EU Referendum

Showing posts with label foreign policy. Show all posts

afghan-war[i-afghan-war]An extraordinary op-ed by Mary Riddell in The Daily Telegraph today bears the headline: "Britain's on the wane, and the EU is our only hope of influence."

If this was just the vapourings of an airhead columnist, it could be dismissed but, unfortunately, it follows on from Miliband's speech yesterday, which said much the same thing. Look also to what Lord Heseltine is saying in The Times - the man whom is likely to join a Cameron administration – and there can be no doubt that Riddell's defeatist diatribe represents the received view of the political establishment.

Essentially, they have given up, sold the pass, and are ready to surrender our place in the international community as an active "player", handing over the initiative on foreign affairs to the EU, while our vassal administration deals only with internal matters. Decoded, these statements confirm our final retreat as a nation, the point where we formally cease to become an independent state and assume the role of a local authority, one province within the greater European empire.

As we pointed out yesterday, one of the defining attributes of an independent state is its control over its own foreign policy. For our establishment to sell the pass, whining about this once great country being "on the wane", and casting our lot in with "Europe" is indeed the final surrender, the acknowledgement that we are no longer an independent state.

That we should be doing this, without – it would seem – a squeak of protest from the media, or the opposition, demonstrates just how far the political process in this country has degraded. As we pointed out, in 1919, a country went to war to recover its control of foreign policy.

Those were the days when people understood the nature of statehood, and the real meaning of independence. Today, it slips from our grasp with the bulk of the population not even realising what has happened – or caring. But, whether they know or care, we are now a second-rate vassal state. We are a province of the European Empire, shortly – if the media has it right – to be ruled by the new Emperor Blair.

Thus, the EU will have achieved something neither Napoleon nor Hitler could achieve – the subjugation of the British Isles. And all without a shot being fired.

Nevertheless, the idea that, by surrendering our independence, we shall thus gain more "influence" is preposterous. The world is changing – as it always does – but the centre of power is moving away from its Eurocentric base, to the Pacific and Asia, where we see the economic dynamism and the potential for conflict that once typified Europe.

And, as the former major colonial power in the region, and the one with more troops on active duty there, other than the United States, we have in our own name, enormous influence. Furthermore, as that former colonial power, we have an institutional memory – one shared by states such as India and Pakistan – that gives us a unique status and capability.

The rest of the member states that comprise the EU are, by comparison, losers, incompetents and lightweights. None of them, as history so readily illustrates, have the capacity or understanding to become serious players in the region. We did not become "players" by accident. We had the temperament and the skills, inherent in our Anglo-Saxon heritage.

This is not unimportant. In fact, it is of vital interest. With our troops committed to Afghanistan, we are in the epicentre of a region on the brink of war. Serious commentators in both India and Pakistan are predicting that these two nations will be at war within two years. And two nuclear-armed nations at war is not a prospect any of us can regard lightly.

The EU's incompetence in this region, its lack of weight and gravitas, renders it a bit-player of very little consequence. Yet, just at the time when British skills and diplomacy are most needed, to head off a conflagration of appalling potential consequences – with knock-on effects of global proportions – we have sold our birthright to Brussels.

It sounds so melodramatic to say that we have been betrayed by our political classes. But that is exactly what has happened. We have been betrayed. But we betray ourselves by allowing it to happen – and by not caring. And there is a price to pay. The bill will shortly be presented. We will pay, most of us not even realising why.

COMMENT THREAD

William_Hague_pie[i-William_Hague_pie]William Hague, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, lives up to that rhyme again. Before the ending of this parliamentary session he will make a major speech about the changes in foreign policy we are likely to see when he is in place. He does make speeches once every year or so, none of them memorable and all rather vague on matters of reality.

He has given ConHome a taster of what he will say and answered a few questions. Three main changes are being promised:

First, we would create a fully fledged National Security Council, comprising all relevant senior ministers and chaired by the Prime Minister. This would be a decisive break from the sofa style decision making of the last twelve years, which has often led to decisions being made without all the necessary information being considered or understood. Second, we would be firmly opposed to the greater centralisation of power in EU institutions, which reduces democratic accountability in Britain. Third, we would give a greater emphasis than in recent years to the role of the Commonwealth, a unique network covering a quarter of the world's population. These are a few examples but I will be making a major speech defining our whole approach to foreign policy before Parliament rises for the summer recess.

Hmmm. Why do I feel underwhelmed by these ideas? Well, let us have a closer look at them.

Number one is not precisely a policy, more of an administrative arrangement. Creating a National Security Council for no particular reason that I can see is something any Prime Minister and any Foreign Secretary can do at any time without changing or even announcing policies. The two take decisions about foreign policy and whom they consult is entirely up to them.

What of number two? Another Conservative prevarication about the EU, I am afraid. Being “firmly opposed to the greater centralisation of power in EU institutions” is very nice, indeed, but what will they do? Policy implies some action or attempted action and some commitment to a course of those actions.

What will the Conservative government and its Foreign Secretary do to prevent further centralisation of power and what methods will they use to reverse that trend? That is the question Mr Hague ought to be answering; that is the problem he ought to be working on if he wants to be taken seriously as a real Foreign Secretary rather than just a man who will say anything that comes into his head.

Number three may resound with some Conservative core voters but ever fewer, I suspect. What on earth does he mean by giving "a greater emphasis than in recent years to the role of the Commonwealth"? Greater emphasis in what way?

Does he mean that the Commonwealth will put pressure on certain members, such as Zimbabwe to clean up their political act and actually succeed? Because if he believes that I have a very nice bridge I can sell him.

Does he mean some kind of preferential agreements? Apart from the sheer stupidity of that and the unlikelihood of Commonwealth countries changing their trading patterns to suit us (especially as those memories of Britain changing her patterns in the seventies still rankle), there is the minor problem that international trade is EU competence and has been since Britain's accession.

If he is thinking about a defence network then he had better remember that there is this little problem called the United States. At least two important Commonwealth countries, India and Australia, are now major regional powers and have their own agreements and arrangements with the United States. Their interests are in the Pacific Ocean and South-East Asia; their worry is China and its client state, North Korea; their view of the world has little to do with Britain or Europe. Are they really going to change all that and start tugging their forelocks to the British government? I think not.

Does this mean that our future Foreign Secretary really has no idea what foreign policy is or what is going on in the world? I am afraid the rest of the interview, which gives plenty of opportunity for Mr Hague to make rather hackneyed and extremely vague comments about slavery and NATO as well as show his misunderstanding of China merely confirm that. Can't wait for the speech itself.

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link[i-link]Ralph Peters in the New York Post lists the major mistakes the Obama Administration has committed since January 21, when he became President (and stepped down from his position as Messiah).

It makes disconcerting reading. Some of it is less serious than the rest. What the Castro brothers (assuming they are both alive) say is not really all that important except for the fact that "maltreatment" of Cuba has been a left-wing cry for many years. Though, oddly enough, not much is said about the maltreatment of Cuban dissidents by the Cuban government and police.

Russia is, indeed, preening again, but it is not clear how much of that is talk. Medvedev has, indeed, announced massive expenditure on rearmament but this is supposed to have been going on for years and not a whole lot has been achieved - the Russian military does not seem to be any better armed than it was before President Prime Minister Putin's time.

On the other hand, effectively telling the Russians that they can do anything they like in the old Soviet sphere is not particularly intelligent. With Georgia once again in turmoil, President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton may well find themselves with a serious problem in the Caucasus. With Russia's economy deteriorating and protests in the country mounting, a little war that could ignite nationalist feelings could appear to be just the ticket to the Russian leadership. Of course, little wars have a habit of turning into big ones and recent Russian history ought to be a warning. Let's face it, the Obama Administration is not going to be.

As for our allies, Obama apparently needs them less than Bush did. O treated Britain's prime minister like the deputy Paraguayan veterinary inspector, and he blindsided the leaders of the Czech Republic, Poland, Mexico and Canada on issues ranging from missile defense to trade. But he'd like them to take the Gitmo terrorists off our hands, please.

Well, that's OK. They won't take the Gitmo terrorists, being readier to scream abuse at the Americans than do anything themselves.

Interestingly, that list does not even mention Secretary of State Clinton's appalling speech in the European Parliament that ought to have warned our own eurosceptic Obama supporters but apparently did not.

The Western alliance is in the very best of hands.

COMMENT THREAD

Clinton_Lavrov[i-Clinton_Lavrov]We seem to have a Secretary of State who is incapable of getting anything right as I do not consider being praised by Hans-Gert Pöttering for sounding "European", which does not mean that she sounded like somebody from a European country, getting it right. Incidentally, though the boss thinks that "this stuff is beyond fisking", I intend to write a bit more later on about Hillary's trip to the European Union.

In the meantime, Glenn Reynolds rounds up several references to a completely cuckoo decision on what sort of a gift to take to the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov. It would appear that Madame Secretary of State gave Mr Lavrov

a present meant to symbolize the Obama administration's vow to "press the reset button" on US-Russia relations.

She handed a palm-sized box wrapped with a bow. Lavrov opened it andpulled out the gift: a red button on a black base with a Russian word peregruzka printed on top.

Oh help! This from an Administration that boasted of being more knowledgeable and professional in its dealings with the rest of the world.

In the first place, as others have pointed out, giving the Russians a button to push does not exactly send the right signal. Here, why don't you press this red button and see what happens. We might talk later on but, then again, this might just be IT.

Secondly, as Mr Lavrov explained in some bemusement, that is the wrong word. Перегрузка does not mean reset. It means overload. Is there nobody in the State Department who knows elementary Russian? Or did they do this on purpose to embarrass the Secretary of State? (After all, somebody must have told her that American democracy, which is, in fact, the wrong expression as the country is a constitutional republic, is older than European, whatever that might mean.)

And to think we complained about Condoleezza Rice! Well, that just goes to show. It can always get worse.

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Tony_Blair[i-Tony_Blair]Given that there is very little time left for the Bush presidency to make a significant mark on world affairs, given that President-Elect Obama seems to be strangely silent on the Gazan situation (voting "present" perchance) and given Secretary of State Rice's complete inability to understand what goes on in the Middle East, I thought that the United States abstaining on UN Resolution 1860, which was always going to be disregarded by Hamas and is, consequently, disregarded by Israel was as good as we could get.

It seems that the outgoing Secretary of State wanted to support the rather fatuous British proposal but was overruled by the President. So she abstained, explaining that the United States wanted to make sure that the Egyptian proposal (hey, what happened to the French bit of it?) would have a good chance of going through.

John Bolton does not think much of this. If the United States wanted to give the Egyptian proposal, which, incidentally concentrates on Fatah as the negotiating partner, not Hamas, a reasonable chance, there should have been a veto with that explanation. France and Britain, he thinks would have gone along with that, albeit with gritted teeth. As it is, America voted "present", as we know the favoured stand of the President-Elect.

John Bolton, rather gloomily, sees this as the precursor of many similar abstentions. He may well be right, though it is also fair to say that we still know nothing about the next President's views or attitudes as far as foreign policy is concerned. He said a number of contradictory things during the campaign, many of which were rather frightening. Then he appointed Hillary Clinton, whose foreign policy expertise he contemptuously decried. Now he is keeping quiet though he is making plenty of pronouncements about more bail-out and yet more bail-out.

It is, however, fair to say that the present Gaza conflict (I doubt if it will be the last but you never know) has claimed a number of collateral casualties and one of them is Secretary of State Rice's reputation - or what was left of it.

When Condi Rice became Secretary of State (black and female, actually a descendant of slaves who grew up in the segregationist and KKK infested south but hey, the earth did not move) I had high hopes, which were based on her professional achievements. Sadly, she, too, fell victim to the State Department's mentality and disappointed many of us.

It was not only her cack-handed and fliberty-gibberty attitude to the Middle Eastern situation that were such a problem, although how anyone with a spark of intelligence could compare a fence put up to protect innocent civilians from suicide/homicide bombers with the segregation of her childhood Alabama remains incomprehensible. Luckily, President Bush stepped in from time to time and prevented her from making too much of a mess.

But Dr Rice's speciality is Russia, the Soviet Union and related matters. Yet she seemed unable to grasp what is going on in that country either. Possibly, those who briefed her from the State Department got it all wrong. Wouldn't be the first time. Then again, I don't suppose her successor will be any better. But I should like to register my disappointment.

Today's Wall Street Journal, however, brings us news of a reputation that has been completely ruined by the Gaza conflict, according to the author Alistair MacDonald.

As the death toll in Gaza mounts, the conflict is causing some collateral damage in an unforeseen area: the reputation of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair as an international statesman.

During his 10 years as Britain's prime minister, Mr. Blair played a prominent role in events ranging from the Northern Ireland peace process to the Iraq war. Now, though, as Middle East envoy for the Quartet group of the United Nations, the US, the European Union and Russia, he is finding himself marginalized while another European statesman, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, garners the headlines as a joint sponsor with Egypt of a cease-fire proposal.

Alistair MacDonald was appointed last year as the Wall Street Journal's UK politics, economics and European financial regulation correspondent. We shall see a lot of him and his articles, I assume. If this is a fair sample, the prospect does not fill me with joy.

First things first. One can argue about Condi Rice's reputation but Tony Blair's? He certainly spent a lot of time racing round the world, talking to all sorts of people - but an international statesman? On what grounds?

Yes, yes, I know he is about to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom together with former Australian Prime Minister John Howard and Colombian President Álvaro Uribe but that still does not make him an international or any other kind of statesman.

Mr Blair certainly played a prominent role in the Northern Ireland peace process but that, for Mr MacDonald's information, is not an international matter. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, of which Mr Blair was Prime Minister for ten long years. (My goodness, if this is the calibre of the people hired and/or promoted by the WSJ in the Murdoch empire, I shall have to give up on that newspaper as well.)

In any case, the situation in Northern Ireland where different terrorist-turned-into-criminal gangs control bits of territory is not much to the man's credit.

Tony Blair played a prominent role in the Iraq war and many Americans from President Bush down felt grateful to him. I think that he was right to line up with our greatest ally but his argument for the need to do so was so ridiculously cack-handed (I am beginning to like that expression) that we have done nothing but argue about files and their appearance instead of concentrating on the important issues: is participation in this war in Britain's interest and are we going about it the right way.

The first question was not aired even once, as the words Britain and interest do not figure high in Mr Blair's scheme of life. The second, as we all know from my colleague's meticulous research can have only one answer: absolutely not and, furthermore, we are refusing to learn from our mistakes.

What of Mr Blair as the Middle East envoy with somewhat nebulous tasks and no powers?

Mr. Blair, charged with developing the economies of the West Bank and Gaza, has faced an uphill battle since his appointment in June 2007. Because of security concerns, he hasn't visited Gaza but has focused on negotiating with Israeli and West Bank officials on issues such as removing roadblocks in the Palestinian territories. Meanwhile, the economies of the territories have declined, leading many to question his effectiveness.

I expect they did and Mr MacDonald quotes at least one "moderate" Palestinian politician who says just that, wording it slightly differently. (How does one get a job like Mr MacDonald's?)

The truth is that if Hamas was not prepared to or could not guarantee Mr Blair's safety then there was no point in taking on the envoyship. Roadblocks are an issue but a bigger one is the internal situation in Gaza and the West Bank, affectionately known as Hamastan and Fatahland, future parts of the coming three-state solution.

Economic development comes from within a country or a society with, naturally enough, links to the outside world. Either Mr Blair does not understand this, in which case he is the wrong person to appoint or he does understand this but does not bother to think beyond today. The latter tended to be his attitude during his premiership, so I am inclined that he jumped into this without bothering to consider the consequences.

Nicolas_Sarkozy+02[i-Nicolas_Sarkozy+02]As for President Sarkozy, who is so reluctant to relinquish his role as representative of the European Union and go back to solving the problems his own country is facing, it is not entirely clear whether his reputation will not be part of the same collateral damage.

At present he is managing to annoy the Czechs, who feel that they are the ones to conduct negotiations, as they have taken over the EU presidency. This is causing a certain amount of amusement.

Nicolas Sarkozy is a small man, about an inch shorter than Napoleon, with an ego as large as an empire. He also travels the world with a famous wife and a penchant for inserting himself into the center of international crises.

The most recent is the Israeli-Hamas conflict in Gaza, where the peripatetic French president, uninvited by the participants, shuttled between Jerusalem; the West Bank town of Ramallah; Beirut, Lebanon; Damascus; and Sharm al-Shaykh, the Egyptian resort on the Red Sea; attempting to negotiate a cease-fire.

In fact, the cease-fire is now referred to as the Egyptian plan with the French part of it conveniently overlooked. Egypt is, apparently, trying to push Hamas into accepting a truce and the government is not happy with the Hamas leadership. Turkey is also mediating and seems to feel the same way. Hamas is, naturally enough, worried that a truce or a longer-lasting peace will sideline or completely destroy them.

Where is all this is the perpetually moving President Nicolas Sarkozy? Or the EU for that matter? Sigh. Another casualty of collateral damage.

COMMENT THREAD

Obama+01[i-Obama+01]Though the American media and blogosphere on the left seems to be taken up with dishing dirt - some relevant, most not so - about Sarah Barracuda, with the occasional irruption of fingernail-gnawing comments of what an utterly bad choice she was and how this will give the Dems the election, other matters do turn up as well, though mostly on the other side of the spectrum.

Oh, before I leave the subject of Governor Palin, here is an interesting reading of the situation by the highly regarded "maverick" blogger Spengler.

On to what really matters and that is what to do about Russia (and if there is one politician who knows about that country, it is the Governor of Alaska). John O'Sullivan produces a jeu d'esprit in the New York Post in which he envisages that famous 3 a.m. phone call for President Obama but as he says the situation would be much the same for President McCain, though he is unlikely to be quite so wimpish. Also, I don't think President Obama will make Hillary Clinton his Secretary of State. But as to what the Europeans might do if there is another crisis, the description is fairly accurate.

"Maybe the Germans can lean on them," mused the president, remembering his warm reception in Berlin.

"Germany won't agree to using force without a UN resolution. It's a constitutional thing with them," chimed in the secretary of state.

"I'm not talking force, Hillary," replied the president. "That's Bush-think. No, we have to respond with diplomacy and, as a last resort, sanctions."

"Maybe the Germans can impose oil and gas sanctions on Russia," said Mrs. Clinton sweetly. "Sit in the dark and warm themselves by burning the money they've saved until the Kremlin crumbles."

"Well, there's a united Europe today," replied the president, brightening. "Sanctions by the whole European Union would worry the Russians. Aren't they a possibility?"

"We'll know for sure in two weeks, sir, when the European Summit meets to discuss the crisis. But the signs aren't good. Poland and the Baltic states want a strong response, but they lack the clout of Germany and France. I'd say a moderately worded rebuke to Moscow is the best we can hope for."

Mr O'Sullivan's conclusion is entirely predictable and is obviously correct, since it is completely in line with what this blog has been saying for some time.

Multilateral forces can work only if there is a clear agreement of what the purpose is and who provides those forces. The European Union, on the other hand, without managing to provide an alternative by way of power, soft or hard, has an entirely negative effect on Western ability to deal with crises:

If the next US president wants effective multilateralism, he must re-establish NATO as the sole supplier of European security. Otherwise, when the phone rings, he'll have one rival to call instead of 25 allies.

There is, presumably, the possibility of re-creating NATO in a completely different form, which would leave out a number of West European countries.

One of the editorials in today's Wall Street Journal is also on the EU's inability to deal with the situation created by President Medvedev's refusal to live up to any of the agreements, supposedly sealed, signed and delviered by President Sarkozy, whose country holds the rotating presidency.

"Stop! Or we'll say stop again!" just about sums up the outcome of Monday's grand summit, whether it is the comedian Robin Williams's line or not.

We are glad to see that the newspaper is not falling for Sarkozy's bully tactics with which he tries to masquerade his own incompetence:

Mr. Sarkozy also insisted that his efforts to reach a cease-fire had borne fruit. The Georgians might disagree. Russia has used the agreement's vague language to justify a continued presence in Georgia far beyond the original conflict zone. The cease-fire called for international talks about the separatist regions, but that didn't stop Mr. Medvedev from recognizing their independence.

The most cynical comment of the day was Mr. Sarkozy's attempt to use the conflict to bully the Irish over their rejection of the EU's Lisbon Treaty in June. "This crisis has shown that Europe needs to have strong and stable institutions" like those it would have gotten under Lisbon, Mr. Sarkozy said.

No, what Europe needs is political will. Rather than scolding Irish voters, Mr. Sarkozy would do better to name and shame those member states whose desire to curry favor with Moscow keeps the EU from taking a firmer stand.

The one problem is that the Wall Street Journal still considers that Europe and the European Union are one and the same, thus assuming that "Europe" can have such a thing as political will.

Obama[i-Obama]Setting aside the hysteria and stupidity of some of the comments, we ought to be happy about Obama's better than mediocre performance in Berlin last night. However, questions arise. Why Berlin? Germany is not the USA's closest ally and not on the front-line of any fight that the West might be waging.

It was during the Berlin airlift that Senator Obama quoted without any reference to President Truman; it was when President Kennedy (not mentioned by Senator Obama) made his famous speech; it was when President Reagan (not mentioned by Senator Obama though he referred to the fall of the Berlin Wall) made his famous comment to President Gorbachev. But now? Hardly.

The frontline in Baghdad and there Senator Obama spoke less than fighting words, as the Wall Street Journal points out, and that is not particularly reassuring. The other developing frontline against the closest of the anti-Western authoritarian states is Eastern Europe, where the countries are, by and large, America's friends and allies. Senator Obama should have gone to Poland where they could have shown him the site of Auschwitz and he could have made his speech there, including the tale of his uncle liberating the camp.

Furthermore, when it comes to the crunch all those hysterical groupies are unlikely to be pro-American even if Senator Obama becomes President Obama. And there is the problem of the European Union and the evolving common foreign policy, which cuts across any ideas of a Western alliance. Given the poor knowledge Senator Obama and his campaign have displayed of foreign lands, it is unlikely that they have heard of this particular problem. They'll learn.

POL+-+BroCam[i-POL+-+BroCam]Some of our readers would have realized that there is yet another new kid on the block of political magazines. Total Politics is a political magazines for politicians, wannabe politicians and all those who surround them. Very nicely produced it is, too.

Its one great fault is that it does not seem to want to publish an article I lovingly crafted for it on the subject we have raised once or twice on this blog: neither Prime Minister Brown nor Opposition Leader Cameron do "foreign". In other words, neither of the leading parties has any notion of a foreign policy. I think that is an important problem and I wrote about it. For one reason or another the piece will not be published though there might be a very different article by yours truly some time later in the year.

Meanwhile, waste not want not. Here is the article that did not get into Total Politics on EUReferendum2.

Malloc_Brown_Soros[i-Malloc_Brown_Soros]The Spectator has an interesting piece on our favourite Minister of State, Lord Malloch-Brown, former interference runner for SecGen Kofi Annan and former member of the “Soros axis of evil”, as the Wall Street Journal described it. At least, we hope he is former.

As it happens we have mentioned before that the man was going to get a grace-and-favour apartment on becoming a member of Gordon Brown’s government as well as pointing out that all this happened because the new Prime Minister has absolutely no idea of foreign policy or, indeed, where foreign is.

Still, it is very nice to have his lordship’s past career, relationship with George Soros, chief funder of the European Council on Foreign Relations, curiously enough, not mentioned in the Speccy article, as well as the expenses of his new residence laid out in a clear and easy to follow fashion.

The CV of Brown’s most senior outside appointment reads like that of a hair-shirted technocrat: a vice-president of World Bank, head of UNDP, chief of staff and then deputy secretary-general of the United Nations and now Minister for Africa, Asia and the UN. His entry in the Lords register of interests is spartan; he declares only his government salary, which is £81,504.

But Malloch Brown’s living arrangements in this country are exceedingly grand, and provided by the taxpayer. Only three members of the government have grace-and-favour residences in London. Malloch Brown is one of them, the other two are the Prime Minister and the Chancellor. David Miliband and his growing family have yet to use 1 Carlton Gardens, the Foreign Secretary’s London residence.

Yet Malloch Brown, astonishingly, has secured one of the three government flats in Admiralty House, where John Prescott used to live. In so doing, this newcomer has leapfrogged 20 full members of the Cabinet who notionally enjoy seniority over him. The oddness of the situation is compounded by the fact that the other two flats in the building are empty, and another government grace-and-favour residence in South Eaton Place, SW1, is being sold off. In response to The Spectator’s investigation Eric Pickles, a member of the shadow Cabinet, has laid down a series of parliamentary questions in an attempt to find out how much Malloch Brown’s living arrangements are costing the Foreign Office.

Malloch Brown’s return from abroad is given as the explanation for him receiving a grace-and-favour flat. Others hint that he secured it because he has four children under 16. If so, Ruth Kelly — with four pre-teen children — should surely have had first pick.

The Treasury’s National Assets Register values the Admiralty House accommodation at £7.76 million and as worth more than the flats above No. 10 and 11 Downing Street. It is, indeed, fit for a Lord, and one with tastes which are the opposite of frugal. A parliamentary answer earlier this autumn revealed that ‘the floor area of the ministerial residences in Admiralty House is 859 square metres.’ In 2006–07 the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office paid the Cabinet Office no less than £173,000 for John Prescott’s living in one of the flats there.

I guess housing in London is quite expensive but I do find it rather difficult to believe that the salary Lord Malloch-Brown is receiving together with expenses and very much together with the savings he must have made while inhabiting George Soros’s palatial residence for peppercorn rent cannot allow him to buy or rent a hovel somewhere in Westminster.

That brings us to the question as to why this man of dubious qualifications but impeccable tranzi background should have managed to negotiate quite such a good deal for himself.

There have been various theories advanced, not least the one about PM Gordon Brown wanting to ingratiate himself with the tranzi world and distance himself from the United States. That may be so (some evidence of the latter has been made clear recently as I shall explain) but we tend to agree with the authors of the Speccy article, one of whom is the estimable Claudia Rossett. Gordon Brown has no knowledge of or interest in foreign policy.

Meanwhile foreign affairs have been marching on. We discussed yesterday developments in Turkey and the fact that Prime Minister Erdogan has met President Bush to discuss various matters of importance to both sides.

The Los Angeles Times added to its report on the US-Turkish negotiations:

With his tete-a-tete with Erdogan, Bush began a week of diplomatic conferences focused on some of Washington's most important relationships. He will host French President Nicolas Sarkozy for dinner today and for official talks Wednesday. At the end of the week, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her husband will stay with the president and Laura Bush at their home outside Crawford, Texas.

Very nice, too, but isn’t there a name missing? Turkey, France, Germany. Where is Britain? Is there a meeting planned with Gordon Brown at some later stage? Or have the Americans finally decided they had enough of the British politicians’ complacency and arrogance? Or does Gordon Brown not want to meet President Bush? To be absolutely accurate one would have to ask: does Gordon Brown not want to meet any of the leaders of other countries?

sarkozy-bush[i-sarkozy-bush]Where is David Miliband, come to think of it? We all sympathize with him adopting another child and wish the family well. But he does have an important job to do for which he gets paid rather handsomely by the taxpayer.

I must say I am rather disappointed by Miliband. The man seemed to start quite well but has fallen off recently. Must try harder.

So, what have we got out of the Sarkozy’s second visit to Washington DC (this time, one must assume without Mme S.)? Not a whole lot, according to the Daily Telegraph leader and one is inclined to agree with them.

He addressed Congress and talked much of Lafayette and Washington (old general L. does get trotted out by the French periodically, though it was, actually, the French navy that helped the Americans most), 1917, 1944, Marshall Plan, Berlin airlift (hmm, minimal French involvement in that). All jolly nice and very different from l’escroc Chirac, who had selective deafness when it came to hearing historical facts.

But on top of these familiar historical references, the French president lauded the "can-do" spirit of America, whether expressed through stars such as Elvis Presley or Marilyn Monroe or through the moon landing of 1969. America's moral value consisted in its "extraordinary ability to grant people another chance"; it was a country where "failure is never the last word", where nothing is owed but everything has to be earned.

Such verbal flourishes were, inevitably, somewhat punctured by Mr Sarkozy's analysis of current problems. He spoke of standing shoulder to shoulder in Afghanistan, without mentioning that French troops are not engaged in combat operations. He made no reference to Iraq. His determination to prevent Iran acquiring nuclear weapons did not envisage military action. And his belief that the way towards French re-integration into Nato's military command is through strengthening the European Union's defence capability failed to convince.

All of which is true. But, as the article grudgingly acknowledges, rhetoric does matter, though practical involvement would matter more. For all of that, given Britain’s gradual withdrawal in Basra as chronicled by my colleague in too many postings to refer to, a little bit of rhetoric on our own Prime Minister’s part would not come amiss.

Perhaps, a reminder that Britain and America do have a great deal in common historically and politically speaking, as well as many differences or a casual reference to the Anglosphere, whose other members also have much in common with this country could give us some idea that Gordon Brown does, indeed, know something about the world.

SMerkel_Bush[i-Merkel_Bush]adly, it will be Chancellor Merkel who will be going to the US next, hoping, as the German journalists put it, to influence President Bush not to upset the Iranians or think about doing anything about their nuclear capability.

It seems unlikely that she will succeed. President Bush has a track record of seemingly agreeing with his European “instructors” and then doing exactly what he thinks is right. Remember the much-vaunted Merkel victory over climate change? When the dust settled (well, there is rather a lot of it what with global warming and all) it became obvious that the agreement was really along the lines the United States had advocated for some time.

We predict that Chancellor Merkel and her husband will come back, basking in the success of her mission, only to find that she had been once again diddled by the “Texas cowboy”.

All of which brings me back to my first question: where, in all this, is the British Prime Minister.

COMMENT THREAD

mugabe4[i-mugabe4]Gordon Brown seems intent on breaking with his colleagues in the European Union over one particular issue and no, it is not the Council mandate aka Constitution Mark II. It is, however an important issue if the European claim to the moral high ground is to be taken at all seriously.

It seems that our new Prime Minister has made it clear that he will not attend the EU - Africa Summit in December if President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe is there. As we mentioned (0nce or twice) before, the Portuguese Presidency, intent on strengthening those EU - Africa relations though not on thinking a lot more clearly as to whether the EU's aid and trade policies are at all useful to that benighted continent, has agreed to invite President Mugabe to the Summit because a number of other African statesmen (if that is the right word), led by President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, refused to attend unless the invitation goes out. It seems that agreed EU rules about ban on visas are less important than threats of non-attendance by African leaders.

Mr Brown has now announced that he is staying on the moral high ground and will definitely stay away from the Summit should President Mugabe be there. Of course, the obvious answer to the threat by President Mbeki and others ought to have been: "oh fine, well then sadly we shall have to do without the Summit and you will have to do without your goodies".

According to the same report, pressure is being put on the Harare government to send some senior official in December. With Mugabe's absence everybody's face will be saved.

Strictly speaking that ought not to make any difference, as senior officials are almost as guilty as politicians of the horror that Zimbabwe has become. It is also questionable whether Mugabe himself will go along with this notion or announce that it is all an imperialist plot and insist on showing up at the Summit.

Will Gordon Brown walk out? And what will Lord Malloch Brown say about such behaviour? He already has a good deal on his hands what with questions being asked (all too quietly, I am afraid) of his links with the Soros empire and that whippersnapper David Milliband repudiating the wise eminence's rather self-satisfied words.

COMMENT THREAD

David+Miliband[i-David+Miliband]Whenever people are asked to produce an example of an oxymoron, that is a word or a phrase that has an inbuilt contradiction, the term “military intelligence” is trotted out. It seems to me that political intelligence is another such term.

Take the example of our new Foreign Secretary, David Miliband. Undoubtedly, the man is highly intelligent, possibly more so than any of his colleagues. He is also very young with next to no experience even in politics, never mind the real world. On the other hand, he is one who imbibed politics with his mother’s milk. So, it should balance out. But does it?

His interview with the Financial Times indicates otherwise. After we get through the golly-gosh-isn’t-it-all-so-exciting we run into problems. To be fair to the man, he, unlike his present and past bosses, feels the historical significance of his job and his office. Well, he would, wouldn’t he? I expect he recited names of past political leaders as a wee child. (I know about families like that, believe me.)

So what is the future for Britain’s foreign policy? It will be a global hub, according to the Foreign Secretary. That means what, precisely?

I think we’ve got the opportunity to be a global hub, is the way I’d put it. We’ve got the opportunity to be a global hub economically, and you can see that demonstrated through the City of London, but you can also see it through even this week’s inward investment report.

We have the opportunity to be a global hub culturally. And of course the British Council is funded in part from here. And we can be a hub politically as well, and I think that’s important. But I think that it’s very, very important that we don’t…in the end, it’s about delivery, and so I think rather than putting grandiose titles on our impact on fate, it’s better to do big things rather than say you’re going to do big things, or be part of important things. So, that’s what I would say.

And, of course, we can be a global hub as far as motherhood and apple pie are concerned, particularly if we use organic milk for the custard.

Actually, to be fair to the man, he was waffling because the questions were not particularly searching, though the Financial Times in its article on the interview managed to ask the rather loaded question of how confident can Britain be after the Iraqi debacle. But who actually says it is a debacle apart from the various media outlets who have convinced themselves on not very good evidence and are trying to convince the rest of us?

If Miliband is to be believed, there will be no hasty withdrawal from Iraq and the war in Afghanistan will be fought to victory. These are reassuring words for those of us who dread the effect of a “cut and run” policy in either country.

As far as Israel and the two Palestinian states are concerned (though the interviewer did not seem all that interested in Fatahland) Miliband reiterated previous policies: the need for Hamas to recognize Israel’s right to exist has not been altered in any way by the release of Alan Johnston as, of course, anyone but the media would recognize.

The release of one man does not show that things are going smoothly in Gaza or that Hamas has eschewed violent and tyrannical behaviour. Ah but this is a British journalist and they are central to our calculations.

Of course, the biggest question in foreign policy will be how exactly does Gordon Brown intend to deal with Blair’s impossible legacy of trying to straddle ever greater European integration and American alliance.

On the evidence of this interview, Miliband has not exactly worked matters out but one can see which way he is heading. There is, of course, no mention of the rest of the Anglosphere except for a rather spurious reference to alliance with India. There is only the United States and the European Union.

Here, sadly, Miliband shows himself to be too intelligent for political life. He actually lets the cat out of the bag:

All I wanted to say about Europe is that I’ve been convinced for years that the greatest challenge facing the European Union is about delivery rather than about internal democracy; that the root to respect in European hearts is through delivery, that it’s the delivery deficit rather than the democratic deficit that should be the focus of our attention.

And I think now, with the forthcoming IGC, with the mandate that was produced at the European council, we have a unique opportunity for the European Union to get beyond the institutional questions and the institutional debates that flummox and infuriate and bore ordinary members, you know, real people, and get on to the things that could excite them whether it be energy security or climate security or jobs. And I think we’ve got a real responsibility as well as an opportunity to seize that opportunity.

And that will be the focus and the drive of our engagement with European partners and I think a real opportunity. My sense around Europe is that that’s what foreign ministers and environment ministers and prime ministers want to get on with.

As far as foreign policy goes, though, where is Britain situated? Well, according to our Foreign Secretary, our alliance with the United States is enormously important but our link with Europe is even more so. And, as he clearly explains, our relationship with the European Union is not bilateral. We are part of it.

This is precisely what we have been saying on this blog for a very long time. The question is what are we going to do about it.

COMMENT THREAD

Alex+Salmond[i-Alex+Salmond]Hurrah! The world's problems are about to be sorted: peace will descend upon the Middle East, Hamastan and Fatahland will become friends, they will all stop attacking Israel and recognize its existence (or maybe not), Iran will become a liberal democratic state and eschew its nuclear programme on the grounds that it has a huge amount of oil that it is not, at the moment, capable of extracting or processing. And North Korea? Well, they will abandon all attempts to challenge the world and sign a genuine peace treaty with South Korea that will involve Kim Jong-il and his friends and relations being tried for crimes against humanity.

How do I know all this? Simple. According to this morning's Scotsman

Alex Salmond issued a clear challenge to Westminster yesterday as he declared Scotland would play a bigger role on the world stage under his leadership.

In his first foreign relations speech since becoming First Minister, Mr Salmond said he wanted Scotland to become a more powerful player than it has been for generations.

He was speaking in Northern Ireland where he signed an agreement with First Minister Ian Paisley and Second Minister Martin McGuinness

pledging the support of both governments to work together to try to secure better deals from the Westminster government on tourism, higher education, transport and the pursuit of a cut in corporation tax. They intend to involve the Welsh administration once the shape of that organisation becomes clear.

This, apparently, is the beginning of Scotland and Northern Ireland becoming a force or, maybe, two forces in the world: asking for more money from the poor benighted English taxpayer. It is at times like this that I begin to appreciate the arguments in favour of an English parliament, though I remain at heart a Unionist.

Anyway, so far Alex Salmond, temporary leader of the Scottish Assembly (his share of the vote is considerably less than overwhelming) has not said anything of any interest on his ideas for foreign policy, beyond pointing out that the Nordic countries have an alliance and it has a certain clout in the world. Of course, the Nordic countries pay for their own alliances and diplomatic services.

One assumes that is at the heart of this and subsequent statements. Scotland wants its own diplomatic service and its own negotiators. Who will pay for this? Need you ask?

Mr Salmond accused Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, of ignoring Scotland by signing a memorandum of understanding with Libya on prisoner transfer and his ministers have started talks with London counterparts in a bid to secure more power and money from Westminster.

The curious aspect of all this is that ever since devolution Scotland, in the past a country whose eyes were on the world, has become considerably more inward looking and parochial. The Scotsman is a case in point. It used to be a newspaper that wrote about many matters in the United Kingdom and outside it. Most of its headlines now have to do with Scotland. Not even the rest of the country.

COMMENT THREAD

George Soros, the billionaire, spent $27.5 million in 2004 to try to defeat George W. Bush. Clearly, the man is a huge success in political terms. He is now pouring money into Barack Obama's campaign. If I were Obama and his advisers I'd feel a little worried.

Soros also funds other organizations like MoveOn.org, dedicated to the overthrow of the, in their minds, illegitimate Bush administration and American hegemony, while they are at it, and Human Rights Watch, whose purpose appears to be to write anti-American and anti-Israeli reports. His activities in the former Communist countries are separate and have, actually, produced useful results, where he has not been thrown out.

Clearly, the man has decided that he cannot win in the United States - money does not necessarily buy political power in a democracy. So, he has turned to Europe (whatever that might mean to him) and announced that he will set up a European Council on Foreign Relations. He announced this, yesterday at a conference in Oxford and added:

Europe has to be interested in recreating what used to be called the West, based on the principles of international cooperation. Out of this idea came the idea of founding a European Council on Foreign Relations.

Well, that's nice. Is this the equivalent of the one telephone number that Henry Kissinger used to long for?

After all, it is not clear where the Council will be set up and whom it is going to advise in the way the original one advises the State Department or other parts of the American government (usually rather badly). So, is the European Council going to be in Brussels, advising Javier Solana and the incipient EU diplomatic corps? Or is it going to compete with the German Council on Foreign Relations or our own Chatham House or Foreign Policy Centre?

Answer seems there to be none but one thing has emerged immediately - this will be a sinecure for Professor Tim Garton Ash, who is advising Soros on the project. What does Professor Garton Ash say?

"Our resources are similar to the United States, but we punch pathetically below our weight," Timothy Garton Ash, a professor of European Studies at Oxford University who is helping Mr. Soros with the plans, said in an interview. "The idea is to contribute a European voice. It's still in the making."

Who is this "we" one wonders.

According to Bloomberg:

Garton Ash said that the new institute would concern itself with global inequality and climate change. Soros said that integrating China into international institutions was a reason why the group would be needed.

Why he thinks that Europeans are going to decide what China does or does not do remains a mystery. But that's the problem with all these "internationalists" - they rarely know what goes on outside their own backyard.

COMMENT THREAD

link[i-link]Let us not forget that one reason of the fifty listed by the Independent last month for liking and supporting the European Union was its ability to unite and put pressure on bloodthirsty thugs like Robert Mugabe. Well, if not exactly put pressure, at least prevent them and their best friends and relations from visiting European countries.

As we have seen, this does not always work out, what with people not giving their full names when asking for visas and what not. The question of Mugabe himself coming to Europe has come up again.

A report by Africast says that the Portuguese Foreign Minister, Luis Amado, is muttering that the EU is determined that there will be an EU-Africa Summit in Lisbon in December and if that means asking Mugabe, so be it. He will be asked, given visa and welcomed, undoubtedly with all pomp and circumstance.

The EU, according to this, wants to carry on bilaterally with Zimbabwe in order to exert pressure (can’t see why they should bother as they have been so totally unsuccessful) but, as it has been made clear by Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the South African Foreign Minister, that there can be no summit without Zimbabwe’s participation, the EU will have to swallow its objections.

Incidentally, recent rumours in various publications that the South African government was about to put some pressure on Mugabe or try to replace him by someone else, have clearly not corresponded to anything resembling reality.

The report is quite helpful in explaining the difference between bilateral and multilateral negotiations:

This issue in some ways illuminates two contrasting approaches to analyzing Africa’s problems: the one identifies internal causes as paramount; the other, external causes.

Usually, as here, bilateral approaches stress internal causes while multilateral approaches stress external causes.

The EU prefers, as a matter almost of principle, multilateral approaches, though, to be fair, those could stress internal causes a bit more with all African countries, especially Zimbabwe. Incidentally, according to a report in the Daily Telegraph, Robert Mugabe has proclaimed joyfully that he has managed to beat off another attempt by Tony Blair to turn Zimbabwe back into a British colony. The reaction of his audience (after the tumultuous applause died down) is not recorded.

Why is it so important to hold this summit, apart from the EU’s need to show that it does have a common foreign policy towards other parts of the world?

One of the main strategic concerns that is now motivating the EU towards holding this summit is the flood of illegal African migrants to Europe in the last few years and the eruption of rioting among African immigrant communities already in Europe.

Amado said the EU and AU were already working on a joint strategy to be ratified at the summit that would include a tripartite approach to the migration problem.

This would be: increased security to address illegal immigration; better integration of legal migrants; and more and better development aid in Africa (to reduce the push factor, presumably).

This does not sound very promising to me. Given the security situation across most of Africa the first one seems all but impossible, unless a huge security fence is built round the European Union, including its sea-shores. It would dwarf the Israeli security fence, so much disliked by the transnational great and the good.

Better integration of legal migrants has precious little to do with the African Union and not a whole lot with the European Union. Each member state has to deal with that separately, not least by working on definitions of national identity, something the EU actually dislikes and tries to undermine.

There seems to be no suggestion that trade, fishing and agricultural policies might be changed in order “to reduce the push factor”. So, we are left with more development aid money that goes to kleptocratic African tyrants, who then continue the wrecking of their countries, thus forcing more people to flee.

It is hardly worth undermining one’s moral standing over Robert Mugabe over this.

COMMENT THREAD

javier_solana[i-javier_solana]The one thing that is not in any doubt in the entire mess of 15 British sailors and marines being captured or, more correctly, kidnapped by the Iranians is that the European Union has not distinguished itself. Far from being a bulwark of strength, it has done little more than mentioned how nasty the Iranians are, refusing to “flex its economic muscles” as Timothy Garton Ash, the leading “perestroika” Europhile of this country sadly concludes in the Los Angeles Times.

Europe, he notes, has not even realized there is a crisis. Well, possibly because it is not their crisis. (Why the British government has not realized there is a crisis is something else.)

The EU is by far Iran's biggest trading partner — more than 40% of Iran's imports and more than a quarter of its exports are with the EU. Remarkably, this trade has grown strongly in the last years of looming crisis. Much of it is underpinned by export credit guarantees given by European governments, notably those of Germany, France and Italy. According to the most recent figures available from the German economics ministry, Iran is Germany's third-largest beneficiary of export credit guarantees, outdone only by Russia and China. Iran comes second to none in terms of the proportion of German exports — up to 65% — underwritten by the German government. As the squeeze grows on Iran from U.N. sanctions, and as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad fails to deliver on his populist economic promises, this European trade becomes ever more vital for the Iranian regime.

In the House of Commons earlier this week, a former foreign secretary, Sir Malcolm Rifkind, asked if Britain's European friends, and Germany, France and Italy in particular, might be prevailed on to convey to Iran, perhaps privately in the first instance, the possibility that such export credit guarantees would be temporarily suspended until the kidnapped Europeans are freed. I gather that if such private pressure is not forthcoming, Britain might be tempted to raise the suggestion more formally at a meeting of European foreign ministers in Bremen this weekend.

So here's a challenge for the German presidency of the EU. Will you put your money where your mouth is? Or are all your Sunday speeches about European solidarity in the cause of peace and freedom not even worth the paper they are written on?

Well, we know the answer to that and sad though it makes me to watch Professor Garton Ash sobbing his heart out, I suggest it is time that he took some kind of a reality check. Why in goodness name should the Europeans do anything to help the British if they cannot see that the war the terrorists, armed, trained and funded by Iran, are waging is a war against us all?

Another serious Europhile has been sobbing into his cups this week-end. Sir Malcolm Rifkind, has gone beyond speaking in the Commons. In this week’s Observer he has noted sadly that “Europe has failed us in the Iran crisis”.

There was, however, one other approach that would have a good chance of succeeding. The members of the EU aspire to having a common foreign policy. What better issue could there be on which our French, German and Italian allies and partners could show solidarity with the UK and demonstrate the benefits of joint action?

The best means of pressure would have been the export credit guarantees that are given to assist trade between Iran and western Europe. These, together with banking and other financial facilities are the soft underbelly of the Iranians and their withdrawal could do significant damage to Iran's already weak economy.
Such measures have already been canvassed by the Americans in respect of Iran's nuclear defiance.

The firm statement made by EU foreign ministers calling for the 'immediate and unconditional' release is welcome. But the apparent lack of any agreement over economic pressure has two serious consequences. First, it makes it very unlikely that Britain will be able to secure the release of the service personnel in the short term. Second, it is now almost inevitable that Iran will try to impose conditions from the international community and, in particular, the US, on their ultimate release.

This lack of agreement shows how hollow are the aspirations to a common European foreign policy. France and Germany should be ashamed at their refusal to assist their European partner in a humanitarian cause of this kind. If there had been a political will, there could already have been agreement.

Indeed. But, of course, that is not how the European Union views such crises. A crisis is not there to be solved, it is there to be utilized ex post facto in the great project for further integration. After all, exactly what does a common foreign policy mean among 27 countries who have no common interests?

Meanwhile Ségolène Royal has continued to make tough statements about Iran and has insisted that there should be European sanctions on Iran until the sailors are released. Her chief rival, Nicolas Sarkozy has expressed himself horrified but did not actually manage to suggest any course of action.

Our readers will be glad to hear that the European Foreign Policy Supremo, Javier Solana takes a more sanguine view of the situation as a whole.

In his overview of the European Union’s foreign policy in 2007 to the European Parliament, Solana identified various issues as likely to cause problems: Arab-Israeli dispute, Darfur, Iranian nuclear stand-off and Kosovo. He condemned the seizure of the 15 British marines and then announced

that there was "major desire" around the world for a strong EU foreign policy and reminded them that the EU has 10 international military missions and plans more in Afghanistan and Kosovo. Later in the debate Joseph Daul of the European People's Party took up this theme when he said that EU foreign policy should encourage freedom around the world.

It is not entirely clear how that “major desire around the world” is expressed as most commentators either have no idea that such a thing is possible or express some puzzlement at its failure to do anything whenever there is a crisis. No amount of international missions will make up for a complete lack of purpose, encouraging freedom around the world not being particularly high on anybody’s agenda in the European Union. Especially not the freedom of 15 British captives in Iran.

COMMENT THREAD

LAND+-+Humvee+005[i-LAND+-+Humvee+005]Such is the general disdain for things military shown by my more politically savvy colleagues and rivals, who feel they have far more important things to write about than men (and women) fighting and dying, that I almost feel impelled to apologise for writing another post about things military.

For the sake of this blog too, which always shows a slight downturn in readership when we deal intensively with military matters, one tends to the view that we should avoid the subject for a while and write about more popular issues in order to maintain the hit rate.

However, safe in the knowledge that vital matters of state are being closely monitored here and here, I feel we can nevertheless attend to what many are treating as a trivial issue - the "grim milestone" of the 3,000th recorded US military death since the invasion of Iraq.

If in so doing we are taking a side-swipe at UK political blogs, it is not only because this event is important in its own right but also because it is a political event, and one of some significance to the UK. The reaction to it by the American public will have an impact on our own foreign policy in that vital area of the Middle East, and also on the fate of our troops committed to the theatre, that in itself having political repercussions.

link[i-link]That our own bloggers are so heedless of such issues, however, is not so much a reflection on them as on the body politic as a whole. It – rather like the media - has become so introverted and wedded to its own internal affairs that it has ceased to understand the relevance of such tedious things as foreign policy and defence matters – unless a cheap debating point can be scored.

Nevertheless, of the several points arising from this sad event which are of political concern to us, all are hugely important. The first one is that, while the US military has now suffered 3,000 fatalities, in comparative terms, we are not that far behind. The US currently maintains an establishment of 134,000 in theatre against the UK's 7,200. If we maintained the same number, our fatalities (currently standing at 127) would, on a pro rata basis, have reached nearly 2,500. And that is in a supposedly more peaceful sector where there is no sectarian rivalry.

link[i-link]For the Americans, the biggest single cause of deaths from enemy action is the improvised explosive device (or IED) which has accounted for a third of US casualties. That brings us to the second point of political concern to us: roughly a third of UK combat casualties have also been caused by IEDs.

Third, in both cases, the casualty rate has been needlessly high as a result of reliance on inadequately armoured patrol vehicles, in the US case the Humvees and with us the "Snatch" Land Rovers.

link[i-link]Fourthly, in both instances, some improvements are being made. The US is fielding RG-31s, Cougars and Buffaloes, the latter two vehicles being extraordinarily resistant to IEDs. (The photographs show three instances of Buffaloes hit by IEDS, with the crews walking away unharmed.) The UK, on the other hand, is fielding up-armoured FV432s, known as Bulldogs, and Mastiffs.

Fifth, the rate of introduction of these vehicles is too slow, in the US sector, and – with the UK, overly delayed. In both cases, it is a question of too little too late.

LR208[i-LR208]Finally, both governments are going to have to make tough decisions in the near future. They are going to have look at public reaction to the current (and likely future) casualty rates and assess whether they are politically sustainable - in our case, how many more "Snatch" Land Rovers we are prepared to see burn.

If the respective governments conclude that they are going to let the casualties mount at the same rate, then they are going to have to work out how to neutralise the hostile sentiment as the figures increase. If, on the other hand, they decide that the death rates must be contained, then they are going to have to spend serious money on countermeasures.

In the UK, that means billions in new money. And, given the parlous state of public finances and the already over-stretched budget, spending more on defence - especially on an unpopular war - is going to have major political consequences. It could even be one of the issues which influences the outcome of the general election, when other "services" have to be cut in order to buy kit for our troops. And the Party that is able to make the most convincing noises about supplying that kit will garner many new votes.

As we asserted, therefore, the death of 3,000 Americans is not only a "grim milestone" in human terms. It is also a political milestone, on both sides of the Atlantic. It is indeed a measure of the failure of the body politic that it cannot see (or understand) its significance. And, for remarking on that, I make no apologies.

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