LONDON − A “disgrace.” A “clown” whose “slur” was disrespectful to war heroes. “JD Dunce.”
Those were some of the headlines published by Britain’s tabloid newspapers Wednesday after U.S. Vice President JD Vance said that an American economic deal in Ukraine was a “better security guarantee” for a potential peace deal with Russia “than 20,000 troops from some random country that hasn’t fought a war in 30 or 40 years.”
Vance made the comments in an interview on Monday night with the Fox News host Sean Hannity after Britain and France pledged troops to a peacekeeping force in Ukraine. Vance has since insisted he did not “even mention the U.K. or France,” adding that both had “fought bravely alongside the U.S. over the last 20 years, and beyond.”
He said it was “absurdly dishonest” to claim he disparaged either country, or its troops.
However, the vice president did not specify which “random” country or countries he was referring to in his interview with Fox News and no other countries have publicly offered to send troops to Ukraine.
His comments sparked a strong reaction in Britain and France, with opposition politicians and veterans in both countries saying he was dishonoring hundreds of troops killed fighting alongside U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq.
“JD Vance is wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong,” said Nigel Farage, the leader of the right-wing Reform U.K., an anti-immigration opposition party. Farage is longtime ally of President Donald Trump.
James Cartlidge, the “shadow” defense secretary for Britain’s opposition Conservative Party, said in a post on social media that Vance’s remarks were “deeply disrespectful” to militaries in Britain and France.
Cartlidge pointed out that NATO’s Article 5, which declares an attack against one member state an attack against them all, had been invoked just once in the alliance’s history: after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
He said Britain and France had, at the time, immediately come to America’s aid, “deploying 1,000s of personnel to Afghanistan, including my own brother & numerous parliamentary colleagues, past and present.”
In Paris, Sébastien Lecornu, France’s defense minister, received applause when he told lawmakers there on Tuesday that while Vance had “fortunately corrected his statement,” the approximately 600 French soldiers who had died while serving their country over the past 60 years or so “deserve our respect and the respect of our allies.”
Michel Goya is a former colonel in the French army. He said in a post on X, addressed to Vance, that “British and French soldiers who died in Iraq and Afghanistan alongside the Americans are giving you s**t from where they are.”
