CONNECT: Tony Blair's backing of George Bush humiliates Britain. Until he became Bush's poodle, Blair seemed a British Bill Clinton - agreeable, affable and astute,writes Eddie Holt.
In an age of 'on-message' political management, smiling Blair was the consummate political manager. He was too oily for some tastes but at least he wasn't a thoroughgoing bully like Maggie Thatcher.
Old Labour socialists and old and new Tory conservatives criticised him, of course. His 'New Labour' party was too right-leaning for the socialists and too left-leaning for the disgraced Tory hardcore. But his 'third way' moderation appealed to a generation largely contemptuous of the past and fixed on the future. Sure, he was suspiciously oily but far better than the alternatives.
He dyed some true blue Tory policies a fashionable New Labour red and romped to election victory. Mixing red and blue produces purple and Blair could strut like a be-purpled Roman emperor. Few hated him - he seemed too affable and sincere (albeit designer-sincere) for such strong emotion. Then came the attacks on the US and, cliché-time: the rest is history.
Mind you, it was recent history that made him back Bush so fulsomely. Since World War 2, when Winston Churchill decided that getting the US onside in world affairs was Britain's best hope, British prime ministers - Harold Macmillan, Ted Heath, Maggie Thatcher, for instance - always backed the US. British support for its former colony was originally pragmatic; now it's humiliating.
The irony of it all is that the dislike for the past which empowered Blair proved hypocritical because of his reverence for Britain's historical backing of the US. The man who would break with the history of left-wing and right-wing ideology chose to back the most right-wing administration in the history of the United States. History assured him it was the pragmatic position to adopt.
Our own government pursued a similar, albeit muted, pragmatism. The boss in Washington's White House whipped the governments of most English-speaking countries, along with those of Spain, Italy and Portugal into line. The Orwellian 'coalition of the willing' was born even though it was governments - not democratic populations - that supported it. We were all humiliated.
Yet nobody and no country (not even Jose Maria Aznar in Spain) have been as humiliated as Blair and Britain. Opinion polls in the US showed that Bush needed a prominent ally to copper-fasten support for attacking Iraq. This gave Blair leverage and his supporters point out that he attempted to secure a second UN resolution and a plan for peace between Palestine and Israel.
He did but it didn't matter anyway. The attempted UN resolution failed and within a year Bush had shredded the plan for Middle East peace in front of Blair on the White House lawn. That ought to have been enough for any British prime minister to realise the US government was treating him not just as a lap-dog but as a worm.
Everybody makes mistakes, of course, but monumental mistakes by a British prime minister have far-reaching consequences. Yet Blair, sooner than admit he had misjudged Bush and his cabal, continues to support them. Fair enough, power - and not just this US government - invariably seeks to do as it wishes. But Bush has used - indeed, abused - Blair and everybody knows it.
It may be that Blair understands Bush and fears, with good reason, offending the US president. Yet turning Britain into a virtual colony of its former colony is abject. Pragmatism can go only so far before it mutates into servility and sycophancy.
Blair was always pragmatically oily; now he's becoming a Uriah Heep, a Gollum, of world politics.
Certainly, his transformation of the British bull-dog into a British lap-dog is painful to watch. Whatever Irish people's views on Britain are, nobody doubts British pride. Indeed, frequently expressing itself as arrogance, British pride irritates, indeed confounds, many more egalitarian countries. But where is that legendary hauteur and pride when it comes to George Bush? The cage, the chains, the orange jump-suit in which British hostage Ken Bigley was seen this week are despicable. Designed to humiliate him in the Guantanamo style, they are also intended to humiliate Tony Blair and the country he leads. Even Bush's veto on releasing two Iraqi women prisoners shows how Blair is treated contemptuously by Washington.
Yet few would contend that Tony Blair is an evil man. He is a political cut-throat, of course - he didn't become a prime minister by really being Mr Nice Guy. Nonetheless, beside the hawks in Washington, he does seem to justify his sometimes nickname of 'Bambi'. He should now be pragmatic about his erstwhile pragmatism and sever support for George Bush.
He made a huge mistake over Iraq and needs to admit as much. It was always certain that some British prime minister or other would back an outrageously gung-ho administration in the US. The fact that it was Tony Blair shows that you ignore or ape history at your peril. It's more subtle than that - all you can ever do is learn from it. Blair should learn from the last three years.