The Foreign Service Journal, October 2004

guardsmen playing “The Star Spangled Banner” outside Buckingham Palace? — has given way among most Europeans to fear and anger. Fairly or otherwise, America is much unloved and President Bush bears the brunt of the opprobrium. The question Europeans now ask themselves is whether the American people are set to endorse the policies of a president so widely disliked in the world beyond. That is as true in Britain as else- where. Mr. Blair’s support for the Iraq War and his close relationship with Mr. Bush have domi- nated the nation’s politics during the past two years. Public anxiety about the march to Baghdad — the nation was about evenly divided when Mr. Blair sent British troops into action—has turned into opposition. The fail- ure to find weapons of mass destruction, allegations about the manipulation of intelligence, the mishandling of postwar reconstruction, and the torture scandals at Abu Ghraib have badly damaged public trust in the prime minister. So, too, has his seemingly unquestioning support for Mr. Bush. The image of Mr. Blair as the pres- ident’s poodle has become the favorite of political car- toonists. In his own party, where opposition to the war has been fiercest, Mr. Blair is compared unfavorably with Harold Wilson, the 1960s Labor prime minister who firmly rebuffed LBJ’s call for British military involvement in Vietnam. Mr. Blair’s position as prime minister has remained relatively secure only because the opposition Conservative Party, led by Michael Howard, is a tradi- tional ally of the Republicans and was as firm in its sup- port for regime change in Iraq as was the government. So the outcome in November carries profound implications for Britain — both political and strategic. On one level, the result could severely test Mr. Blair’s capacity to shake off the damaging domestic political consequences of the war. On another, it could shape decisively the future of the special relationship with Washington that has been the leitmotif of British for- eign policy since the Suez debacle of 1956. Kerry’s Strength John Kerry’s greatest strength, in Britain as else- where in Europe, is that he is not Mr. Bush. The Democratic candidate presents himself as a member of the East Coast Atlanticist club with which Europeans have always been comfortable. His background and career are steeped in foreign policy. But, above all — this, at least, is how the conventional wisdom runs — his election as president would mark a clean break with the past, allowing frac- tured political and personal relation- ships to be repaired. My own view is that many on the continent — Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroeder among them — expect too much of Mr. Kerry’s promises to return America to the path of multilateralism. Once installed in the White House, Mr. Kerry would demand as much as he offered to European leaders; and the defeat of Mr. Bush would rob Paris and Berlin of a convenient excuse for withholding support for the rebuilding of Iraq. But for the time being, hostility toward Mr. Bush tends to swamp such nuanced judgments. In the short term, the awkwardness of a Democratic victory would be felt by Mr. Blair. As Mr. Bush’s co- conspirator in the invasion of Iraq, defeat for the pres- ident could leave the prime minister looking danger- ously isolated. Persistent calls from critics within his own party for a change of leadership could well grow louder if the U.S. electorate was seen as having voted for a fresh start. How, some of his more ambitious col- leagues would ask, could Mr. Blair leave history behind and build a warm relationship with Mr. Kerry? Might not the new president decide to make a point by invit- ing Mr. Chirac to the White House ahead of Mr. Blair? These are all real concerns — heard among Mr. Blair’s aides as well as from his political rivals. But they mask the deeper significance of the election for Britain’s foreign policy. In strategic terms, Britain’s interests lie firmly with a victory for the Democratic contender. A Deeper Significance If that seems counter-intuitive, the explanation lies in the likely consequences of Mr. Bush’s re-election. In such an event, Mr. Blair, of course, could expect to remain a privileged guest at the White House. The harsh realities of power revealed by postwar Iraq might also temper Mr. Bush’s unilateralism. But — and this is the critical point F O C U S O C T O B E R 2 0 0 4 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 41 John Kerry’s greatest strength, in Britain as elsewhere in Europe, is that he is not Mr. Bush.