"The Sunday Times" has published a previously unreleased column by British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson urging Britain to stay in the EU. The article was penned days before he became chief Brexit campaigner.
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Boris Johnson's uncertainty about joining the Brexit campaign ahead of June's referendum is not itself news to the British public.
But a previously unpublished column printed in "The Sunday Times" has now shed light on exactly how Johnson would have made the case for staying in the European Union. The original text was revealed in "All Out War," a new book by the newspaper's political editor, Tim Shipman.
Just two days before Johnson broke from Prime Minister David Cameron's "Remain" camp, he wrote that the United Kingdom's remaining in the EU would be "a boon for the world and for Europe."
Johnson, who became foreign minister after the referendum, went on to warn that Brexit could lead to "economic shock" and the breakup of the union between Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom.
Directly contradicting comments made this week in which he described the European single market as "increasingly useless," Johnson wrote that "this is a market on our doorstep, ready for further exploitation by British firms: The membership fee seems rather small for all that access."
"Why are we so determined to turn our back on it?" Johnson wrote.
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'Some big questions'
Johnson warned of "the Putin factor": "We don't want to do anything to encourage more shirtless swaggering from the Russian leader, not in the Middle East, not anywhere."
"There are some big questions that the 'out' side need to answer," Johnson wrote.
The former London mayor also made an emotional plea to voters to consider the impact of Brexit on future generations, writing: "Shut your eyes. Hold your breath. Think of Britain. Think of the rest of the EU. Think of the future."
In or out?
Responding to the publication, Johnson told journalists outside his London home that he had been "wrestling with the issue" in February and wrote a long article that was "overwhelmingly in favor of leaving" the EU.
"I then thought I had better see if I could try and make an alternative case to myself, so I wrote a kind of semi-parodic article in the opposite sense," Johnson said.
"I set them side by side, and it was blindingly obvious what the right thing to do was," Johnson said. "And I think the people made the right decision."
Plummeting pound
Fifty-two percent of voters favored leaving the European Union in June's referendum.
Cameron also resigned, leaving the door to number 10 Downing Street open for Theresa May. Last month, the UK's new prime minister announced that she would trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty by the end of March to begin two years of negotiations on Britain's departure from the European Union.
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Brexit club
The pro-Brexit campaigner will now be making frequent appearances in Brussels. The euroskeptic wasn't always so adverse to European integration, whatever his EU opinions. In 1997, he said: "I'm rather pro-European ... I certainly want a European community where one can go off and scoff croissants, drink delicious coffee, learn foreign languages and generally make love to foreign women."
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'Crass and tasteless'
Guests at a gay rights event in 2013 walked out in disgust after Johnson said the following about gay marriage: "I’m delighted that as of this autumn any young man will be able to take his chum up the Arsenal ... and marry him." Labour's Angela Eagle, the first female MP to come out while in office, said that Johnson's "crass and tasteless remarks" only served to undermine the gay community.
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Hitler jokes? Nein, danke
Earlier this summer Johnson struck again, comparing the EU's aims to Hitler's. Speaking to UK newspaper "The Telegraph," Johnson said European history had seen repeated attempts to rediscover the "golden age of peace and prosperity under the Romans." "Napoleon, Hitler, various people tried this out, and it ends tragically. The EU is an attempt to do this by different methods," he said.
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'Special relationship'
Born in New York, Johnson has upset the "special relationship" with the US more than once. In April, Johnson faced huge criticism after recounting the story of a bust of Winston Churchill being moved from the White House to the British Embassy. In the British tabloid "The Sun," Johnson asked whether the move was "a symbol of the part-Kenyan President's ancestral dislike of the British Empire."
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Only one laughing
But Johnson is no stranger to making derogatory comments. In his 2002 column, he described how the Queen had "come to love the Commonwealth, partly because it supplies her with regular cheering crowds of flag-waving piccaninnies." Commenting on then-Prime Minister Tony Blair's trip to Congo, Johnson wrote how "the tribal warriors will all break out in watermelon smiles to see the big white chief."
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Woes with the West Bank
In November last year, Palestinian authorities canceled Johnson's visit after he said a boycott of Israeli goods was "completely crazy" and supported by "corduroy-jacketed, snaggle-toothed, lefty academics in the UK." Officials said Johnson's comments risked creating protests if he visited the West Bank, and accused him of adopting a "misinformed and disrespectful" pro-Israeli stance.
Image: Reuters/P. Nicholls
Bull in a china shop
In 2008, Johnson even managed to offend his hosts at the ceremonial passing of the Olympic flag from Beijing to London. "I say this respectfully to our Chinese hosts, who have excelled so magnificently at Ping-pong," Johnson said. "Ping-pong was invented on the dining tables of England in the 19th century and it was called Wiff-waff!"
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No Shakespeare
Johnson won a £1,000 prize in May for penning a poem about Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in which he referred to the Turkish prime minister as a "wankerer," rhyming with the Turkish capital, Ankara - a far cry from Johnson arguing that Turkey should join the EU in 2006. The competition was launched after Erdogan sued German comedian Jan Böhmermann, whose poem accused him of having sex with a goat.
