After about a week of media coverage about the deterioration of the Anglo-American relationship and the late decision to deploy the Royal Navy destroyer HMS Dragon to Cyprus, it was time to move forward with the conversation.
On a visit to the UK’s permanent military headquarters in Northwood, northwest of London, Defense Secretary John Healey asked two senior British military officers whether there were “any signs of a link between Russia and Iran” in the expanding conflict that has suddenly engulfed the Middle East.
It was obvious that Healey knew what response he was going to get. It emerged that the previous night an unspecified number of drones had attacked a coalition base, used by British and other anti-Islamic State forces, in Erbil, northern Iraq. Although there are no reports of serious casualties, it was a relatively rare hit against a Western target.
The fact that the drones managed to get through was, the minister was told, a reflection of greater tactical sophistication: knowledge passed from Russia to Iran and its proxies. Lt. Gen. Nick Perry, head of joint operations, acknowledged that the most effective tactics had “proved problematic” as the war entered a new phase.
Iran has not collapsed quickly and is instead showing signs of wanting to hold on and resist despite intense bombing by the United States and Israel. However, launch rates for Iran’s feared ballistic missiles have fallen by more than 90% since the end of last month: six were fired at the United Arab Emirates on Wednesday compared to 137 on the day the war began.
As a result, Tehran and its regional allies are turning to the Shahed 136 and other drones in their effort to inflict economic and military pain on the United States and its allies. Drone launch numbers have also decreased, but the 39 fired at the United Arab Emirates on Wednesday (the Emirates, which are the most targeted and publish the clearest data), still represent a significant threat.
The Shahed 136, with its distinctive delta wing and noisy engine, was designed by Iran earlier in the decade and then sold to Russia, which needed a new weapon to terrorize Ukraine after its initial attempt at conquest failed. In 2025, Russia fired around 50,000 weapons at its neighbor, endlessly refining how it could use them.
There are still clear 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’s no surprise that piloting advice has been passed down. There have been reports, from the United States, that Russia is providing targeting information to Iran, although Putin unsurprisingly told Trump on Monday that was not true.
By establishing an active connection between Iran and Russia, Healey links the war in Ukraine to the war in the Middle East. Support for Ukraine, in its freedom fight against Moscow, remains relatively high in the UK, unlike the war against Iran, which is so unpopular that even Trump ally Nigel Farage decided this week to say he was against getting involved.
It also gives the defense 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, chief of the Defense Staff, is being blamed: there may be 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. However, 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 complete confidence,” Healey said, the kind of statement no one wants to leave as the final headline.
A challenge for Healey is that the UK may feel it has to become more militarily involved 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 the United States is hardly persuasive in itself.
The idea that there is a covert Russian-Iranian alignment is also an idea that the UK would like to reinforce in the minds of the White House, although it will be difficult to make progress. Anglo-American relations have degenerated to the point that Trump is happy to describe Starmer as “not Winston Churchill”, so British politicians may find it difficult to be heard.
In any case, after Putin told Trump that Russia was not helping Iran, Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy, said: “We can take them at their word.”
