President Donald Trump is reportedly plotting a stunning insult to King Charles III on the eve of his visit to the U.S.
The British monarch will land in Washington, D.C. on Monday alongside his wife, Queen Camilla, in a visit that is being framed as a potential Band-Aid for ailing relations. Even Trump himself has suggested as much.
When asked by the BBC if it could repair the faltering “special relationship” between the two nations, he said: “Absolutely. He’s fantastic. He’s a fantastic man. Absolutely, the answer is yes.”
“I know him well, I’ve known him for years,” he added of Charles. “He’s a brave man, and he’s a great man. They would absolutely be a positive.”
Trump, 79, is a vocal fan of King Charles, 77. That makes it all the more surprising that he is reportedly weighing up reconsidering America’s position on Britain’s claim to the Falkland Islands—a move that would go down like a lead balloon in Britain.
Reuters has reported on a leaked Pentagon memo that suggests Trump’s administration could re-evaluate whether it believes Britain should retain the Falkland Islands, a self-governing British Overseas Territory in the South Atlantic, where King Charles is head of state.
Argentina and the U.K. went to war in 1982 when Argentinian forces descended on the island in a failed bid to retake the archipelago for Buenos Aires. The king’s younger brother, Prince Andrew, served as a helicopter pilot in the conflict.
The move, which the Pentagon has not ruled out, is designed as a response to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s refusal to help with Trump’s war in Iran. Earlier this month, Starmer, the head of the left-wing Labour Party, said the U.K. would not help enforce Trump’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz.
Since the war kicked off on February 28, Starmer has repeatedly refused to get involved. A spokesperson for Starmer said the bullish approach from the Trump administration doesn’t threaten him. “The PM has said very clearly that he won’t be pressured on the Iran war. He will always act in the national interests of the U.K. and will not be dragged into this war.”
Kingsley Wilson, the Pentagon press secretary, echoed the sentiment of the president, who seems jilted by the lack of help from traditional European Union allies. The Reuters leak also suggested that Spain could be suspended from NATO for its unwillingness to engage.
“As President Trump has said, despite everything that the United States has done for our Nato allies, they were not there for us,” Wilson said.
“The war department [Department of Defense] will ensure that the president has credible options to ensure that our allies are no longer a paper tiger and instead do their part. We have no further comment on any internal deliberations to that effect.”
Asked about the memo by The Guardian, Starmer’s spokesperson added: “We could not be clearer about the U.K.’s position on the Falkland Islands. It’s longstanding. It’s unchanged. Sovereignty rests with the U.K., and the islands’ right to self-determination is paramount. That’s been our consistent position and will remain the case.”
The Falkland Islanders, he added, “voted overwhelmingly and in favor of remaining a U.K. overseas territory, and we’ve always stood behind the islanders’ right to self-determination.”
Previous administrations have formally recognized the U.K.’s de facto control and administration of the islands, but have not taken a formal position regarding sovereignty. In 2024, Argentinian president and major Trump ally Javier Milei said he intended to set out a “roadmap” for the archipelago to become part of Argentina.
However, a month later, he accepted that the Falkland Islands are currently “in the hands of the U.K.,” and that there was “no instant solution” to changing that status.
In a May 2013 referendum, islanders were asked: “Do you wish the Falkland Islands to retain their current political status as an Overseas Territory of the United Kingdom?” Voters, who are mainly descendants of British settlers, voted overwhelmingly “yes” at 99.8 percent. That was with a 92 percent turnout. The 2021 census recorded 3,662 residents.
A British settlement was established on the islands as early as 1766. The islands, known as Las Malvinas in Argentina, came under British control in January 1833, when the U.K. reasserted sovereignty and expelled Argentine military personnel.
A major flashpoint came in 1982 when Argentina sent troops to take the archipelago and its dependencies, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. The war stretched over 74 days and concluded with Argentina’s surrender on June 14, restoring British control of the islands. In total, 649 Argentine troops, 255 British service members, and three Falkland Islanders lost their lives in the fighting.
In his infamous 2019 BBC Newsnight interview, then-Prince Andrew cited an “overdose of adrenaline in the Falklands War” when his helicopter was fired upon as the reason he was unable to sweat.
He fought back against now-deceased Virginia Giuffre’s sexual abuse accusations with a series of bizarre claims. Posed with her description of him being sweaty on a dancefloor, he said, “There’s a slight problem with the sweating, because I have a peculiar medical condition, which is that I don’t sweat, or I didn’t sweat at the time, and that was—was it—yes, I didn’t sweat at the time.”
His brother, King Charles, has said he “cherishes greatly” the ties between the Falklands and the U.K.
He made a gaffe during a visit in 1999 when he said he hoped “modern, democratic Argentina” would in the future be able to “live amicably alongside ... another modern, if rather small, democracy just a few hundred miles off your coast.”
The feeling in Argentina has always been that the Falklands are its territory and that Britain stole them. The reaction to the then-prince’s comments was swift. Argentine Vice-President Carlos Ruckauf called Prince Charles a “usurper,” and described the speech as “intolerable.”
The Pentagon leak has caused a stir, too. Sir Ed Davey, the leader of the U.K.’s Liberal Democrats, has even called for King Charles’s State Visit to the U.S. to be canceled altogether.
“Any move by the president to question our sovereignty in the Falklands should be met by robust denouncement,” he said.
He described Trump as an “unreliable, damaging President” who “cannot keep insulting our country.”
The royal couple is due to visit Washington, D.C., New York, and Virginia. The trip coincides with the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
