Is Joe Biden really a close friend of Britain?

According to Joe Biden on the steps of Downing Street, by travelling to the UK he ‘couldn’t be meeting with a closer friend and greater ally. Our relationship is rock solid’. Really? In that case, will Biden be using his time in London to start talks for a US-UK trade deal? Will he be changing his mind and back Ben Wallace, rather than Ursula von der Leyen – who was an embarrassing failure as German defence minister – as the next secretary-general of Nato? Will he be taking notice of Britain’s objections to sending cluster bombs to Ukraine?

The answer to the above questions, of course, is ‘no’, ‘no’ and ‘no’. Even allowing for the truth-stretching demanding by international diplomacy, Biden’s words come across as hollow. Biden doesn’t really see the US’s relationship with Britain as special. It certainly didn’t seem that way in April when he stood in Dublin, telling Ireland’s people that he ‘felt at home’, and spun a narrative about his ancestors leaving Ireland to escape British rule for a better life in the US (actually, Biden is no more Irish than he is English).