At the Huffington Post, Tim Farron is decrying the delay to the Chilcot report into the Iraq war.
The publication of the Chilcot report is crucial and the delays are unacceptable – we cannot afford to continue walking in the dark.
The underlying issue which we need to understand and question is the alignment of British foreign policy with American priorities. Has Blair and Thatcher’s determination to maintain “the special relationship” benefitted our country? Should we continue in this vein? The Chilcot report, when it is eventually published, must force us to learn lessons for the years ahead: at the moment we are in limbo. In a year when the country will decide who rules for the next five, this is unacceptable.
Tim’s theme throughout is very much of significance placed by governments on the UK’s “special relationship” with the US and the extent to which this has led to participation in unsound military adventures.
For Margaret Thatcher, our closeness to Washington enabled us to stand apart from the European continent. For Tony Blair, the image of Britain as a transatlantic ‘bridge’ served a similar aim; he moved away from partnership with France and Germany, towards the USA. But Britain is a European country. We share interests with our neighbours across the Channel, and with them face shared threats. Over the past five years, political and military cooperation between Britain and France has grown, though largely unreported to Parliament or the press, as well as with the Netherlands and the Nordic countries. The Eurosceptic insistence that Britain can stand tall in the world without close cooperation with our European neighbours depends upon belief that Washington still sees the British Prime Minister as ‘special’ – and special enough to shore us up against the threats.
Read it all here.
Follow @LibDemVoice on Twitter
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Farmageddon ****
Two Fortean tales from the 1915 Quintinshill rail disaster
Press: Legalising cannabis can reduce violent crime
David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens
The will of the people has changed: great film from the farm of a Lib Dem PPC
How Johnson's Brexit deal is worse for the UK than May's
Brexit; the blame game moves on.
Ross McLean
Roland
frankie
John Marriott
3 Comments
It’s good, but I think it needed more about the importance of an independent UK foreign policy. I too have noticed that the US has slightly different interests in the Middle East to us and they are acting on them in a way that we shouldn’t copy.
My slight problem with Tim’s article is that it doesn’t differentiate enough between the EU’s interests and our own interests. We shouldn’t be swapping master Washington with master Brussels.
I am reminded of this damning review of the war in Afghanistan, Helmand province.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n24/james-meek/worse-than-a-defeat
While impressing the Americans did seem to be a central British goal, the Americans, rightly, weren’t impressed.
To put the Chilcott delay into perspective see these comments from Norman Baker MP in January 2010 —
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1245626/NORMAN-BAKER-Hutton-farcical-feeble-amateurish–MUST-told-truth-week.html#ixzz0dX2wSl2i