Recently, President Biden ignited controversy when he announced that he wouldn’t attend the coronation. The right-wing British press has seized upon this as yet another example of his supposedly long-standing anti-British sentiment. Dan Wootton of the Daily Mail alleges that Biden’s pride for his Irish heritage, his mother’s hatred of the late queen, and his sympathy for Megan Markle indicate that he is “both monarchy and Britain-hating”. These ridiculous claims reveal an embarrassing delusion about the global status of Britain, that I hope to set straight. Because frankly, your arrogance has gone on long enough.
The first example of Biden’s anti-British sentiment, Wootton claims, occurred shortly after his victory in the 2020 election. A reporter with the BBC asked the then president-elect for “a quick word with the BBC”, only for Biden to jovially respond, “the BBC? I’m Irish!”, which sparked an immediate meltdown on the British right. Washed-up Brexiteer, Nigel Farage tweeted, “as you can see from this clip, Biden hates the UK”, and in his more recent article, Wootton labouriously recalls how Biden gave the journalist a “threatening glare, before breaking out into a grin”. Who knew that the British, famous across the pond for their splendid wit, could fail to recognize such an obvious joke? More serious concern has risen from Biden’s consistent dedication to peace in Northern Ireland. Throughout his presidency, he has opposed the Northern Ireland protocol and supported the return of power-sharing between Catholic and Protestant parties. When he reiterated this last week in Belfast, former First Minister of Northern Ireland, Arlene Foster, again levied the accusation that Biden is an Irish nationalist who “hates the UK”, as if there could be no other possible reason for the president to be invested in the stability of Western Europe.
Not much time needs to be spent debunking these ridiculous claims. Biden has worked closely with all three of the past Prime Ministers to provide aid to Ukraine, and last year signed the AUKUS pact, whereby the US and the UK will jointly assist Australia in the acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines to protect their interests in the Pacific against China. And as for Biden’s position on Northern Ireland, support for the Good Friday Agreement has hardly been a novel foreign policy initiative of the United States. If Biden’s goal has been to wreak vengeance upon Britain for the mistreatment of his Irish ancestors, he has done a poor job.
So what explains his refusal to attend the king’s coronation? Wootton ominously describes how amidst the Troubles, Biden’s pro-IRA mother advised him, “don’t you bow down to her”, before the then-young senator met with the late queen. But while this makes a compelling tale of patriotism and vengeance, the truth is perhaps much more frightening to right-wing British ears: Britain is simply not relevant enough to warrant the president’s participation in its twee ceremonies. After World War II, the exhausted British Empire rapidly crumbled. India and Pakistan went first in the 40s, then the West Indies in the 50s, and finally Africa in the 60s. Even the white settler colonies of the British Empire, namely Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, drifted away. Australia and New Zealand have pursued closer relations with each other and their neighbours in Southeast Asia, and with the signing of NAFTA in 1994, Canada went from being Britain’s eldest son to America’s younger brother. Despite all the attempts by Britain to reassert itself as a great power, such as its botched attempt to maintain control of the Suez Canal in 1956, its refusal to adopt the euro, and most recently Brexit, it is obvious that Britain has little hope of being anything other than a medium-sized European regional-power.
While few are deluded enough to believe that Britain is still the empire it once was, many British right-wingers believe that Britain maintains, or ought to maintain, a kind of cultural hegemony over its former colonies. The monarchy is a good example of this. When its colonies gained independence, Britain assented with the caveat that Queen Elizabeth remained their ceremonial head of state. This arrangement allowed Britain to pretend as though they still had an empire, without the economic and ethical costs attached. For most former colonies, however, this was temporary. By the time of her death, the number of realms Elizabeth ruled over had declined from thirty-two to fifteen, and it is likely that this decline will only accelerate under the less popular and more scandal-ridden King Charles. I do not intend to dispute the supposed benefits that the monarchy gives to Britain, but to pretend as though it has relevance beyond this island, including in its former colonies is absurd. Neither Narendra Modi of India, Shebhaz Sharif of Pakistan, nor Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria will be attending Charles’s coronation, despite the fact that their countries used to be ruled over by the British monarchy – nor should they. Why should the symbols of a brief and miserable half-century of colonialism be so prized when these countries have their own traditions and ceremonies?
Some might argue that the United States is different from these. After all, the United States speaks the same language, follows the same religion, and has the same ancestors as Britain. There is a supposed “special relationship” between the British and the Americans, some say. But even this is overblown. The United States has always been a melting pot, and its composition has significantly changed from the colonial days of Jamestown and Plymouth Rock. In addition to its original indigenous inhabitants, the United States has been shaped by massive waves of immigration from Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. According to a 2000 census, only around 12% of Americans claim British ancestry. That is equal to the number of Americans who identify as black, and smaller than the 17% who identify as German and the 19% who identify as Hispanic. With these statistics, Biden has more of a reason to attend the coronation of the Spanish king, the opening of the Bundestag, or the inaugurations of West African presidents than to indulge in the United Kingdom’s quaint ceremony surrounding its powerless figurehead. To demand that the leader of the free world pay special attention to it would be beyond entitled.
My message to those upset by Biden’s actions is simple. Britain isn’t the vast colonial empire it once was, and it’s about time people stop pretending it is. Enjoy the coronation – but don’t expect everyone else to.
[Biden] Image Credit: UKinUSA / CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
