Tony Blair Psychosis

His name is synonymous with death, destruction, lies and deceit.  Once it represented the future and the hope that comes with it.  Then that all changed.  In the House of Commons the Leader of the Opposition David Cameron looked at him in the face and mockingly jested “You use to be the future once.”  Who was he speaking to?  None other than former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair.  I was only 11 when Blair lead New Labour to power in 1997.  My Mum was a traditional Labour supporter, fed up of years of Conservative rule.  I didn’t know much about politics then, but what made Mum happy made me happy.  So I became a de facto supporter too.  For several years the domestic scene looked pretty quiet apart from the odd fuel strike or Foot and Mouth outbreak here and there.  Internationally the UK intervened militarily in the former Yugoslavia and Sierra Leone, but no one made much noise about it.  Apart from the unique side shows of a horrific genocide and a rebel uprising in yet another African country, things internationally looked pretty stable and predictable.

9/11 changed that.  Such a horrific attack and our closeness to the US seemed to justify the war in Afghanistan to most people.  But after those events something seemed to change in how we perceived out Prime Minister.  He seemed much more serious somehow and more decisive.  Standing shoulder to shoulder with US President George W Bush he seemed to swallow Bush’s enemies list, the Axis of Evil, lock stock and barrel.  While he mercifully didn’t use Bush’s gung ho language, he didn’t make any effort to counter Bush’s suggestion that another confrontation was very close.  His silence was taken as automatic acceptance.  The British public who at first distrusted him, now feared him.  That fear soon turned to anger when he pointed towards the next venture: the 2003 Iraq War.
The 2003 Iraq War will be remembered in the UK for all the wrong reasons.  I often imagine telling a future child of mine about it and I struggle to think how I would do it.  It was a strange and fearful time.  It was one of sorrow for my family when my late grandma passed away.  The last time I saw her we were watching planes lift off from a US aircraft carrier.  She said she was afraid for the children in Iraq who would soon be threatened by the bombs on those planes screeching into the darkness.  At Christmas that year the family had a debate about the run up to war, fuelled by alcohol.  A the time I was strongly for the war.  I remember Mum telling me about Dad’s Iraqi friends from university, called up for military service on the eve of the Gulf War.  I imagined the arrogant dictator Saddam Hussein hiding in one of his palaces far away from the front lines while such good people were sent off to fight and die for him.  I didn’t very much care for what happened to the man in the palace.
The most bitter thing people remember now and will remember I think is the one infamous abbreviation “WMD”: Weapons of Mass Destruction.  Blair, Bush and their pressmen mentioned WMD daily and seemingly sometimes hourly in the run up to the war.  And then came the 45 minutes claim and the so called “Dodgy Dossier”, the latter of which seemed to be less of an intelligence brief and more of a cut and paste job.  With much doubt cast on this reason to go to war the government proliferated many others.  One of these was the claim that Saddam was hosting Al Qaeda in Iraq, which turned out to be bogus.  The multitude of reasons and the almost hysterical pushing of them on the British public made them confused, bewildered and then finally angry.  Huge anti war demonstrations took place in the UK and many other countries but to no avail.  We went to war.
Despite Bush presenting a “Mission Accomplished” banner the mission never seemed to be accomplished no matter how hard everyone tried.  Resentment towards the coalition’s occupation and it’s mismanagement of reconstruction fed a brewing insurgency.  For many years it seemed as though the country of Iraq would burn to the ground despite our effort.  Then it seemed to calm down and then we left.  That is it in a nutshell.

 But when the UK public thought they had got to the peak of their distrust for their former leader in war time, Blair turned around and seemed to pretend that everything had gone according to plan.  Quotes similar to ‘I would do the same again’ appeared, making some people question his memory if not his sanity.  This is what made people very bitter, but he didn’t seemed to notice and he doesn’t still.  But in not acknowledging any humility Blair, the liberal interventionist may already have done liberal intervention’s grave.

Before Iraq when we saw mass graves filled with men women and children we often asked “how do we stop this?”.  Such sights filled us with feelings of horror and justified anger at the perpetrators.  Now when we see this the question tragically seems to be “how do we avoid doing anything about this?”  The latter thinking has brought out the worst out of people.  Many people openly venerate overthrown dictators, making the Gadaffi’s and Saddam’s of this world look like President Eisenhower’s, albeit with 24/7 torture centres.  Others openly speak of people not being ready for moving towards democracy.  Most tragically many people look at genocides and say “so sad” and then change the channel and think about something else.

 Consider the following scenario.  After nearly decades of his father ruling the country the son steps in and is hastily sworn in as President.  He goes through the motions of confirming himself in power.  The military swears their loyalty to him and the schools pass on his personality cult.  But try as he might he doesn’t fill the big shoes of his father.  Slowly but surely events start to run away with him.  Grumbles in the population get louder and then turn into protests.  The protests then turn in to mini risings and then serious and coordinated uprisings.  The son hides in the Presidential Palace thinking he is safe.  Then the military starts to grumble too and he decides to throw in the towel.  This is a rough outline of the events that lead to the dictator of Haiti Jean-Claude Duvalier aka Baby Doc (son of Papa Doc) fleeing from power in Haiti.  If one of Saddam’s sons Uday or  Qusay Hussein had to take over from their father it is likely that similar events would have played out.  But such hypothetical scenarios are scorned in the post-Blair era.  The hangover of Iraq has made all of it’s critics act like foreign policy experts, and they have no time for people answering back.

 This is my coming out as an ardent liberal interventionist.  Why?  Because I believe that all life is sacred.  Because I believe in helping your neighbours when they are in dire need, despite my lack of spiritual leaning.  Because we cant rightfully shout about the virtues of freedom and democracy and decide who deserves it.  But mostly because I know that past experience, including the Iraq War, can never dictate the future.  This country needs to exorcise the demon of the Iraq War from it’s soul or it will turn us into uncaring, cynical and ultimately hypocritical people.  There is evil in the world and if we profess to be a beacon of freedom we should be prepared to stand up to it.  Yes we won’t always be able to help in the form of active intervention.  But those that lecture about the power of diplomacy and talk must recognise it’s limits.  Sending angry letters to certain evil doers won’t make them desist because of their fear of paper cuts.

But as it is Tony Blair’s aloof and arrogant attitude has pushed this country away from intervention.  He has filled our hearts full of bitterness and cynicism instead of determination and hope.  For that I can never forgive him.

 "The wicked flee when no one is pursuing"

Proverbs 28:1