Perilous Times
Tony Blair: military intervention in rogue regimes 'more necessary than
ever'
Former PM defends foreign policy record, revealing that the experience
of Iraq and Afghanistan has not diminished his commitment to taking on
opponents
* Owen Bowcott
*
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 1 September 2010 13.08 BST
Tony Blair addresses British troops in Basra Tony Blair addresses
British troops in Basra, southern Iraq, in 2003. Photograph: Reuters
Globalisation has made military intervention in rogue regimes overseas
more necessary than ever, Tony Blair argues in his memoirs. Not
toppling Robert Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe, is one regret voiced
by the former prime minister.
His belief that Iran needs to be confronted in its nuclear ambitions
and as a last resort prevented by force shines through. The experience
of Iraq and Afghanistan has not diminished his commitment to taking on
opponents.
His appetite for international affairs, he admits, has been sharpened
by his role as a mediator in the Middle East. "Personally I have never
felt a greater sense of frustration or indeed a greater urge to
leadership," he writes in his postscript.
But it was the Balkans that formed the crucible for his new policy of
liberal interventionism. "My awakening over foreign policy was ...
abrupt," he explains. "It happened over Kosovo."
Distinctions between foreign and domestic policy are breaking down as
consequence of globalisation, he maintains. Television news beams
foreign crises into every living room. "The world [is] interconnected
not just economically or in self-interest but emotionally, the heart as
well as the head."
Looking back he admits he was surprised: "The 1997 campaign was fought
almost exclusively on a domestic policy basis. If you had told me on
that bright May morning as I first went blinking into Downing Street
that during my time in office I would commit Britain to fight four
wars, I would have been bewildered and horrified."
Foreign policy based on "narrow self-interest" is outdated, he asserts.
"Global alliances [have to] be ... based on shared global values." That
realisation has resulted in the undermining of the old political
divisions of left and right.
"We ended up in the bizarre position where being in favour of the
enforcement of liberal democracy was a 'neoconservative' view and
non-interference in another nation's affairs was 'progressive'."
Kosovo was his first test. The "ethnic cleansing" and killings
"completely changed my own attitude to foreign policy", he admits.
While Europe stalled, in favour of pacification rather than resolution,
Blair was "extraordinarily forward in advocating a military solution".
He persuaded Bill Clinton, the US president, he suggests, to take part
in aerial bombardments even though there was no direct US interest in
the region. "I saw it essentially as a moral issue. And that, in a
sense, came to define my view on foreign and military intervention."
Clinton, he says, was "the most formidable politician I had ever
encountered". He exults in their close political empathy, describing
them on one occasion working US crowds "like two old music hall queens".
Many opposed Blair. He compresses their counter-arguments. "Beginning
wars is relatively easy; it's ending them that's hard. Innocent people
die; unintended consequences develop; bad situations can be made worse."
On the range of his military targets, he comments: "People often used
to say to me: If you got rid of the gangsters in Sierra Leone,
[Slobodan] Milošević, the Taliban and Saddam, why can't you get rid of
Mugabe? The answer is I would have loved to, but it wasn't practical
(since, in his case, and for reasons I never quite understood, the
surrounding African nations maintained a lingering support for him and
would have opposed any action strenuously)."
Over Kosovo, Blair recounts how he tried to "stoke up concern" with
other European leaders. Kosovo became the template for his subsequent
military interventions. His close relationship with and affection for
his generals is a recurring theme.
"The leader has to decide whether the objective is worth the cost," he
states. "What's more, he or she must do so unsure of what the exact
cost might be or the exact price of failing to meet the objective. ...
In this context, by the way, indecision is also decision ... Omission
and commission both have consequences."
The expedition to restore democracy to Sierra Leone in 2000, Blair
says, "is one of the least discussed episodes of my 10 years as prime
minister, but it's one of the things of which I am most proud." His
father used to teach at Freetown University in the African nation's
capital.
The former prime minister's discussion of his early foreign adventures
contain remarkably few references to United Nations resolutions or
international law, considering he is a lawyer by training.
In one passage he comes curiously close to expressing a sneaking
admiration for the bold action of the Bolsheviks in Russia in 1917
rather than Kerensky's social democrat government.
Seeking to systematise his theory of foreign interventions in regimes
that are "oppressive or dictatorial", he writes: "They may pose no
outside or external threat; or it may be easily contained
diplomatically. It may – as with Mugabe – be impractical to intervene."
A judgment has to be made. "If change will not come by evolution,
should it be done by revolution? Should those who have the military
power contemplate doing so?"
On Iraq, he insists that he never regarded those who opposed war in
Iraq as "stupid or weak-minded".
About 9/11, he concedes that: "I misunderstood the depth of the
challenge ... If I had known then that a decade later we would still be
fighting in Afghanistan, I would have been profoundly disturbed. I hope
I would have still taken the same decision, both there and in respect
of Iraq."
Blair is uncompromising in the face of the dangers he perceives in
Tehran, discussing them in the context of the growing danger that
terrorists will obtain nuclear weapons. "It is America that leads the
challenge to Iran and its nuclear ambitions," he says. "But let us be
frank: Iran is a far more immediate threat to its Arab neighbours than
it is to America ... That's why Iran matters. Iran with a nuclear bomb
would mean others in the region acquiring the same capability; it would
dramatically alter the balance of power in the region, but also within
Islam."
In his interview with the Guardian, he declared: "I wouldn't take the
risk of Iran with a nuclear weapon."
Speaking to Andrew Marr in a BBC interview to be broadcast in full
tonight, Blair says: "I think it is wholly unacceptable for Iran to
have a nuclear weapons capability and I think we have got to be
prepared to confront them, if necessary militarily. I think there is no
alternative to that if they continue to develop nuclear weapons. They
need to get that message loud and clear."