister Richard Marles. He’s also the bloke who used RAAF jets as an Uber and to caddy his golf clubs on international trips.

Australia desperately needs AUKUS for our nation’s defence and for the security of our region.

Yet when a regime that is so openly hostile, is a declared sponsor of state terrorism, that was building nuclear bomb capacity, can’t break Starmer’s threshold of allowing a joint airbase to be used, President Trump has every reason to question AUKUS.

Starmer is so clearly doing this to play for Muslim votes.

It’s a familiar pattern here in Australia for Labor too. Tony Burke pandered on Palestine and did a closed door deal on ISIS brides to chase Muslim votes in his seat of Watson.

More broadly, Albanese has shown none of the raw courage that NSW Premier Chris Minns has shown both before and after the Bondi massacre.

The Albanese government reluctantly said Australian sailors served on the US submarine that sank the Iranian warship last week and Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Australia might send defensive capability to peaceful Arab nations under attack from Iran.

Hardly full-throated support for a just war on a tyrannical regime that sponsored terrorism on Australian streets.

Our three great nations used to stand united for democracy and values in a hostile world.

But with friends like Wong and Burke in Australia and Starmer in the UK, why wouldn’t the US simply withdraw from AUKUS and instead keep the submarines fully US flagged?

Cameron Milner is a former Queensland Labor State secretary