British newspapers have reported unease in Washington over the departure from No.10 Downing Street of Tony Blair and his replacement by Gordon Brown. In particular there was unease over some of the latter’s government appointments. A Pentagon source was quoted as saying there were “some conflicting signals”. This is healthy and as it should be. An important correction, long overdue in my view, is under way. The Conservative Party, the official opposition, made their correction first. When Iain Duncan Smith was the Conservative leader he became an obsequious supporter of President George Bush.
Early in 2006 William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, led a small team of senior shadow cabinet members to Washington. A keen supporter of the Atlantic alliance, he sensibly played the part of the candid friend. He told one audience his party would not sign up “to every dot and comma of US foreign policy.” He thought Britain’s role should be “solid but not slavish, firm but also fair, robust but clear-headed.”
He left the impression that he thought on occasions the way the United States had conducted its declared “war on terror” had undermined America’s “moral authority”.
On Sept. 11 last year David Cameron, the present Conservative leader, made his first major speech on foreign affairs.
In it he said: “We have never, until recently, been uncritical allies of America ... I worry that we have recently lost the art. I fear that if we continue as at present we may combine the maximum of exposure with the minimum of real influence over decisions. The sooner we rediscover the right balance the better for Britain and our alliance.”
Before taking over his luggage to No. 10 on June 27 Gordon Brown and his advisers would have been closely studying how his new Labour government should deal with President George Bush. They would certainly not have wanted the Conservatives to gain popular support by being seen to be more critical of the Bush administration than Labour.
Within the Labour Party for many years there has been a strong feeling that Tony Blair has been far too close to George Bush, and the extremely unpopular neoconservatives in Washington. Either Tony Blair has not pushed George Bush sufficiently firmly and effectively on big issues for the United Kingdom, or else George Bush has seen no reason to help him out. This summer President Bush runs a lame duck administration and few American presidents have built up such a record of failure at home and abroad.
Sir Jeremy Greenstock, now British ambassador in Baghdad, said recently:
“We have not been following our interests. We’ve been following a collective interest with the United States, in which the United States dominated. It’s time for a change.”
Gordon Brown’s new foreign secretary is the highly intelligent and ambitious David Miliband, who is only 42. His friends have been putting it about that he had doubts over the Iraq war from the start. Last summer he spoke out against Israel’s military action in Lebanon, and the United Kingdom’s most unwise support for it, within the Cabinet. He is respected for having a measured degree of independence in politics.
Americans have noted especially the appointment of Mark Mallock Brown to be a minister in the Foreign Office with responsibility for Africa, Asia and the United Nations. It was an imaginative appointment. Last June he said at a think tank seminar in New York that in the United States there was “too much unchecked UN-bashing and stereotyping over too many years”. As is well known this is the truth. John Bolton, the neoconservative absurdly selected to be the United States’ ambassador at the UN, flew off the handle and attached Mark Mallock Brown’s “condescending, patronizing tone about the American people.” Americans will also have had their attention drawn to the election of Harriet Harman to be the deputy leader of the Labour Party and her new job as leader of the House of Commons. I saw her on BBC TV agreeing that the Labour Party should apologize for supporting the invasion of Iraq.
It would be foolish to take these appointments as marking a massive switch in policy toward the United States by Gordon Brown. He is fascinated by America, its history and politics, and he and his family holiday there. But they certainly suggest a change of tone and a recognition of mistakes made. I like to think British-American relations are returning to their traditional basis after the misjudged Blair years.
