David Cameron really needs to face up to the fact that so far he has proved not much better at foreign policy than he has at winning elections. In fact, it might be in Britain’s interest if the poor fellow’s passport was simply taken away. The latest blunder came in Pakistan. Asked whether Britain could help resolve the long dispute over Kashmir, he (wisely) said that the UK should not take a “leading role” in such efforts, but then added:
“As with so many of the world’s problems, we are responsible for the issue in the first place.”
“So many”? Some, undeniably, but that extra level of grovel seems unnecessary.
The Daily Telegraph wades in here, concluding with this lethal jab:
[Cameron] could learn something from his predecessor in No 10. On a visit to Africa several years ago, Gordon Brown responded to an attack on Britain by Thabo Mbeki, then South Africa’s president, by declaring that “the days of Britain having to apologise for its colonial history are over”, and that “we should celebrate much of our past, rather than apologise for it”. We agree. Our past is by no means perfect, but it ill behoves the Prime Minister to lay so many of the world’s ills at our own door.
Quite.
I’d add that behavior like this, and the underlying set of beliefs that it reveals, only reinforce the need to treat Mr. Cameron’s recent criticisms of state-sponsored multiculturalism with a great deal of caution. He can talk the talk, but as for whether he’ll actually change anything, we’ll have to see…
You mean some foreign leaders actually thought the "Obama Apology Tour" was effective leadership?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe correct rule of thumb is, the longer the exposure of an ex-English colony to the English common law, an English educational system, English ethical standards of public administration, and English values of civil rights, the better the ex-English colony has fared on its own. As for the colonies of the other European colonial powers, you don't even want to go there.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseEvery time you write the same thing Mr. Stuttaford, I'll write the same response:
Which British politician is better? Who do you support as an alternative?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe free world is led by pansies.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseConservative in name only.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI wonder if David Cameron would start crying if one were to point out that Gandhi is just as "responsible", given that he supported the partition only after begging Nehru to step aside and allow Jinnah to become India's first Prime Minister.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Which British politician is better? Who do you support as an alternative?"
Being surrounded by weeds is no reason to start praising dandelions.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt's very easy to see the mistakes of the British Empire because they are visible, shocking, and easy to isolate. The contributions of the British peoples, however, are so vast and so pervasive that it is impossible to single them out.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt's actually almost egotistical to grovel about that - reflects some serious delusions of grandeur about what Britain could have done about it.
Unless he just means that because Britain was there for so long, they are responsible for everything in the region. In that case, they get to take credit for the state India is today, which isn't a bad legacy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt was a simple statement of fact. Britain was no worse a colonial master than many and distinctly better than some (Belgium). But with its vast empire on which the sun never set, it was a partial contibutor to a much wider array of problems than, say, Germany was responsible for.
So many of the problem spots plaguing the US today and in recent times - Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Israel/Palestine/Jordan, Egypt - were neglected or aggravated under British rule. Britain didn't break all those places, but they didn't do much to fix them, either. And even when they make a token effort in Iraq or Afghanistan, the way most of their media and populace and politicians act, they're doing us some sort of favor to help us solve our problems - when it's the converse that's true.
Don't react like a (former) Brit, Andrew. From an American perspective, Cameron's statement was refreshingly candid.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAs Steyn so wonderfully put it: you're much better off having been exposed to British rule than not - why is Barbados Barbados and Haiti Haiti?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePatrick J:
"But with its vast empire on which the sun never set, it was a partial contibutor to a much wider array of problems than, say, Germany was responsible for."
OK, that is more or less fair as written but whooeee does that emphasis on width gloss over the depth of problems that Germany was responsible for.
Your exact formulation of Britain's role in that list of countries is not too unjust either, though it seems to imply that Britain had an obligation to "fix" places. If that is true then it would be worth pointing out that Iran, after decades of competing British and Russian influence peddlers, was probably in much better political and cultural shape circa 1950 than it would be after just a few years of American meddling. In that place at least, America is fully the author of its own problems.
Whatever the legacy of British policy in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was a very long time ago and a lot of years of American activity have intervened. Those countries did not become problems for the US in the 1990s because of anything Britain had done. They did so because of their own characteristic pathologies, which in some ways Britain worsened and in others had poorly suppressed, but which the US had had decades to muck around with since. The US usually acted for usually good policy reasons [need Iraq to kill Iranians, need Afghans to kill Russians] but with some rough fallout after the fact that has now to be cleaned up.
Britain and a few other countries that have actually sent troops to kill the enemy and take losses themselves in Iraq and/or Afghanistan are there to support American policies, in support of American requirements, because America asked, in the wake of an attack on America. That doesn't mean that the problems of these places do not generate threats to those countries as well, or that they cannot find solid national interest reasons to be there. But don't lay out any nonsense about how America is at war in Afghanistan and Iraq to solve Britain's problems.
And Cameron's statement is everything but "refreshingly candid". Britain, like America, like the entire West, has been apologizing for itself for generations. It cannot be either refreshing or candid at this late date.
Cameron has his duties as PM, among them maintaining decorum in foreign parts. Fine. But if he were being refreshingly candid he would have told his audience to go and perform unspeakable acts on goats.
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