At 7:57 AM +0000 3/11/03, Chris Burford wrote:Blair's tactics towards public opinion seem to be almost masochistic
It makes sense that the Bush junta believed it's in their interest to invade Iraq, thought and still think that they can get away with it, and believe that they can't back down now without losing "credibility."
What doesn't make sense at all is Blair's devotion to the Bush project -- especially at this point when it's clear that it's the most unpopular war in history and he's facing revolts from his party and cabinet even. What's in it for Blair???
Without the UN SC mandate for the war, Blair has nothing to gain by going along with Bush and probably a lot to lose given UK public opinions, _even if_ the coalition of the willy-nilly manage to go to war without the UN and conquer all of Iraq relatively quickly.
--
Yoshie
Good question: my attempt at an answer.
In broad terms Blair's foreign policy is in fact consistent with British foreign policy for the last fifty years. It envies and dislikes the USA, but finds its best chance of punching above its weight is to be in alliance with the US.
Unlike the rest of Europe it has therefore kept armed forces that could just go to war in their own right, and could contribute alongside the US. Note it was surprising but significant that Britain sent the largest possible force it could to the Middle East in order to claim a significant role in the liberation of Iraq.
Tony Blair is extremely skilled in analysising all the factors in the balance of forces, subjective as well as objective, and then convincing himself so he can speak in tones of absolute sincerity that he is trying to do the best he can.
A couple of months ago he deliberately gave a public speech in front of all UK ambassadors, specially assembled for the occasion. His speech was as profound and analytical as anything they would hear in their own briefings and conversations, and most of them will be the elite of Oxbridge, as of course he is too.
His definition of the enemy in the world, was significantly subtly different to George Bush's at around the same time. Bush has defined the enemy as terrorism. Blair on the other hand defined the enemy as "chaos".
That is the signal that he is fully committed not to US hegemony, but to a different project that only temporarily coincides with US hegemony: it is world government. He is deeply committed to unprecedented interventionism. He and Gordon Brown, despite their personal friction are now actors on a world stage. The domestic audience is secondary to the task in their minds.
The agenda is ambitious and cogent. Blair tries to communicate it in human terms by candidly saying his main motive is fear: what he means is that in a globalised world, the sovereignty of nations will have to be ridden over. Although Elbaradei may be right that the document suggesting Iraq was trying to acquire nuclear material in the Ivory Coast was a forgery, Elbaradei is even more pertinent at the IAEA conference in Vienna at the moment, which is pointing out we need global inspections of radioactive material used routinely even in hospitals. The leaders of the world cannot tolerate fuzziness on this.
Iraq requires exemplary punishment to force all other states to cooperate actively with the new global governance. A more gradualist approach to regime change, which is how Europe managed the Soviet Bloc is out of the question for Blair and self evidently appropriate for Chirac.
In terms of chemistry and the pace of events, Blair almost certainly felt compassion for the US and Bush who appeared stunned after Sept 11 for a week. As the prime minister of a country used to dealing with terrorism he offered support, and also instinctively saw this as an opportunity to reshape world politics after all the difficulties from the start of Bush's presidency. The loss of Clinton was a big loss for Blair.
His role has been to steady Bush and guide him to win multi-lateralist support despite Bush's unilateralist prejudices. It is not being emphasised much now, but Blair signals it, that last year Bush was wanting to go to war with Iraq, and Blair was instrumental in delaying it.
I think Blair has now got caught up in the step by step logic of his own tactics, which have involved bridging the gap and taming the unilateralists. This has forced him to give commitments in turn. He pulled off a uninanimous 1441, despite unilateralist scepticism. But now he is caught up in the logic of disarmament by intimidation, and cannot discuss a further delay of six months, although it would suit the Brits very well.
Unfortunately for him the gap has got wider and wider. He can be careful not to wear a texan hat when he visits Bush on his ranch, but he cannot shut Bush up when Bush is addressing his domestic audience. These images repel Brits, when clipped for the UK media. We live in a globalised world, but the media in the UK is very different to that in the US. Partly because of New Labour's commitment to a deepening of civil society, and usually its skill in managing debate, and partly because the media has become the best opposition to the Labour government, we have a far far more searching media in the UK.
The media story is now coming through with arguments presented by people like Paul Krugman: Bush has been able to play the docile US media in such a way as to leave the impression in the minds of most Americans that Saddam is connected with Sept 11. Brits absolutely know that to be false.
There is also the level of the connection between the economic base and the superstructure. In technical terms Britain is an imperialist country, like Germany etc. But generations shift and Brits no longer expects to rule the waves. the "British public" will feel imperialist to the extent that it will back the army intervening and take a level of casualties as perfectly normal, because it would like to feel we are a bit important in the world. It now wants to do it for the United Nations, and has a very idealistic view of the United Nations. This imperialist ideology is subtly different but importantly from that of the open hegemonism of those in the USA who will support Bush over Iraq because "we are the biggest kids on the block" and it is our duty = our right.
So while in close strategic alliance with Bush, Blair has to endure the satire that he is love with the man or prays together with him. Blair has to present the arguments with an anguished show of sincerity in quite a different way.
Long term US unilaterialism will fail. Rumsfeld will probably get his attack on Iraq, but next time round there may not even be a coalition of the willing. It is already a coalition of the seriously embarrassed (Aznar is facing losses in the May local elections) Soon US unilaterialism will have no allies, except for when the United Nations can give a legal cover for any initiative.
Blair and Brown have the more serious global imperialist policy if you look at it over the next decade or two, even if neither of them are there then. "In the last instance production is the decisive factor". Their policy is more consistent with the objective needs of global finance capitalism.
For Blair this is his finest as well as his most dangerous hour. Blair has to hang himself out for crucifixion in order to win the moral right to contribute to thousands of deaths in Iraq. Whether that helps the British public to accept that he has a more complicated genuine moral argument than Bush and Rumsfeld, depends on how the war goes.
The best way I see it this morning.
Chris Burford London
