Battling Boris bets on Brexit buddies

The resignations of two of his most senior ministers - Rishi Sunak and Sadiq Javid - and several others in less prominent positions have put British Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the center of a perfect storm.

Will Johnson - who recently survived a confidence vote over the so-called party-gate fiasco - survive this storm over Christopher Pincher's conduct?

Pincher resigned recently as the Conservative Party's deputy chief whip after he was accused of groping two men at a private members' club.

It later emerged that Pincher had been investigated for misconduct in 2019. And before Johnson named Pincher to the whip post, he had been briefed on the accusation.

Looking forward, Johnson will unlikely face a new confidence vote in the near future - at least for another year in accordance with party rules - after winning the recent one in relation to party-gate.

But the sudden resignations of Sunak as chancellor and Javid as health and social care secretary jolted the party like an earthquake. Before he was named health and social care secretary, Javid had been Johnson's chancellor and former prime minister Theresa May's home secretary.

Yet, curiously enough, aside from a few resigning from less prominent positions yesterday, none of the ministers in prominent roles - including Foreign Secretary Elizabeth Truss, Home Secretary Priti Patel and Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab - followed suit.

To the contrary, the hugely popular "minister for vaccines" Nadhim Zahawi defended the embattled prime minister on TV after taking over as chancellor.

Zahawi has been praised for the rapid rollout of vaccines, which made it possible for the UK to return to normalcy from the pandemic.

Sunak, Zahawi's immediate predecessor, had once been touted as a candidate for Johnson's job but was already politically crippled by a US green-card and tax saga surrounding his wife.

As a result, Sunak could never reach higher than chancellor.

It is clear that Johnson tried to stabilize the furiously rocking ship when he appointed Zahawi as chancellor.

Anyone else but Johnson would most likely have resigned following the rush of resignations, by-election defeats, party-gate and now Pincher's misconduct fiasco.

But he will fight on to protect his political life - and may well rely on die-hard Brexiters within the party.

Although the British voted for Brexit, the issue is far from over. The specter of super inflation could easily tilt the balance back to the favor of remainers, who have never given up on plotting the country's return to the European Union.

Hard Brexiters fear that a leadership change could bring in a soft or non-Brexiter and, therefore, Johnson remains their best choice.

Johnson knows this too. In the absence of a clear alternative in the Brexit camp, die hards are likely to rally around him to protect the Brexit achievement.

There's no question the fight within the Conservative Party will escalate in a buildup to the next party conference later this year.

Will Johnson be forced out of 10, Downing Street, between now and then?

It's still too early to say.