Throughout history, chaos has often been a crucible of great leadership. Yet with Britain in the throes of its biggest political crisis since World War II, it will be surprising if that turns out to be the case this time.
Boris Johnson prepared to become prime minister on Tuesday after the Conservative Party chose him as its leader.
A rumpled master of political theater and the quotable quip, he is idolized by rank-and-file Tories determined to quit the European Union no matter what the consequences. Yet his record as journalist, legislator, London mayor and foreign secretary displays far more bluster than achievement, and a consistent disdain for hard work, probity or the truth.
The prospect of a Johnson government has already spread alarm even through the senior ranks of his party. Several Conservatives voted with the opposition last week to block possible efforts by Mr. Johnson to circumvent Parliament in his drive for a no-deal Brexit. Philip Hammond, the finance minister, and Rory Stewart, the international development secretary, announced that they would quit the cabinet upon his ascendance. Alan Duncan, the Foreign Office minister, resigned on Monday and David Gauke, the justice minister, said he would resign if the next prime minister pursued a no-deal Brexit.
The chief challenge before Mr. Johnson comes on Oct. 31, when Britain must leave the European Union with or without a deal. Theresa May, who resigned as prime minister after her plan for a negotiated break with the European Union was thrice rejected by Parliament, managed at least to postpone the deadline.
Mr. Johnson, however, is among the most vociferous champions of making a break no matter what. In his campaign for the Conservative leadership, he both argued that he knows how to get a better deal from the European Commission and that he welcomes a hard Brexit on Oct. 31.
Nobody seriously believes that Mr. Johnson, who is widely held in disdain in Brussels, especially after his gaffe-prone stint as foreign secretary, will be able to wrest a better deal than the diligent Mrs. May got in two years of arduous negotiations.
And countless analyses by independent research groups and the British government have warned that a hard Brexit would be an economic disaster, with long lines at Channel crossings and broken supply chains. British Treasury studies have predicted slowed economic growth and high costs from lost trade far from the patently fictional savings of 350 million pounds a week that Mr. Johnson blithely advertised on his pro-Brexit campaign bus.
Such realities seem not to worry Mr. Johnson any more than facts much trouble President Trump or any of the new brand of nationalist leaders in Europe. Their popularity is built on emotional appeals to a national glory purportedly lost to globalization and treacherous bureaucracy. In their rhetoric, sovereignty, the people and the nation are the noble opposite of multilateral cooperation and the prosaic, technocratic expertise of the unelected people who do the work of government.
Brexit, in this context, is liberation from the diktat of an alien Brussels. In resigning from Mrs. Mays cabinet a year ago, Mr. Johnson proclaimed with typical hyperbole that under her Brexit deal Britain was truly headed for the status of colony. The passions roused by such populists, however, easily degenerate into nationalism, intolerance and racism.
Now Mr. Johnsons bombast is about to collide with the realities that undermined Mrs. Mays efforts. The European Union will not allow the restoration of a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland to the south, and will insist on the backstop guarantees that undermined Mrs. Mays deal. A majority in Parliament still opposes a hard Brexit. The Conservatives do not have a majority in the legislature, and even a minor rebellion by members of Parliament opposed to Mr. Johnsons leadership could force new elections.
Mr. Johnson lacks the respect in Brussels, and in London, that would enable him to push through an unpopular action. So opposed are some of his fellow Tories to a no-deal Brexit that, according to the BBC, a few of them are apparently considering a formal request to have the queen seek an extension in Brussels if Mr. Johnson barrels ahead.
There is always the possibility that Mr. Johnson will rise to the occasion, and that at the least he will accept the need for another extension of the Brexit deadline, if possible. If not, the politicians who do understand the danger Britain faces must not give in.
