This isn’t something this minister can say. He can’t just make up UK defence policy and foreign policy on his own.

This is just outrage bait.

All we know so far is that Iran has made verbal threats about UK bases, which prompted the armed forces to further beef up their defence, the US informed the UK that they were going to bomb a few sites in Iran (but did not ask the UK to join), and that the UK government paid lip service to the US but seems reluctant on anything else so far.

I’d hope Iran aren’t actually stupid enough to attack UK bases, but you never know. I think everyone is far more keen on continuing to focus on Russia-Ukraine, rather than this distraction.

And yeah I know Iran does manufacturing, particularly of drones, for Russia, so it’s not like they’re unlinked… but my hunch is that the monetary and political cost of going after Iran directly would be too much, and Labour would rather stay out of a war with Iran if they can.