In linking Iran to Russia, Healey could be laying ground for hard choices ahead
After a week or so of wearing media coverage about the deterioration of the Anglo-American relationship and the belated decision to deploy Royal Navy destroyer HMS Dragon to Cyprus, it was time to move the conversation on.On a visit to the UK’s permanent military headquarters in Northwood, north-west London, the defence secretary, John Healey, asked two senior British military officers if there was “any sign of a link between Russia and Iran” in the sprawling conflict that has suddenly engulfed the Middle East.It was obvious Healey knew what answer he was going to get.The night before, it emerged, an unspecified number of drones had struck a coalition base, used by British and other anti-Islamic State forces, in Erbil, northern Iraq.Though there are no reports of serious casualties, it was a relatively rare hit on a western target.
That the drones got through was, the minister was told, a reflection of a greater tactical sophistication – know-how passed from Russia to Iran and its proxies.Lt Gen Nick Perry, the chief of joint operations, acknowledged that the more effective tactics had “proven problematic” as the war entered a new phase.Iran has not collapsed quickly and instead is showing signs of wanting to endure and resist despite the intense bombardment from the US and Israel.However, launch rates of Iran’s feared ballistic missiles have dropped by more than 90% since the end of last month: six were fired at the UAE on Wednesday compared with 137 on the day the war began.As a result, Tehran and its regional allies are shifting towards Shahed 136 and other drones in their effort to inflict economic and military pain on the US and its allies.
Drone launch numbers are also down, but the 39 fired at the UAE on Wednesday – the heavily targeted Emirates publishes the clearest data – still represent a meaningful threat.The Shahed 136, with its distinctive delta wing and noisy engine, was designed by Iran at the beginning of the decade, and then sold to Russia, which needed a new weapon to terrorise Ukraine after its initial attempt at conquest failed.In 2025, Russia fired about 50,000 at its neighbour, endlessly refining how it could use them.There still are distinct limits to Russia’s willingness to help Iran, not least because Vladimir Putin wants Donald Trump’s help in forcing Ukraine to make peace on his terms.But it is hardly surprising that piloting tips appear to have been passed on.
There have been reports, from the US, that Russia is providing targeting information to Iran, though unsurprisingly Putin told Trump on Monday that was not true,By making an active connection between Iran and Russia, Healey links together the war in Ukraine with the war in the Middle East,Support for Ukraine, in its struggle for freedom against Moscow, remains relatively high in the UK – quite unlike the war against Iran, which is so unpopular that even Trump ally Nigel Farage decided to say this week he was against becoming involved,It also gives the defence secretary something else to discuss,Recriminations over the failure to deploy a Royal Navy warship to the eastern Mediterranean before the US and Israel attacked have reached the point where Sir Rich Knighton, the chief of defence staff, is being blamed: there may be a “a fatal collapse” of confidence in him at No 10, according to a report in this week’s Spectator.
In reality, the late dispatch of HMS Dragon is diplomatically embarrassing but not, at least so far, militarily significant.Nevertheless, Healey had to answer questions about whether he had confidence in the head of the armed forces, a man appointed by Keir Starmer only last June.“I have total confidence,” Healey said, the kind of statement that nobody wants to leave as the final headline.A challenge for Healey is that the UK may feel it has to become more militarily engaged in the future, perhaps to protect merchant shipping in the strait of Hormuz, perhaps in the event of an unexpected Iranian escalation.But in the current climate, arguing – as British politicians have done for decades – that greater action is necessary simply to help out the US, is hardly likely to be persuasive in itself.
The idea that there is a covert Russian-Iranian alignment is also one that the UK might like to reinforce in the minds of the White House, though making progress will be difficult,Anglo-American relations have degenerated to the point that Trump is happy to describe Starmer as “not Winston Churchill”, so British politicians may struggle to be listened to,In any event, after Putin had told Trump that Russia was not helping Iran, Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy, said: “We can take them at their word,”
Rapper Lil’ Kim to headline both Vivid Sydney and Melbourne’s 2026 Rising festival
The pioneering female rapper Lil’ Kim will headline both Vivid Sydney and Melbourne’s Rising this year, as each festival revealed its programs on Wednesday.The performances at Sydney’s Carriageworks and Melbourne’s Festival Hall will be Lil’ Kim’s first Australian shows in 15 years, celebrating her landmark multiplatinum records Hard Core – which turns 30 this year – and The Notorious KIM.Both Vivid and Rising are staged annually in winter.Rising’s artistic director and chief executive, Hannah Fox, said the 51-year-old rapper, who broke out as a member of Junior MAFIA and was mentored by the Notorious BIG, was on “a really exciting return to form”.“Hard Core and Notorious KIM really did carve a path – there are so many women rappers and femcees now who absolutely followed in her tiny footsteps, her funked-up, sex-positive vibe,” Fox said
Stephen Colbert on US war in Iran: ‘We’re still no closer to learning what the goal is’
Late-night hosts looked into the murky goals, economic impact and disrespect for military protocol of Donald Trump’s war in Iran.“We’re on day 10 of the Iran war,” said Stephen Colbert on Monday evening, “and we’re still no closer to learning what the goal is. Is it regime change? Is it ending a nuclear program? Is it changing the name to Donald Trump’s Iran-a-Lago?”“But we are learning more about the cost,” he noted, as the first week of the war alone is estimated to have cost about $6bn. “Do you know what you could buy with $6bn? Twenty-seven Kristi Noem horsey commercials!” he joked before clips of the very expensive, controversial ad campaign that likely ended Noem’s tenure as secretary of homeland security.Despite the exorbitant cost, Trump said over the weekend that this new surprise war would stop only after Iran’s “unconditional surrender”, to which Iran replied: “That’s a dream that they should take to their grave
Leap Year is patently ridiculous and widely panned. It’s also the perfect romcom
In 2010 the Guardian gave the romcom Leap Year a one-star review. The script was “horrendous”, according to the reviewer: “Afterwards, the only ‘leap’ I felt like making was off a motorway gantry into the fast lane of the M25.”He wasn’t alone. Leap Year has an approval rating of 23% on Rotten Tomatoes; the New York Times called it “so witless, charmless and unimaginative that it can be described as a movie only in the strictly technical sense”.It has been 16 years
Womadelaide 2026 review: Grace Jones embraces the compulsion for dancing in the dark times
Botanic Park, AdelaideNo matter the music, no matter the mood, the festival crowd moved and moved – in a celebration embodied by the liberated, messy and sexual stylings of the 77-year-old headlinerGet our weekend culture and lifestyle emailStraight away, the atmosphere at Womadelaide is calmer this year. On opening night, it is only 25C – the warmest it is forecast to be all weekend. After two years of temperatures in the 40s, this will be a festival to ease into. Even the bat colony at the entrance feels decidedly more settled. “I hear we missed a really hot one last year,” says Beoga’s Niamh Dunne later that night
‘A lot of comedians don’t have a sense of humour’: Jack Dee on his loser Lead Balloon creation Rick Spleen
‘Rick’s basically a what-if version of me. Had I not found success, that’s how I would have been – deluding myself into thinking success will come, or believing it’s not my fault that it hasn’t’I was doing a lot of standup, working with other comedy writers. I was interested in the relationship between writer and performer. I wondered: “What if the writer is funnier than the performer?” I approached Pete Sinclair, who I’d written with for a long time, and said: “What do you reckon?” BBC4 commissioned a pilot.We developed the world of Rick Spleen and his relationship with his writer and the public
Jack White: ‘I’m not going to put a painful thing out there for some idiot on the internet to stomp all over’
As a new book of his lyrics, poems and selected musings is published, the White Stripes’ singer, songwriter and general guitar hero reflects on poetry, politics and why writing a song is like reupholstering a chairOn the jacket of Jack White: Collected Lyrics & Selected Writing Volume 1, the poet and critic Hanif Abdurraqib writes: “I wish I read more people who talked about Jack White as a writer of lyrics.” He makes a good point. White is celebrated as a singer, guitarist, producer and generator of indelible riffs but not so much as a wordsmith. His new book, edited by official archivist Ben Blackwell, sets the record straight. Following 2023’s The White Stripes Complete Lyrics 1997-2007, it covers every song White has written outside that band, along with several poems, Instagram ruminations and scans from his notebooks
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