Armageddon Postponed – A dramatic farce in a single act, written by the Reverend Peter Mullen.

Dave is on the beach baring his rotundity for the paparazzi and the benefit of the whole nation Dave: “I say, Sam, I’ve had the most terrific idea for a wheeze. We used to dream up spiffing wheezes at my posh Bullingdon School.”

Samantha: “Oh, you’re not going to stand Mr Gove in the naughty corner again?”

Dave: “Much better than that. I’m going to bomb the **** out of Assad.”

Samantha: “In that case, darling, you’d better ask Barak for permission. Here use my mobile.”

Dave (on the phone): “I say Barak, old chap.

I’ve just had the most spiffing idea for a wheeze. Why don’t you and I bomb the **** out of Assad?”

Barak: “Well, lookee here Davey boy, I didn’t get to go to no posh school. But gee yeah, let’s kick ass. I’m all for bombing the **** out of Assad. It’ll take my people’s mind off the **** I’ve made of the economy.”

Dave: “For this wheeze to work, we need a pretext. How about Assad’s use of chemical weapons?”

Barak: “Has the son of a bitch used them?”

Dave: “Who cares? I’ll tell our MPs he did and they’ll give me a chit to do it.”

Barak: “Well, if you really have to ask those guys, Dave.”

Enter Secretary with a wheelbarrow full of the printed text of ten million tweets: “Prime Minister, I have to tell you nobody in Britain wants us to bomb the **** out of Assad. They say it’s just a re-rerun of the Blair disaster over Iraq.”

Dave: “Wow – that’s a real bummer! How am I going to explain to Barak that the wheeze is off?”

Secretary: “Don’t worry, sir. I’ll tell the whips’ office to lean on some Tory MPs not to turn up for the Commons vote.”

Dave: “Wizard, Fortescue! Now I can ring Barak and tell him any bombing the **** out of Assad he’s got to do by himself.”

Dave picks up the phone: “I say Barak, old chum, I’ve just read 10m tweets from our people and they say if I help you bomb the **** out of Assad they won’t vote for me at the next General Election.”

Barak: “Funny you should say that, Davey boy. Same here. So, as it says in the Broadway song, Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off. For a minute I thought I was going to have to ask that Monsewer Hollande and his cheese-eating surrender monkeys to lend a hand.”

Enter Vladimir on the phone: “Hey, what’s this I hear about you two imperialist running dogs planning to bomb the **** out of Assad?

If there’s any **** to be bombed out, I’ll bomb it out of your silly little island. By the way, I didn’t go to a posh school either – just the local KGB comprehensive.”

Dave: “Thank you so much for saying that, Vlad. That’s really helped get Barak and me off the hook. Just one thing: to save face, can you could cook up some deal with Assad about putting his chemical weapons where they can’t do any harm – you wonderful old Czar, you?”

Vladimir: “It’ll cost you.”

Dave: “That’s okay. The Yanks will pay.”

Barak: “Business as usual then! Now I shall just have to look around for someplace else where I can start a small war to take our folks’ minds off the economy.”

Dave, Barak and Vladimir: “That’s a relief.

Let’s all get together for a celebratory stitchup and p*** up at the G20 in St Petersburg.”