Sir Keir Starmer left a NATO summit in Turkey with a ceremonial firearm and ammunition, which he has strategically abandoned in Ankara rather than risk explaining to airport security why the Prime Minister is transporting Ottoman-era weaponry through Stansted.
The Turkish president gifted the gun as a token of alliance. Starmer’s team immediately recognized this as the diplomatic equivalent of receiving a fruitcake at Christmas: theoretically meaningful, practically useless, and impossible to explain to anyone. So they left it behind with “British officials,” which is diplomat-speak for “we have no idea whose problem this is now.”
This is how modern statecraft works. Two leaders meet, shake hands, discuss trade agreements and military cooperation, then one hands the other a deadly weapon as if they’re exchanging business cards. The weapon stays in Turkey. The photo op stays in Westminster. Everyone pretends this enhances the special relationship.
Starmer’s office has not explained why a decorative gun improves bilateral ties more effectively than, say, actually discussing bilateral ties. They have also not explained why the ammunition came along, or whether the Turkish president was testing whether the British Prime Minister would accept a loaded gift without flinching.
The cats of Ankara remain unimpressed by this display of international friendship.