Era of New Labour: Foreign Affairs (AQA A-Level History): Revision Notes
Military Interventions and the 'War on Terror'
Origins of Blair's interventionist approach
Blair sent British forces into battle five times in six years.
Blair's background provided little indication of the militaristic direction his premiership would take. During his time at Fettes public school, he had chosen community service rather than joining the Combined Cadet Corps. Those familiar with Robin Cook's emphasis on an ethical dimension in New Labour's foreign policy would not have anticipated 'ethical wars'. Nevertheless, Blair's conception of Britain's international role underwent substantial evolution by the time he became Prime Minister.
In a speech delivered in Manchester shortly before the 1997 election, Blair articulated an ambitious vision: 'for century upon century it had been the destiny of Britain to lead other nations'. He argued that this destiny 'should be part of our future. We are a leader of nations or nothing.' This statement revealed Blair's developing belief that Britain should maintain a prominent role in global affairs, moving beyond the more cautious internationalism that had characterised much of the post-imperial period.
The doctrine of humanitarian intervention
Blair's most substantial articulation of his worldview came in a speech delivered in Chicago during April 1999. This address outlined the circumstances under which the international community could legitimately intervene in the internal affairs of sovereign states. Humanitarian intervention refers to the use of military force to prevent or halt serious human rights violations, even without the consent of the state where such violations occur.
Blair's Chicago Speech Criteria for Legitimate Intervention:
Intervening parties must meet several key conditions:
- Be confident of their case and convinced that their interests were engaged
- Have exhausted all diplomatic options
- Establish achievable goals
- Commit to long-term engagement, including the task of rebuilding
This framework encountered criticism from Foreign Office lawyers concerned about implications for international law and the United Nations.
While Blair's thinking differed from American neo-conservative ideology, sufficient overlap existed for initial cooperation. For Blair, this represented the philosophical foundation for what became known as the doctrine of humanitarian intervention.
The doctrine was not merely abstract theory. Blair was simultaneously learning from real-world crises. The speech was delivered during the Kosovo crisis, where Slobodan Milošević's Serbian forces were conducting ethnic cleansing against the Albanian population. Blair rapidly concluded that averting disaster required deploying ground troops. Though Downing Street probably overstated Britain's role in the eventual success, Kosovo gave Blair confidence in his own analysis.
The Kosovo intervention resulted in only two western casualties (helicopter pilots killed in a training accident) and was applauded internationally. Blair viewed Kosovo as a model for humanitarian intervention founded on moral principles.
A comparable success in Sierra Leone during 2000 appeared to vindicate this approach. The intervention seemed to have rescued the former British colony from catastrophic civil strife, further reinforcing Blair's self-assurance. Even the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, responding to 9/11 and rapidly toppling the Taliban government, appeared to follow the same pattern. With each intervention, historian Anthony Seldon notes, Blair 'became stronger and more assured of his own judgement'.
The Iraq War
Bush administration pressure and the 'axis of evil'
Iraq became the central issue on which Blair's decade in office turned. More than any other matter, the war shaped assessments of Blair's government and the Prime Minister personally. Taking into account the traumatic impact of 9/11 and the outlook of influential Bush administration figures, assessments must remain provisional, but Iraq is likely to be regarded as the largest single misjudgement of Blair's premiership.
Vice President Dick Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, both of whom viewed Iraq as unfinished business from the First Gulf War (1991), exerted substantial influence on Bush. America's decision to act against Saddam Hussein became increasingly probable, even though no meaningful connection was ever demonstrated between the Iraqi dictator and the attack on the twin towers.
Bush's 'axis of evil' speech indicated his belief that Iraq was too dangerous for the existing containment policy to continue. By spring 2002, Bush spoke openly of 'regime change'. Regime change means the removal of an existing government and its replacement with a new political system, typically through external intervention.
Blair's position and the Crawford summit
Blair found himself caught in an evolving situation. He regarded terrorism backed by 'weapons of mass destruction' (WMD) as an existential threat to western democracy that could only be addressed through military action. Additionally, he clearly relished being celebrated in the United States as America's best friend and the President's closest ally.
Blair's Stated Conditions for Supporting Action:
Several conditions were established:
- The creation of a broad coalition
- Exhausting the UN route to achieve a settlement
- Tackling the longstanding Middle East problem which Blair believed partly explained Islamic terrorism
These conditions appeared to have been pursued as desirable goals rather than red lines that must be insisted upon.
At the Crawford summit in April 2002, Blair proclaimed a doctrine of pre-emption – the principle that states need not wait to be attacked if they identified a threat emerging. The 9/11 attacks demonstrated that waiting was futile when facing such threats. Saddam Hussein posed precisely such a threat and, though objectively weaker than during the First Gulf War, if the US found itself fighting to defend democratic values, 'we fight with her'.
The WMD dossier controversy
On 24 September 2002, the British government published a report based on Intelligence Services findings. 'Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction – The Assessment of the British Government' became one of the most controversial documents in Britain's path to war. The dossier suggested that 'some of Iraq's WMD could be ready for use within 45 minutes' and that Saddam's 'WMD programme is active, detailed and growing', producing alarmist newspaper headlines.
The Critical Flaw in the 45-Minute Claim:
The document stated that the 45-minute claim related only to tactical battlefield weapons that could not be deployed against the west. If the intelligence agencies' cautious and qualified conclusions had not been misrepresented, then 'every last drop of intelligence was squeezed from the relatively thin raw material to portray the dossier, and hence the justification for war, as strongly as possible'.
As time passed, growing numbers of British citizens concluded that Blair knew Saddam had no WMD but had lied to justify taking the country to war. Cook was more charitable, describing the Prime Minister's 'sin as not one of bad faith but of evangelical certainty'.
UN Resolution 1441 and its limitations
Blair deserves recognition for persuading Bush to seek UN backing for military action, but the resulting Security Council Resolution 1441 proved less than satisfactory. Whilst declaring Saddam in 'material breach' of previous UN resolutions and warning of 'serious consequences' if he failed to comply, the resolution avoided the explicit wording that the UN typically used when sanctioning military action.
The resolution 'fudged the trigger for war', enabling countries such as France and Russia to claim that a breach of 1441 would not authorise war without further UN approval. This ambiguity would prove significant in the debate over the war's legitimacy.
Public opposition and Robin Cook's resignation
On 15 February 2003, London witnessed possibly the largest demonstration in British history, with up to two million people protesting against the prospect of 'Blair's war'. On 7 March, UN weapons inspector Hans Blix, heading a UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission to determine whether Saddam was breaching existing UN resolutions, declared he was making considerable progress and that he had not identified any WMD, requesting more time to complete his mission.
Blair remained undeterred. Cook resigned from the government, with International Development Secretary Clare Short agreeing to remain temporarily despite her opposition to the war. Though the forthcoming parliamentary vote was not constitutionally necessary, Blair – still an effective communicator – spoke passionately supporting the course upon which he was set. The vote passed comfortably with Conservative support, but 139 Labour MPs rebelled. The war began on 19 March 2003. However, the Prime Minister's problems were only beginning.
Key figure: Robin Cook
In his resignation speech to the House of Commons on 17 March 2003, Cook articulated the concerns of many Labour MPs about the rush to war. He stated: 'What has come to trouble me most over past weeks is the suspicion that if ... Al Gore had been elected, we would not now be about to commit British troops.' Cook observed that 'the longer that I have served in this place, the greater the respect I have for the good sense and collective wisdom of the British people.'
Cook's Assessment of Public Opinion:
Cook believed the British public's mood was sound. They:
- Doubted that Saddam posed a brutal threat
- Were not persuaded he represented a clear and present danger to Britain
- Wanted inspections to be given proper opportunity
- Suspected they were being rushed into action by an administration with its own agenda
Cook was particularly uneasy about 'Britain going out on a limb on a military adventure without a broader international coalition and against the hostility of many of our traditional allies'.
His speech provided a compelling critique of Blair's Iraq policy, raising questions about which features genuinely reflected Blair's ethical foreign policy principles.
Aftermath and reconstruction failures
Military victory was achieved quickly and, objectively, represented the overthrow of an oppressive regime and a vindication of Anglo-American policy. However, the anticipated 'Baghdad bounce' did not translate into improved government standing. The primary problem was the failure to discover any WMD. The removal of a brutal tyrant was a worthy accomplishment and had made the world safer. However, critics had become sceptical of New Labour's media management abilities.
To find a new humanitarian basis for war after discovering Saddam possessed no weapons to disarm 'does not ... merely move the goalposts, but transposes the entire football field, stadium and all'. Allegations that the government had manipulated pre-war intelligence prompted a full-scale dispute with the BBC and contributed to the tragic suicide of government scientist David Kelly.
The Greatest Tragedy: Reconstruction Failures
The greatest tragedy of the Iraq invasion lay in America's failure to consider reconstruction tasks seriously. This responsibility, denied to the UN, fell to the US Defense Department. Donald Rumsfeld rapidly became a figure of ridicule in Britain. Catastrophic mistakes were made, particularly the De-Ba'athification policy.
De-Ba'athification refers to the systematic removal of members of Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party from positions in Iraqi society, which eliminated the country's entire administrative infrastructure. This policy deprived Iraq of any viable bureaucratic structure.
Blair appears to have accepted the American belief that no eruption of conflict between Shia and Sunni Muslims would occur once Saddam's controlling hand was removed. In reality, Iraq became impossible to stabilise, descending into chaos and anarchy.
Assessing the consequences
In 2004, Anthony Seldon wrote: 'If Iraq settles quickly into a peaceful democratic nation, if the world becomes a safer place, if no terrorist bombs in Britain follow the 3/11 [2004] attack in Madrid, if WMD proliferation slows, then the view of the war and of Blair's judgement will change.'
The Iraq War: Final Assessment
More than a decade later, the assessment was clear: this best-case scenario failed to materialise. The consequences:
- Iraq did not become a peaceful democratic nation
- The world did not become safer
- Britain experienced terrorist attacks
- WMD proliferation continued
- Blair's reputation was severely and permanently damaged
The consequences for Tony Blair's reputation require no further elaboration.
Key Points to Remember:
- The 9/11 attacks in 2001 transformed Blair's foreign policy, leading him to frame the conflict as a battle between democratic values and terrorism, with Britain standing 'shoulder to shoulder' with America.
- Blair developed a doctrine of humanitarian intervention, outlined in his 1999 Chicago speech, which was seemingly validated by successful interventions in Kosovo (1999), Sierra Leone (2000), and initially in Afghanistan (2001).
- The Iraq War began on 19 March 2003 following a controversial WMD dossier (September 2002), UN Resolution 1441, and massive public opposition (including a demonstration of up to two million people on 15 February 2003) and Robin Cook's resignation.
- No WMD were ever found in Iraq, and reconstruction efforts failed catastrophically, particularly due to the De-Ba'athification policy which destroyed Iraq's administrative infrastructure and led to chaos and sectarian conflict.