When Tom Tugendhat was about 20, he felt he needed a better understanding of North Africa. So he traveled overland from Morocco to Israel, skipping only Libya because it wouldn’t let him in. Much of the journey he did on foot.
“Why North Africa?” I asked when we spoke by phone. “Because it’s … there?” he replied half-jokingly, an echo of George Mallory’s line about climbing Mount Everest. Unlike Mallory, Tugendhat survived the trip.
Tugendhat has survived a few other things on his way to becoming a serious contender for leader of Britain’s Conservative Party and thus Boris Johnson’s successor as prime minister.
Among them: A 10-hour firefight during his service in Iraq, in which he was wounded twice by friendly fire. And opposition to Brexit, which might have spelled political death for him as a Tory had he not distinguished himself as Parliament’s most credible voice on foreign affairs.
In the interest of full disclosure: He’s also managed to endure a friendship of many years with me.