Nigel Farage has a chance to secure his place in history — by standing down

What exactly does Nigel Farage want? He has marched his men (and women) to the top of the hill and now he seems to be marching them down again — but only halfway. This grand old duke now accepts that the deal negotiated last month does amount to Brexit, despite previous denials. In that case, why won’t he join forces with Boris Johnson?

Having implicitly acknowledged that if the Brexit Party fought the Tories in their own seats, the only winners would be the Remainers, Farage says he is still determined to fight them in Labour marginals. Not only does this make neither strategic nor tactical sense, but it ignores the dynamic that he himself has now unleashed.

More and more Brexit Party followers and even candidates are returning to the Tory fold. It is doubtful whether Farage ever did have the troops on the ground to gain any Leave-voting seats from Labour. Now it is obvious that all he can hope to achieve there is to stop Conservatives from winning. That could make all the difference in a tight race.

Having at times demonstrated daredevil courage in defying the political and media establishment, Farage now threatens to make a laughing stock of himself. Already he is widely assumed to have “bottled it” rather than fight a seat himself. Now he has stood down his troops in almost half of all constituencies. What is the point of contesting the rest? The Tories have already indicated that they will fight every seat regardless.

His co-founder Richard Tice, for example, is standing in Hartlepool. It is a typical Northern Leave constituency but it was once Peter Mandelson’s heartland and it is still seen as a safe Labour seat. The party slightly increased its majority in 2017 to 7,650. Tice is one of the Brexit Party’s most impressive candidates, but even if he won over half of all Labour voters — despite Jeremy Corbyn, a highly improbable scenario— the Tory vote would have to collapse too for him to win. Given that for Leave voters Boris Johnson is a much more attractive figure than Theresa May, such a Tory collapse can safely be ruled out.

So Nigel Farage has woken up this morning in the unenviable predicament of needing to believe two impossible things before breakfast. Both Labour and the Conservatives have to surrender for his barmy army to achieve anything in this election. That is just not going to happen. On the contrary, it is his Dads’ Army amateurs who are more than likely to give up without a fight. Farage could be left looking like those Japanese soldiers left in the jungle who were still fighting the war long after it was over.

If, however, the grand old duke can be persuaded to swallow his pride and march all the way down again, it is not too late for him to exact a price for his co-operation. Once he no longer poses a threat, Boris Johnson could afford to be magnanimous. To do so would be in his interest, too. After all, if Farage had not set up the Brexit Party less than a year ago, it is possible that Boris would not be in Downing Street now.

For the Conservatives, the endorsement of the man who forced David Cameron to hold an EU referendum in the first place would mark the end of an existential threat. In her day, Margaret Thatcher ensured that no party to her Right could emerge. Since then, the Tories have at times moved so far onto the centre ground that first Ukip and then the Brexit Party have been able to secure significant victories in European elections.

A glance at the rest of the EU is enough to remind us of what can happen once hard Right parties establish themselves. This week one such party, Vox, came third in the Spanish general election. Given that Spain was a dictatorship less than half a century ago, this is a disturbing development and an indictment of both the weak centre-Right leadership and the Left-wing government, which played with fire by exhuming the remains of General Franco. Similar phenomena are occurring all over Europe, as the EU and its hitherto dominant federalist parties struggle to contain popular discontent.

That this has not happened in Britain is a remarkable tribute to the deep roots of our democracy. Farage is not a far-Right extremist, although his propaganda has at times veered into dangerous territory. By renouncing his own ambitions and endorsing the deal that Boris Johnson has negotiated with the EU, he could now ensure his place in history as one of the architects of Brexit. Is that not what Nigel Farage always wanted?