Blair defends UK support for the US
As he prepares to name the day that he will leave 10 Downing Street, Blair has declared that his successor should also be prepared to use hard power - military action - in pursuit of it's goals and warns that al-Qaeda might be winning the propaganda war in it's battle with the West.
He strongly defended Britain's relationship with the United States:
Blair no doubt thinks he's telling us stuff that we don't know at this point. In fact, leaving aside his notion that we shouldn't have an independent foreign policy, there is nothing that he has said so far with which I would disagree. The US is generally a force for good and our interests are, more often than not, the same as theirs."The reality of today's world is that you can't opt out of these conflicts - certainly not if you want to retain any control over the factors and events that are going to effect the security of your own country," he said.
The Prime Minister argued: "If we want to remain a strong power, capable of wielding real influence in the world, then we have to keep two principles intact - that we are allies of America and strong central partners in Europe, and secondly that we are prepared to use hard as well as soft power."
"It is also important to recognise that your allies are real allies when the going is tough and not simply when the going is easy. I happen to believe our strategic relationship with the United States has served this country well for many, many decades and should continue to serve us well."
If Britain adopted an independent foreign policy from the US, that strategic relationship would be weakened, which would be "tragic" for Britain and the world, he said. After the 9/11 attacks, America felt it was at war. "I believed the most important thing for us was to be with them in that fight and I believe that still and I hope that in future we will be strong allies of America," Mr Blair said.
However, it is surely the job of a good friend to also point out when you think your ally is about to commit a strategic blunder? Blair seems to put loyalty before good sense, which is probably why he has earned the sobriquet, "poodle".
He has often stated that, after 9-11, it was important that the US was not isolated, a curious thing to say when one considers the outpouring of grief that took place across the planet and the Le Monde headline stating, "We Are all Americans Now". That grief was real and heartfelt. Few of us moved from our TV screens for the first two days and I remember being genuinely moved when the guards outside Buckingham Palace played the American national anthem.
It was the first time in British history that such a thing had occurred. And Brits cried alongside their American visitors.
Nor was there ever any question that the US would have to respond to such an outrage. The question was in what way would the US respond and against whom?
Blair seems, even now, not to understand that the strategic blunder that he and Bush made wasn't in going after bin Laden, it was in going after Saddam, who was completely unconnected to the incident for which the whole world mourned. Nor was the world, when millions of citizens marched to try and prevent that war, remotely concerned about the fate of that old dictator. They were concerned at how many innocent Iraqis would die in the process; indeed, the same concern for innocent loss of life that made them mourn 9-11.
Blair never seemed to understand that. Because Bush described war and invasion as "liberation", we were supposed to accept this piece of Orwellian nonsense. The insult to the world's collective intelligence was simply too much and the vast reservoir of public sympathy generated by 9-11 was eventually totally drained.
It was a catastrophic miscalculation.
And now Blair shows how little he understands both the US, under George Bush, and the amount of distrust and revulsion that this war has generated.
Mr Blair defended his interventionist foreign policy but denied that events in Iraq would make it more difficult to win international action against countries such as Sudan over the crisis in Darfur.I don't know if he's being duplicitous here or if he's simply being dumb. None of us would have the slightest problem were the US to engage it's enormous capacity for good towards Darfur. Indeed, many of us are crying out for such a thing.
The problem is that the US, under George Bush, isn't talking about going into Darfur, all the noises they are making are against Iran and Syria.
Does Tony simply not get that? Our problem isn't that we dislike the US, nor even that we have some sort of knee jerk negative reaction against employing the military. Where we fundamentally disagree is in the CHOICES that are being made.
It was bad choices that lost the US the world's sympathy, and by highlighting Darfur, Blair is only casting a spotlight on where we should go next, whilst we all know that the present incumbents of the White House have their eyes firmly fixed elsewhere.
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