When Vice President Vance’s remarks were reported in the UK, they landed like an insult on freshly-dug soil.

Families who had buried loved ones in Iraq and Afghanistan heard not a policy critique, but a dismissal of the sacrifice their sons and daughters had made beside American troops.

Veterans’ groups spoke with raw anger, accusing him of cheapening a shared history written in blood.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer and other leaders quickly framed the response around respect, not partisanship. They reminded Washington that British soldiers had followed the United States into two controversial wars and never walked away. Vance’s later clarification—that his comments were not aimed at the UK—did little to calm a deeper fear: that the bond between allies can be frayed not just by strategy, but by careless words that forget who paid the ultimate price.