In Britain, as in most other western democracies, elections are rarely won on issues of foreign or defence policy; and in opposition, politicians don’t usually spend much time thinking or speaking about them.
In government it’s different. One of the most frequent complaints made by British prime ministers is that foreign policy problems fill up their red boxes and their time. Boris Johnson must feel this at the moment. He has just returned from over a week abroad attending consecutive Commonwealth, G7 and Nato summits, while at home two byelections were lost and the rumblings of discontent among his backbenchers grew ever louder.
By common consent Johnson has done well over Ukraine. He sensed early on that this was an issue where leadership mattered. Of course it was Volodymyr Zelensky whose leadership has been crucial and whose performance has won the admiration and respect of the world. But Johnson has shown leadership, too, both by articulating persuasively the case for supporting Ukraine and by ensuring Britain provided significant amounts of military and financial help. Compared with the dithering of Olaf Scholz and the posturing of Emmanuel Macron, Johnson’s position has been clear and consistent.
But will the British electorate thank him for it? The precedents suggest not. British prime ministers rarely reap domestic rewards from military success. The most egregious example was the general election of 1945. Winston Churchill had led the country for most of the Second World War. He had been steadfast throughout in resisting calls to negotiate a settlement, notably during the discussions in Cabinet in May 1940. He had inspired the British people with his oratory, he was personally hugely popular and had in May 1945 delivered victory in Europe. Yet on 5th July that year the voters turfed him out of office, giving the Labour Party a majority of 145 seats in the House of Commons.
The reason was an underlying feeling in the country that it was time for a change. The war had upturned many of the social assumptions of the time and had left both those who fought in it and those who endured it at home with the feeling that things could not, and should not, go on as before. Lord Carrington, a future Conservative defence and foreign secretary who served for the whole of the war in the Grenadier Guards, once said that sharing a tank with his fellow soldiers from Normandy to Germany had made him realise how unpopular the Conservatives were; and that had he been able to vote, he might well himself have voted Labour.
Margaret Thatcher had better luck in the election of 1983 and many historians consider her determination and leadership in the Falklands War to have been a key factor in her victory. No doubt it played a role in some voters’ minds. But probably of greater significance was that memories of the Labour government in the late 1970s were still fresh; and the prospect of Michael Foot as prime minister, with an election manifesto described as the longest suicide note in history, simply did not appeal. John Major’s victory in 1992 was similarly due more to the character of his opponent Neil Kinnock than to the success of Britain and its allies in the first Gulf War.
But if success in war does not necessarily bring electoral rewards, neither, it seems, does failure necessarily bring an electoral penalty. Anthony Eden had to resign in 1957 after the debacle of Suez. But in more recent times failed foreign adventures have not prevented prime ministers from being re-elected. It was clear in 2005 that the Iraq War was legally questionable, politically toxic and operationally challenging. But Tony Blair won his third general election that year with a comfortable, albeit reduced, majority. Similarly, in 2015 it was obvious that the British/French intervention in Libya was not going to produce peace or stability. But David Cameron won an unexpected electoral majority.
All four of Nato’s main players are currently in domestic difficulty. Joe Biden’s popularity is at an all-time low and his party faces a hammering in the forthcoming mid-term elections. Macron won a second presidential term but lost his majority in the Assemblée Nationale. Scholz’s party has lost two land elections and his personal ratings have plummeted. So have those of Johnson, who barely survived a confidence vote in his own party last month.
Perhaps they all hope that the war in Ukraine will give them an opportunity to display skills of international statesmanship which will redound to their credit. That would be optimistic. As inflation and the cost of living soar and economic growth stagnates, voters’ minds will be on life at home, not on the situation in the Donbas.
