The leader of the Conservative Party is facing calls to apologise after she suggested the UK military are “just hanging around” rather than taking the necessary action in the Middle East.
Kemi Badenoch said there was a need to reduce the capability of Iran to attack British bases, adding that the UK is currently just “catching arrows”.
Defence Secretary John Healey said her comments “insults the men and women of our Armed Forces” and that she should apologise.
Ms Badenoch said there needed to be an effort to stop missiles from being launched rather than just focusing on intercepting them.
“You can’t always wait for people to attack you. Sometimes you have to make sure that you get there first to stop their ability to hurt your citizens,” she said.
“They’re not doing enough… What they’re doing is catching arrows,” she told BBC Breakfast.
“It’s not working. We need to actually make sure our bases aren’t being hit.”
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Pressed on whether she supported firing on Iranian missile bases, she said she did, adding: “What else are our jets doing, just hanging around there?
“They need to be able to see who is attacking us and stop them from firing at British soldiers or even British people in hotels.”
On Friday, Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy, said RAF jets could legally strike Iranian missile sites being used to attack British interests.
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He stressed that F35 and Typhoon jets were currently only shooting down missiles and drones fired by Iran at allies in the region.
The UK has already given the US permission to use British bases to carry out defensive strikes against Iran’s missile facilities.
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Responding to the growing row on Saturday, Sir Andrew Mitchell, former Conservative shadow foreign secretary, told Times Radio: “I don’t think she has anything to apologise for at all.”
He added: “She knows, as well as you and I do, that the Royal Air Force follows the orders and commands of British ministers. And I think she was making a point that…British ministers were slow off the mark, and should have been much quicker to support the countries in the region with whom we have very deep and close relationships.”
The controversy comes as Ms Badenoch launches her most scathing attack on Prime Minister Keir Starmer to date, calling him a “political hostage, held at the behest of a load of half-rate left-wing MPs”.
In a speech at the Conservative spring conference in Harrogate today, the Tory leader will accuse the prime minister of “sitting on the fence” while the rest of the world rearms.
Kemi Badenoch claims Labour is “nothing like the patriotic party of yesteryear” and is “playing student politics” over the Iran war.
