David Lammy has lost his mind – even more deluded than Keir Starmer | Personal Finance | Finance

Thanks to them, Greenland is now safe from military invasion by US president Donald Trump. And it’s all down to Labour’s secret superpower. At least, that’s how Lammy tells it. Those who still retain some grip on reality may dispute his warped version of events.

So what is this miraculous force, known only to Labour and deployed so deftly by Lammy and Starmer? It’s called “international law”. In their world, even the most aggressive dictator must bow to it. So convinced are they, they see its benevolent hand everywhere. Including Greenland.

According to Lammy, Trump was ready to seize Greenland from fellow Nato member Denmark by force until Britain intervened. Lammy even suggested that Trump dropped plans to impose 10% tariffs on eight countries, including the UK, because they stood up to him using the power of law.

On Friday, he told the BBC’s Nick Robinson that Trump’s apparent retreat on Greenland was a “consequence” of the UK making its position on international law and Nato solidarity “absolutely crystal clear”. In Lammy’s telling, Trump listened, reflected and backed down.

It’s a lovely picture. Trump being sat down and lectured on the finer points of international law by Starmer and Lammy, before seeing the error of his ways. It’s also a fantasy.

Starmer and Lammy are projecting their own delusions onto Trump. So is Lib Dem leader Ed Davey, who claims Trump backed off because he fears the EU. Another fantasist.

The truth is we don’t know why Trump changed his tone. We do know that Republican voters hated the idea. So did the stock market. US generals warned it was unconstitutional and threatened to resign. Maybe Trump never meant it in the first place and just enjoyed the attention. He does that.

What we do know is that David Lammy will not have featured highly in his calculations. Nor will international law. That would be comic if it ended there, but it doesn’t. Because Labour seems to believe the same magical thinking can stop Vladimir Putin.

Putin doesn’t care about international law. If he did, his troops wouldn’t have raped and murdered their way across Ukraine, or bombed schools and hospitals. He wouldn’t have sacrificed close to a million of his own people in the process.

There’s only one thing that restrains Putin, and it isn’t “lawfare”. It’s force. Yet Labour still behaves as if treaties and polite representations are a substitute for drones, bullets, missiles and boots on the ground. And this delusion is terrifying.

Yesterday, Dominic Lawson reported in the Sunday Times that the government has pressured countries bordering Russia not to withdraw from international treaties banning anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions.

Funnily enough, Russia hasn’t signed either treaty. Neither has the US or China. Lithuania did sign, then remembered it has a 170-mile land border with Russia and decided landmines might come in handy after all.

Instead of understanding that reality, Labour’s foreign office minister Baroness Chapman expressed “regret” at Lithuania’s decision and said the UK had raised “concerns”. Chapman, of course, was once Starmer’s political secretary.

This is where Labour’s hallucinations lead. The same mindset saw Starmer open the door to prosecuting British soldiers over Northern Ireland, while terrorists walk free. Who would risk their life for a country that might later drag them through the courts?

Starmer and Lammy genuinely believe rules will save us in a world that no longer follows them. That isn’t just naive. It’s suicidal madness.