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Chris Mason: Starmer’s strongest rebuke yet for Trump

The prime minister’s condemnation of Donald Trump’s remarks about the war in Afghanistan are his strongest public criticisms of the president yet.
They come in a week where circumstances have led Sir Keir Starmer to conclude three times that it was necessary to publicly rebuke a man he has ploughed so much effort into building a strong relationship with.
I am told Sir Keir, on returning to Downing Street on Friday afternoon, saw it as essential to make his views clear in the most direct terms.
His tone and body language conveyed his anger, as did his words, in which he said what President Trump had said was “insulting and frankly appalling”.
The president had claimed that the Nato defence alliance, of which the UK is a member, had sent “some troops” to Afghanistan, but they “stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.”
The comments, which are factually inaccurate, have been widely seen as crass and deeply offensive.
Four hundred and fifty-seven British service personnel died in the conflict and many more suffered life changing injuries.
The prime minister’s team tell me Sir Keir sees standing up for and defending the armed forces as a first order duty of his role, as both those serving and those killed in conflict can’t speak publicly for themselves.
Incidentally, it is not the first time the Prime Minister has felt the need to stand up for the British military after remarks from the Trump administration.
In March of last year, Sir Keir pointedly paid tribute to UK troops in the Commons after the US Vice-President JD Vance was accused of disrespecting them.
But on that occasion, he made no reference to the vice-president by name.