Reports of the death of the special relationship are greatly exaggerated. Donald Trump might be having a pop at Sir Keir Starmer for not immediately falling into line on Iran, but the underlying bedrock of the US and UK’s intertwined military and intelligence alliance remains unchanged.

On Tuesday, Trump escalated his criticism of Starmer, widely taken as a fresh example of how publicly strained the two allies’ relationship has become. “This is not Winston Churchill we’re dealing with”, he said, in a news conference in the Oval Office, cross because he couldn’t immediately use the British-controlled Chagos Islands.

But this is part of a pattern of behaviour from a US President who isn’t shy about expressing his frustration in public, only for his administration to crack on as usual behind the scenes via diplomatic channels, intelligence agencies and promoting mutual business investment.The UK Prime Minister, meanwhile, under domestic constraints, is doing his lawyerly best to show the Americans he doesn’t agree with their war.

“This Government does not believe in regime change from the skies,” Starmer said on Monday, also implying he doesn’t think the US bombardment of Tehran is the result of careful planning. He also offered up a rebuke over the legality of the US’s actions: “I will not commit our military personnel to unlawful action,” the Prime Minister said.

The US-UK relationship appears to have gone downhill since an early bonhomie. After Starmer pushed back against Trump’s designs on Greenland earlier in the year, the US President has turned on his ally – criticising the deal ceding sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, raising tariffs’ and insultingly dismissing Britain’s role fighting alongside US troops in the Afghanistan war.

But behind the scenes British officials are not worried. One senior source said they “eye-roll” at the idea the special relationship is dead, recounting all the times the two nations – if you were to believe the headlines – seemed on the........

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