“Russia doesn’t hold all the cards,” said Keir Starmer – for Europe still has a couple of jokers to play. One is Emmanuel Macron, in Washington to try to persuade Trump that Putin is, on balance, the bad guy. He brought along his wife, Brigitte, though if he thinks she’ll help change Donald’s mind, he’s mistaken. The president doesn’t go for older women.

The other wild card – or very boring card – is Starmer, who imagines himself as a latter-day Churchill and courageously, historically joined a summit in Kyiv via Zoom.

He was introduced to the audience as “Keira Starmera”, and stared awkwardly at the camera for ten seconds, like Orson Welles waiting for a cue. “Colleagues,” he eventually said – his way with language is extraordinary – Britain stands with Ukraine and will be raising the pressure on Russia! This means new sanctions on mink hats and, in lieu of an Army, we’ll be tooling up Princess Anne and dropping her in by parachute.

An aid package of 10,000 Paddington Bears – second-hand, we’re not made of money – is also on its way.