The White House is considering buying the Chagos Islands, potentially sinking Sir Keir Starmer’s plan to cede the territory’s sovereignty to Mauritius.

US officials have drawn up a proposal to bypass Britain and make their own deal to take control of Diego Garcia, the strategically important UK-US military base, The Telegraph understands.

It is among several options drafted by Donald Trump’s administration in a paper aimed at providing alternatives to the Prime Minister’s proposal to hand control of the islands to Mauritius, an ally of China and Iran.

The White House has been in regular discussions with Downing Street about securing the future of Diego Garcia, one US official with knowledge of the discussions told The Telegraph.

While purchasing the islands is not the leading solution for the White House, the idea has been raised directly with Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, who has brought the matter to the president’s attention, sources said.

The war in Iran and China’s rising naval power have reignited calls to maintain a global chain of strategic military bases.

Diego Garcia’s location would put Iran within striking distance and allow for round-the-clock, long-range bomber missions, such as the strike on Tehran using B-2 Spirit stealth bombers.

Accordingly, senior members of Mr Trump’s administration fear that handing control of the water to China-allied Mauritius would open the door to espionage by sea.

Officials have in recent months highlighted the Chagos Islands’ importance, stressing top-secret capabilities.

Ben Judah, David Lammy’s former special adviser when he was foreign secretary, told The Telegraph this year: “This airbase…has super secret, super sensitive facilities there which are so important to what Britain is able to do in the world.

“The moment you understand what it is, you come into the British deep state’s logic, which is that we must retain access to this thing at all costs. We would never be able to replicate if we had to do it all by ourselves.”

A price for the Chagos Islands has not yet been discussed. Britain initially planned to give the islands to Mauritius and then pay around £35bn ($46.7bn) for 99 years to lease back the military base.

To take control of the islands, Washington would first have to allow Sir Keir’s deal to go through, then negotiate with the Mauritians once sovereignty had been transferred.

The president initially supported Sir Keir’s deal to give the islands away, but then chose to scuttle it after Sir Keir refused to allow the US to use Diego Garcia to carry out strikes on Iran in the opening hours of the war.

Labour had hoped to pass a bill to give the islands to Mauritius in 2025, but it cannot ratify the deal and hand the islands over to Mauritius without US consent.

In several public outbursts earlier this year, the president denounced the deal as an act of weakness and “great stupidity” and argued that Sir Keir was “losing control of this important island”, referring to Diego Garcia.

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In an interview with The Telegraph on March 2, Mr Trump said he was “very disappointed” in the Prime Minister for blocking him from using the island to strike Iran.

Since then, he has launched repeated attacks against Sir Keir, saying he was “no Winston Churchill” and that he was responsible for the decline of the special relationship.

Britain is also reliant on the US to amend an exchange of letters sent in the 1960s and 1970s that form the legal basis for the agreement to share the base.

Mauritius has repeatedly challenged Britain’s ownership of the Chagos Islands in the international courts, and ministers expected that the International Court of Justice would soon issue a binding ruling to transfer ownership of them.

Hamish Falconer, minister for the Middle East and North Africa, said in May that there was no scenario in which Washington could purchase the islands, insisting that the Government was “committed to the deal that we have struck”.

A US official told The Telegraph: “We remain in regular discussions with our British allies as we work together to preserve the viability of Diego Garcia as a regional security platform.”

Downing Street did not respond to requests for comment.