The seventh episode of “The Diplomat” had Kate feeling overwhelmed after hearing the distressing news from Afghanistan. Her intel from Russian intelligence worked in her favor, but she ended up facing the brunt of cancelling the Libya attack from the British PM. With the plan being made to hunt down Roman Lenkov in France, will there be some sort of showdown?
Spoilers Ahead
Kate And Dennison Head To Paris
Kate has a meeting with Dennison, and he is in favor of Roman getting arrested in France along with the British Forces taking the charge ahead. Trowbridge was not interested in the arrest of Roman Lenkov at first because he was keener on getting the Lenkovs out of Libya. That would have sent a stronger message to Russia. Soon the PM will change his mind, according to Dennison, who is now in favor of the arrest of Roman Lenkov because, hopefully, his interrogation might reveal more information about who hired him to attack the aircraft carrier. Kate and Dennison are happy to see things going their way. Dennison, to begin the process of the arrest of Roman in Paris, is headed to the city to have a meeting with his counterpart to get her green signal to use the British task force to arrest the man. He is not sure if France would allow a foreign task force on their land, but he can only hope it would work in his favor. Dennison is excited about this meeting, but he will be joined by Ganon.
On reaching the embassy, Kate is informed that she will be heading to Paris with Dennison because having her there would have a big impact on the meeting with the French government officials. Kate has made quite an impact so far, and she is happy her work is being recognized. With her on the verge of becoming the next vice president, she is looking forward to making this Paris meeting a success. Park informs Billie about Hal meeting up with a potential suspect, someone who could be brought under the CIA’s radar. Park is keen on making Hal a CIA asset, but Billie asks her not to do that because Kate is up for a significant job after her London posting. Eidra Park is intrigued, but she is informed by Stuart that Kate is up for the Vice President job, and he might go to Washington with her to work. Park is livid that Stuart decided without considering her. She gave up on her Cairo job because Stuart wanted her to stay. She breaks up with him now for not even considering her as a factor before deciding on moving to Washington with Kate. Park has every right to be angry because she chose her relationship over her career and did not move to Cairo because Stuart wanted them both to be in the same city and work on their relationship. Stuart’s not considering her before deciding puts her in a foul mood and leads to her ending their relationship.
‘The Diplomat’ Episode 8 Ending Explained: Who Was Behind The HMS Courageous Attack?
Before Kate makes her Paris trip, she and Hal talk about what needs to be done about their relationship. Hal is keen on taking on roles of responsibility now that he has proven through his knowledge that he can deliver. He does not want to be the trophy wife as of now, and he would love to make himself useful. He is far from retirement, and he does not even want to think about spending his life from now on just vacationing when his experience and knowledge can be of use. But Kate gets a little rattled thinking about him starting to work and wonders if it would hamper her. She has a few trust issues creeping up. Though she does not let him know about it to his face, she offers for him to join her in Paris with Dennison, and they can make a vacation out of this trip. Hal is not keen on traveling with her, but he is keen on taking her place if she is unable to attend due to some unforeseen circumstances. He is hinting at the speech that she was supposed to deliver at Chatham House. She will have to miss it because of her Paris trip.
Stuart lets her know there was a mistake in the itinerary as the day of the speech coincides with her trip to Paris. Kate confirms that Hal will be speaking at Chatham House on her behalf. As Dennison and Kate reach Paris, Hal gives a rousing speech about asking questions and communicating with everyone, especially if one needs to get into the field of diplomacy. As he goes on talking about what works in the field of international relations and diplomacy per se, he becomes the man of the hour by the end of the evening. In Paris, Dennison and Kate are trying hard to get the Paris officials and Dennison’s French counterpart to agree to allow the British Task Force to carry out an operation to get hold of Roman Lenkov. The official in charge refuses to agree with the plan because France has never allowed a Bin Laden-style capture in their country, and keeping their sovereignty in mind, it will not be right to give credit to the foreign officials when it will be French officials who will be guiding them through the process of making this operation a success.
Dennison and Kate know what the French are saying is right, but they need to somehow convince them otherwise. Dennison suggests that the French woman seems not to be a fan of Dennison himself, so Kate can strike up a conversation with her based on their dislike for the British Foreign Secretary. Kate gets a call from Hal, who lets her know that the Chatham Hall speech was a success, and he informs her that an MP from the Conservative party approached him to have a meeting with him, to which he disagreed, but Hal offered for the MP to meet Billie, the Chief of Staff. Kate loses her mind over Hal using her name to overreach his boundaries, which he knows as a former ambassador he is not supposed to do. Kate goes into paranoia mode when she suspects Hal has the ambition to be the next Secretary of State of America, and that is why it came across as easy for him to let the MP do the meet and greet with the current chief of staff. Kate is paranoid when it comes to her husband. She knows Hal inside out and understands why he would make such a move. She understands why Hal would go out of his way to use his influence as a spouse of the ambassador; there is something he considers above her, and maybe that’s why Kate stopped him from having any conversation with the said MP, Merritt Groove.
On reaching the event where Dennison and Kate are supposed to meet the French official again so that Kate can again push her to agree to the British agenda, Kate learns from the French official that Lenkov would be assassinated upon his arrest, whereas Kate had been sure that Lenkov would only be arrested for interrogation. Shocked to hear about the new development in the case, Kate wonders if it was the plan for the British Government, including Dennison, to go behind her back and make plans to assassinate Lenkov before he is even interrogated. She confronts Dennison about this information and accuses him of lying to her about this operation. Dennison was also unaware of the assassination part, where he reveals that Trowbridge was not stupid enough to give that order. As Kate is hyperventilating, she comes to a quick conclusion, grabs their phone and throws it over to the bodyguard, in case their phones are tapped, and says out loud to Dennison that only the people who hired Lenkov would want him dead. They quickly realized that Trowbridge had hired Lenkov, perhaps to carry out an attack, and to counter that, the PM would launch a military action on the so-called perpetrators, which would turn into a win-win situation for him. His popularity would go up, and he would surely go on to win the next election. Kate and Dennison are shocked by such developments.
In London, Stuart asks Hal to cancel his meeting with Merritt Groove, as it is not right for Hal to take meetings in the absence of his spouse, the ambassador. Stuart offers to have dinner with Merritt at the restaurant, but Hal is keen on offering an apology on his behalf, which Stuart again disagrees with. Stuart and his colleague Ronnie head to the restaurant to let him know that Hal won’t be joining them. Merritt is upset about this ambush and heads toward his car when he sees Hal approaching him. Merritt’s car explodes into flames. The explosion happened in such close proximity to Stuart and Hal that it is not understood if they would survive the blast. The MP would have died on the spot, but it can be safely assumed that Stuart and Hal would suffer grave injuries from it. Kate is informed of the blast that took place in London, and Hal and Stuart’s situation is also explained to her on the spot. Kate is appalled and in shock. The blast was probably connected to PM Trowbridge. There is a chance that Merritt Groove wanted to inform people about the attack that happened on HMS Courageous. Reaching out to Hal was considered an easier option than talking to the ambassador, which would require an official appointment. An unofficial meeting would go under the radar and probably help Merritt let Hal know about any information he might have. If the PM is responsible for the blast that killed his MP, it means he would get rid of anyone who would divulge any intel that would lead the investigation to him. The MP might have been the PM’s next victim. It can be slowly assumed that Trowbridge would do anything to stay in power.