British Finance Minister Rachel Reeves was not backing away from her criticism of the Iran war as “folly,” even as she prepared to meet Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and other U.S. officials in Washington on Wednesday.
As with Canadian Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne, Reeves is among the economic officials gathering from around the world as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank hold their spring meetings in the U.S. capital.
While British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been praised in some quarters for his handling of U.S. President Donald Trump the past 16 months, both he and Reeves in the past week have gone public with their frustration with the White House, even as King Charles will be making a state visit to the U.S. in less than two weeks, at the behest of Starmer’s Labour government.
Trump and members of his administration have been more than happy in recent days to share their own critiques of the British government’s domestic and foreign policy.
Reeves, whose official title is chancellor of the exchequer, made her “folly” comment as part of an interview with the Mirror that was published Tuesday. She posted a link to the newspaper’s writeup early Wednesday, in which she said everyday Britons are feeling the pain from a war not of their government’s choosing.
“This is a war that we did not start. It was a war that we did not want,” Reeves told the Mirror. “I feel very frustrated and angry that the U.S. went into this war without a clear exit plan, without a clear idea of what they were trying to achieve.”
Among G7 countries, the IMF on Tuesday forecast that Britain’s economy would likely be hardest hit, in no small part due to the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, which initially doubled the price of natural gas that Britain relies on.
The IMF downgraded Britain’s 2026 growth forecast to 0.8 per cent, from a previous projection of 1.3 per cent, and said it expected Britain’s unemployment rate to rise to 5.6 per cent this year, from 4.9 per cent in 2025.
Reeves piggybacked on comments made by Starmer himself in an interview with Britain’s ITV network last weekend, in which he said he was “fed up with the fact that families across the country see their bills go up and down on energy … because of the actions of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin or Trump across the world.”
‘Great stupidity’
Another irritant for Starmer and his government is Trump’s position on a Labour government plan to cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius. The U.S. and U.K. share a military base on one of the islands, Diego Garcia, a base that was to remain under British control even with the deal.
After telling Starmer at the Oval Office last year that “we’ll be inclined to go along with your country” on the deal, this year Trump has instead called it an “act of great stupidity.” Starmer’s Minister of State Stephen Doughty told Parliament this week the deal was now “impossible” to see through under the current circumstances.
Bessent, for his part, told the BBC that a “small bit of economic pain” is a worthwhile price given Iran’s threat to security, pointing out that Tehran has “mid-reach intercontinental ballistic missiles that could reach London.”
Iran fired two ballistic missiles toward the joint U.S.-U.K. military base on Diego Garcia, an island in the Indian Ocean, on Friday — an attack that was ultimately unsuccessful. Britain’s Ministry of Defence said on Saturday that Iran was ‘lashing out’ across the region and holding the Strait of Hormuz hostage.
Britain controversially was a part of the U.S. war in Iraq in 2003, and Trump has been angered that he didn’t receive similar support as the U.S. has launched its assault on Iran. Europe’s NATO members have highlighted that alliance members didn’t receive advance notice of the American plans, and Starmer has allowed U.S. forces to use British military bases for defensive purposes that result from the war.
Trump and U.S. Vice-President Vance have also criticized Britain’s energy policies, though the Vance’s recent assertion that British customers pay several times as much for energy as Americans has been described as inaccurate. Trump’s claims that more drilling by Britain in the North Sea would help its energy situation have been viewed as debatable.
‘A dangerous and corrupt gangster’
Liberal Democrat Leader Ed Davey said in Parliament this week that under the circumstances, the British government should scrap the King’s visit to the U.S.
“I really fear for what Trump might say or do while our King is forced to stand by his side. We cannot put His Majesty in that position,” said Davey, calling Trump “a dangerous and corrupt gangster.”
Starmer responded to the Davey that “the monarchy, through the bonds that it builds, is often able to reach through the decades on a situation like this.”
The timing for the four-day royal visit to the U.S. beginning April 27 came in for criticism in the British media when it was announced last month, given that exchanges of missiles and drones between U.S. and Israel on one side, and Iran targeting Israel and Gulf countries on the other side, were at a fever pitch.
Trump offered more criticism of Starmer in comments to Britain’s Sky News published Wednesday. The president also suggested he “didn’t realize” that the King’s visit was not initiated by Buckingham Palace itself but came from 10 Downing Street.
President Donald Trump announced the United States would apply its own blockade of the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for Iran’s de facto shutdown, which is now stretching into its seventh week. But, as Andrew Chang explains, responding this way to Iran’s control of 20 per cent of the world’s energy supply could pose several risks as the war in the Middle East escalates. CORRECTION (April 16, 2026): An earlier version of this video incorrectly used an aerial image of the Clarence Strait to illustrate the Strait of Hormuz. The image has been replaced. Images provided by The Canadian Press, Reuters, Adobe Stock and Getty Images
Trump told Sky he could separate his warm feelings for King Charles with any political friction with Starmer’s government.
But there’s still more to come between now and April 27 — Trump’s announced two-week ceasefire will lapse by then, and Starmer on Friday is hosting an international meeting on the bottleneck in the Strait of Hormuz, an byproduct of the U.S. war in Iran that is affecting the supply of oil, fertilizer and other resources around the world.
As with the war itself, Britain has stressed it will not participate in the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports announced by Trump in recent days.