The US’ Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, has claimed Iran has the capability to strike the UK’s capital London with missiles.
Sir Keir Starmer has so far taken a cautious approach to the conflict in the Middle East and did not take part in the joint US-Israel strikes on Iran last month.
The prime minister had initially intended to prevent the US from using RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire and Diego Garcia, the UK-administered island base in the Indian Ocean, to support operations against Iran.
He later reversed that position, approving a US request described as a “specific and limited defensive purpose”, focused on eliminating Iranian missiles at their “source”.
Even with that approval in place, the UK has continued to avoid direct participation in the fighting.
Hegseth has now highlighted what he says is a threat to the UK, after the base on Diego Garcia was reportedly targeted last week by two missiles.
Although the missiles did not appear to land successfully, Hegseth said the incident underlined Iran’s reach, stating: “Two days ago they [Iran] shot two failed missiles on a target 4,000km away. For years, they told the world that their missiles could only range [2,000] kilometres. Surprise. Yet again, Iran lie.
“And to the world. I say London is 4,000km from Iran. Washington DC is 3,300km from Venezuela, another country President Trump did something about, which partnered for a long time with Iran.
“So you’re telling us that Iran is not a threat to the world or to the US? President Trump knows better.”
UK Defence Secretary John Healey has also been asked about the prospect of Iran launching an attack on Britain, addressing the issue in comments to Sky News.
“We have no assessment of Iranian plans to strike London,” he said.
He added: “What I’m saying, and trying to reassure people, is that we’ve got no assessment that Iran has any plans to attack.
“But we have the resources, we have the alliance in place, to be able to defend Britain, and we do that with allies, and we do that with Nato.”
Healey went on to say: “As far as Iran goes, they’re demonstrating a capacity to hit across the Middle East, we see the same tactics and technologies that we see employed by Russia in Ukraine, and this is the hidden hand of Putin in both conflicts.”
Meanwhile, Donald Trump has repeatedly taken aim at Starmer and the UK’s stance on the conflict, and has previously dismissed the prime minister as being ‘no Winston Churchill’.