Brown faces domestic pressure over 'proxy war'

There has been inevitable outrage in Britain over the decision to send British troops to guard the Iraqi border with Iran and the risk that this runs of starting a proxy war between the UK and the government of Tehran.

Sir Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat leader, demanded an explanation from the Government over the controversial operation: "This is yet more evidence of the lack of a coherent strategy for the deployment of British troops in Iraq. It would be disastrous if we were drawn into some kind of proxy war with Iran.

"It would serve neither regional nor international interests and would put British lives at further risk," he added. "We have consistently called for the early withdrawal of British forces from Iraq as their presence is not helping establish the lasting peace the country so desperately needs."

Peter Kilfoyle, the former armed forces minister, called for a statement at the "earliest possible opportunity" from the Prime Minister or from Des Browne, the Defence Secretary.

He said: "This is alarming because it's a new role for our troops who already have a difficult peace-keeping role in Basra and could lead to a potential battle with the Iranians. Given the concerns over the Americans' intentions towards Iran, this is very worrying."

Gordon Brown is attempting to play his cards cleverly, by pulling British troops out of Basra Palace but, nevertheless, satisfying the Americans that he is serious about helping them by placing our troops at the Iranian border.

However, as most of us suspect that the US is looking for an excuse, any excuse, to attack Iran, Brown really couldn't have chosen a worse way to help the Americans from the viewpoint of his own domestic well being.

Britain was already used as a convenient fig leaf of international legitimacy before the Iraq invasion. Brown - by placing our troops at the Iranian border - runs the risk that we will, once again, be used by the US to justify yet another attack on yet another Middle Eastern country.

Brown has done very well since taking power to spell out that the British are independent of the US when it comes to this conflict and that British interest and the interests of the US are not always interchangeable.

He's made a boo-boo here and he's done so at a time when British ambassadors are going to great lengths to point out that the Iraq debacle has very little to do with British planners and everything to do with American incompetence.

In an interview with today's New Statesman, Britain's outgoing ambassador to Washington makes clear the Government's irritation with the lack of preparation by the White House for rebuilding Iraq after the removal of Saddam Hussein.

Sir David Manning said: "Was a key period mishandled and opportunities lost? Yes. I don't think anybody can see that the immediate post-war situation was anything other than a failure. We had hoped that rapidly the situation would stabilise, that it would be possible to introduce reconciliation, get the economy moving quickly and rebuild society. Did it happen quickly? No, we failed. We were over-optimistic, as we perhaps were after the collapse of the Soviet Union, about the powers of this place to regenerate itself."

He said himself and Tony Blair had a meeting with President Bush to express their misgivings and were assured that the State Department would take charge of rebuilding. Instead the job went to the Defence Department, headed by Donald Rumsfeld.

In this febrile atmosphere, Brown should not be placing British troops in the very position that the insane neo-cons would find them most useful for fomenting trouble between Tehran and the West.

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