British Prime Minister Tony Blair used a traditional forum - a speech at the Lord Mayor of London's banquet - to set out the British Government's foreign policy.
Blair's new tack is very much in line with ex-US Secretary of State James Baker's Iraq Study Group. He wants to get the US and Britain out of Iraq and establish peace there by `creating a dialogue with Iran'and bringing the mullahs and Syria into the picture to plot an exit strategy as part of a `comprehensive Middle East peace process.' (translation: lean on Israel)
Blair confirmed that an appeasement of Iran was in the wind in both the US and UK, and offered Iran a `partnership' instead of isolation, and an end to any consideration of military options against Iran if it stopped supporting terrorism in Lebanon or Iraq and halted attempts to develop nuclear weapons.
This is pathetic on a number of levels; not only are both Blair and US President George Bush both lame ducks on their way out, but the Iranian leadership has said without any qualification that they're going to go ahead with their nuclear program regardless, and that it's off the table. Ahmadinejad just announced that Iran's nuclear program will be complete in three months.
If Bush and Blair were unwilling to confront Iran before, when they had much stronger positions at home, why would Ahmadinejad take anything either of them has to say seriously now?
A good indication of how much contempt Iran has for the West is Iran's attempt to put its own man in place in al Qaeda as bin-Laden's successor.
Iran has always been a tacit ally of al Qaeda, and was and is the haven of a number of al Qaeda figures who established themselves there after the Americans and British invaded Afghanistan. Iran provided logistical support to the al Qaeda group that attacked the Russian city of Nalchik last year, among other things.
Now, with bin-Laden in declining health, the mullahs are lobbying to put people in power there friendly to Iran. The Iranians are pushing for Saif al-Adel, a 46-year-old former colonel in Egypt's special forces, to be the organisation's number three.
Al-Adel was bin Laden's head of security, and is on the FBI's 22 most wanted list after September 11 for his involvement in attacks against US targets in Somalia and Africa in the 1990s. He has been living in a Revolutionary Guard guest house in Teheran since leaving Afghanistan after the allied invasion in late 2001.
Another figure the Iranians are pushing is Imad Mugniyeh, ex of Yasir Arafat's Force 17, one of the figures involved in the killing of the Marines in Beirut in the 1980's and the liason man between Hezbollah, the Palestinians and Iran.
At this point, of course, with the leftist Democrats who are running the US Congress openly calling for a `phased
Well played, Mr. Blair. You've done a heckuva job, Dubbyah.
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