Unlike Theresa May, Sir Keir Starmer will not be the first world leader to set foot in the Trump White House, but he has at least now secured an invitation to Washington.
It wasn’t issued on the most gracious of terms – with the president telling reporters “it was his request not mine” – but the PM will now have the chance to speak with him face to face in the room where it happens on Pennsylvania Avenue.
Donald Trump was exceptionally casual about the forthcoming meeting, claiming not to know what the two of them would have to talk about.
But Number 10 will be pleased that so far their charm offensive appears to be holding, with the president describing Mr Starmer as “a nice guy”.
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That warm personal relationship is going to come under increasing pressure given the growing divergence of UK and US positions on the topics Mr Starmer will certainly want to discuss – Ukraine, the Middle East, trade tariffs and the Chagos deal for starters.
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The diplomatic contortions required to keep faith with Ukraine – while continuing to stay on the right side of Mr Trump – are only getting more extreme.
The president’s 90-minute unilateral phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, followed by the announcement of peace talks, shocked the world.
The White House does now seem to have accepted that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will need to be at the table, with UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy telling reporters that US vice president JD Vance had agreed the Ukrainians will have to be part of any future deal.
It’s a message the UK has been doing its best to reinforce, with Mr Starmer expressing his “concrete” backing for Ukraine in a phone call on Friday and insisting “there can be no talks about Ukraine, without Ukraine”.
In a joint article in the Daily Telegraph on Saturday, Mr Lammy and John Healey underlined that support, calling “for us all to continue to unite and show strength” and arguing that the West has previously done “too little” to counter Russian aggression.
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The foreign and defence secretaries also wanted to demonstrate they have been listening to the US’s arguments about defence spending, insisting “we have been clear that Europe and the UK must do more together to share the burden of our continent’s security”.
Despite this claim, we’re still waiting for the government to set out when they will meet their commitment to increase defence spending from 2.3 to 2.5% of GDP.
Going further than that – given the chancellor’s existing difficulties in balancing the budget while sticking to her fiscal rules – looks incredibly remote, despite Mr Trump’s calls for a 5% target.
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It also seems unlikely that that promise of shouldering the burden to defend Europe will go as far as establishing an “army of Europe” as proposed by Mr Zelenskyy at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
We’ve heard plenty of discussion about that idea for many years, and the UK has always been opposed.
But it’s also true that Mr Starmer has pledged the UK would “play its full part” in any peacekeeping operation in Ukraine in the future.
How extensively the PM would be prepared to commit to this will surely be another sticking point with the Americans.
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Another open disagreement is over the accession of Ukraine to NATO.
On Friday, Mr Starmer reiterated the UK’s commitment to Ukraine being on an “irreversible path to NATO as agreed by allies at the Washington Summit last year”.
The Americans have described this as “unrealistic” but in his speech on Saturday Mr Zelenskyy continued to insist it must remain on the table as “the core of any security guarantees for Ukraine”.
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Mr Starmer will be hoping the special relationship will help give weight to his arguments when he heads to the White House later this month.
But it’s not the only area of negotiation which requires delicate handling, given the threat of trade tariffs which could cost the UK economy £24bn.
Can the PM’s staunch position on Ukraine survive – let alone prevail – when he needs to go in to bat for the UK on so many other fronts?
