Blair the Travelling Salesman
Blair's global posturings are nauseatingly phony, says John Tyndall

British people with some vestige of national self-respect will surely have experienced recurring vomiting tendencies over the past few weeks while witnessing their Prime Minister's seemingly endless wanderings as international peacemaker, conciliator, head-banger and moral lecturer to the planet. In previous commentaries we have remarked on the pile-up of domestic crises over health, transport, crime and immigration as Tony's travels take him from one capital to another, in conference with one foreign leader after another, as he attends to every nation's business but his own. More recently, the theme has been taken up by numerous mainstream journalists and even now by the Tory Opposition. In the Commons on January 9th Graham Brady, Conservative MP for Altrincham, asked the Premier if he could turn his attention to the health service during his "current visit to the UK," while Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith said of him: "Instead of talking about a new world order abroad, the Prime Minister should sort out the new disorder at home."

Tony's globe-trotting circus reached the final pits of undignified farce when he arrived in India and promptly told the locals that "he was there to exert as strong a calming influence as possible" over India's dispute with Pakistan concerning the disputed territory of Kashmir. He was curtly told by an Indian minister Pramod Mahajan that India had been calm enough over the matter for 50 years - a reference to the long-lasting nature of the conflict. That was, perhaps one of the more polite thoughts in the minds of Blair's hosts, who in fact would have been more than justified if they had issued a public injunction to him to mind his own bloody business.

Getting backs up
The Premier had earlier got Indian backs up when he said: " Of course, Pakistan has a very strong position on Kashmir and they are entitled to that position." This was taken, rightly or wrongly, as a declaration of sympathy with the Pakistanis, and Blair was later forced to wriggle out of it by saying that he had been quoted "out of context" - all just another indication that whenever leaders try to poke their noses into other countries' affairs they are onto a loser whatever they say.

When meeting the Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf, Blair proceeded to give his host what was a thinly veiled talking to. He said that from his talks with the Indians he was convinced that India would be ready to discuss Kashmir - but only if Pakistan took tougher action against Kashmiri terrorists inside its borders. Just before this, he had said:-

‘It is important that we co-operate in the fight against terrorism wherever it is. Terrorism is terrorism, wherever it occurs, whoever are its victims.’

Wherever it occurs? Coming from the man who has spent the past four and a half years appeasing terrorists in Northern Ireland, this would be laughable but for the reminder that the deaths of their victims are no joking matter. Of this issue, more anon.

Repeatedly during his travels, Blair, accompanied by wife Cherie, sought in the most gut-wrenching ways to ingratiate himself with his hosts while by a series of gaffes he succeeded in offending them. Perhaps the worst scene was in India on the 7th January when the two decked themselves out as if they were attending a fancy-dress party. Our Prime Minister wore a suit which seemed to be designed to make him appear a Nehru look-alike - the impression heightened as he posed for the cameras with hands cupped together - while on another occasion he appeared with some kind of exotic rug draped over his shirt and tie. Cherie in one appearance wore an iridescent blue trouser suit, prompting a Daily Mail reporter to remind readers that the two were "keen followers of ethnic fashion." Of course.

Such spectacles evoke, by a kind of association of opposites, the days of a century or more ago when the then Indian population of over 300 millions was somehow ruled, controlled and kept in order by just a few tens of thousands of British colonial officials, administrators, clerks and soldiers. This extraordinary relationship was preserved, not by the Indians necessarily loving us, but by our capacity to earn and sustain their respect. We have indeed sunk a long way since those times when we reach a point at which a British prime minister and his Mem-sahib see fit to clown about in such alien clothes without it, apparently, occurring to them that they are humiliating the whole British nation by their behaviour. Pray, do not bother Tony with such outmoded trifles!

Derision in press
A lot of this was too much for the press back home. Matthew d'Ancona, writing in the Sunday Telegraph on January 6th lamented:-

‘What is the difference between God and Tony Blair? Answer: God is everywhere, but Tony Blair is everywhere except Britain. When the Prime Minister said last week that he wanted to "exert a calming influence" on his trip to India and Pakistan, it occurred to me that he has come to see himself as an international painkiller, a sort of NeuroBlairPlus. A crisis erupts on the other side of the planet and our intrepid leader jumps on a plane to resolve it. Only crises in this country seem to escape his attention.’

Seeking a possible explanation of the Blair fetish for global busy-bodying, d'Ancona continued:-

‘International arbitration looks hard, and doubtless it is often very stressful: but the stakes are not always as high as they appear. Making the 8.15 from Basingstoke run on time, or cutting waiting lists for heart operations, or reducing violent street crime, is very difficult indeed. But flying to the sub-continent, doing your best, and then flying somewhere else carries few political risks. Success is less important than the spectacle of honourable statesmanship. In contrast, no amount of shuttle diplomacy around Britain can make parents happy with state schools or patients content with their health care. There is no drama in the reform of education and health: only a long, grinding haul punctuated by public frustration with the pace of change.’

Peter Mackay in the Daily Mail (January 7th) was considerably more scathing:-

‘Hands tended like a holy man, his face an actor's mask of sympathy and understanding, Nehru-jacketed Tony Blair makes himself - and Britain - look deeply silly in India...

‘Mr. Blair's trip to the sub-continent is pointless and silly. How would we feel if an Indian or Pakistani premier fetched up in Belfast saying they'd come to calm things down? There is no-one in the Blair entourage with the guts to tell him how absurd he and Cherie look, dolled up as panto Indians, while the people they should be calming down - those who elected them - rage about a filthy, congested, useless transport system, soaring violent crimes and a health service which is an expensive disgrace.’

Then in the same paper the next day Stephen Glover added his two-pennyworth:

‘What is Mr. Blair playing at? If he wants to put on a Nehru jacket (when most Indians around him are wearing a collar and tie), and press his hands together in a Hindu greeting, and like Cherie cover himself in a rug - well, the Indians are a very polite people and there seems no very good reason to object. But when he plays the messianic and visionary statesman who knows what is best for India and Pakistan, if only they would do what he says, then it really is time to think about summoning the chaps in white coats.’

Meanwhile Richard Littlejohn in The Sun (January 8th) wrote:-

‘Blair and the Wicked Witch... are demonstrating the classic symptoms of going completely bonkers.

‘Their raid on the dressing-up box for their state visit to Pakistan and India was a dead giveaway.

‘Here is a couple which has clearly lost all grip on reality...

‘The Wicked Witch doesn't pull on a short denim skirt and white stilettos when she visits Romford.

‘Blair doesn't wear a Jimmy bonnet, a kilt and a skean-dhu when he goes to Scotland. So why do they feel it necessary to go native when they visit the sub-continent?

‘By dressing-up like Bollywood extras, the Blairs have made themselves and their country look absolutely ridiculous.

‘They may think they are being courteous to their hosts but they are being patronising and condescending.’

All true, but perhaps not absent from the thoughts of the two might be the little matter of votes in Southall and Bradford! Let the last word go to "Taki" in The Spectator (January 12th):-

‘Although he's hardly my favourite character, I'm seriously worried about Tony Blair. I feel he's in the middle of a nervous breakdown. As a peacemaker in India, covered by a rug, looking campy and resembling a dipsophobe who has walked into a friendly pub, Blair has to have lost it. No other explanation will do. He's always been smarmy and bogus, but this time he brought to mind a catamite in satyromaniacal ecstasy. Non-stop photo opportunities have done to Tony what cocaine and smack did to the late Lord Bristol. The man is a human wreck but he doesn't know it, as desperate for a TV-camera fix as any junkie, and only a palace coup can save him from a Flying Dutchman existence.

‘This must have been the most absurd foreign trip by a British prime minister since Munich, where at least precious time was bought. A prime minister desperately in search of a cause outside his own country can be a very funny thing - for a soap opera. In real life it is quite grotesque.’

"Anti-Terrorism" selective
All of this suggests that we on the so-called ‘far right’ are not alone in our revulsion at Tony's antics, and that is a reassuring thing. But these apt and colourful commentaries exclude one particular consideration, which gives even further ground for nausea. In Blair's posture as a crusader against terrorism, brutality and violence he picks his targets with great political care and sensitivity. Who qualifies to be among the Premier's ‘terrorists’ depends very much on what kind of terrorist he is, in what cause he murders and maims and which particular people are unfortunate enough to be his victims. In his righteous declarations to the world, Tony Blair is an exponent par excellence of what Sir Arnold Lunn used to call ‘selective indignation.’

"It is important that we co-operate in the fight against terrorism, wherever it is. Terrorism is terrorism, wherever it occurs, whoever are its victims." One wonders as to the reaction to these words of the bereaved relatives of those who have perished at the hands of the IRA and not long ago witnessed 445 terrorists being let out of the jails by Tony Blair's Government to run loose and kill again should the fancy take them. One wonders about those who lost loved ones in the Omagh bombing and who are aware, as doubtless most of them are, that the authorities are fully acquainted with the identities of the culprits but are not arresting or charging them because to do so might endanger the ‘peace process’ in Northern Ireland - a ‘peace process’ that has involved ministers of the Blair Government, including Blair himself, sitting down and sharing tea and cakes with the terrorists' political allies, Sinn Fein, in No. 10 Downing Street; a ‘peace process’ that has involved the acceptance as Northern Ireland Minister of Education of the man who back in the late 1960s and 1970s was 2IC of the IRA's Londonderry brigade and has privately admitted his own direct participation in murder.

But why stop at Northern Ireland and the IRA? Let us look elsewhere. What about former Rhodesia, now known as ‘Zimbabwe’? There a mad dictator presides, whose followers have over the past few years been carrying out acts of the most inhuman terrorism against white farmers and their families, including murder, rape and illegal seizure of their properties. Not only this, but Robert Mugabe's thugs have not hesitated to butcher their fellow Blacks if the latter happen to show disapproval of his regime.

With elections coming up in March this year, the Mugabe Government has just recently put new legislation through the puppet parliament making it a criminal offence to criticise the country's chief.

Ethnic cleansing in Zimbabwe
What in fact has been happening in ‘Zimbabwe’ is a policy of ‘ethnic cleansing’ clearly intended to get rid of the country's remaining Whites - a policy no different to that on the pretext of which Blair approved the bombing of Serbia for its treatment of the Albanian minority there, and has subsequently sent British ground forces to the area to ensure the latter's safety.

Stephen Glover, this time writing in The Spectator of the 12th January, reminded us (in case Mr. Blair would have us forget) what is going on in Mugabeland, saying:-

‘The world knows that awful things are going on in Zimbabwe, but is probably unaware of how awful they are. I hadn't realised, until I was in the country last week, that between 80 and 90 per cent of white-owned farms have already been confiscated, or scheduled for confiscation, and that some Blacks are already dying of starvation. Nor had I grasped how widespread Mugabe's reign of terror is.’

What is happening to the white farmers in ‘Zimbabwe’ is sheer theft. It also amounts to racism - supposedly the most diabolical crime in Tony Blair's catalogue. Yet because the racism is directed at Whites by a black government it seems to occupy a much lower priority for attention than if it were the reverse. And as for the Blair Government actually doing anything, all we have heard so far are a few pious and muted murmurs of regret. So much for the claim that "terrorism is terrorism, wherever it occurs." Crusader Tony, when confronted with the brutal facts about the current terror in ‘Zimbabwe’ prefers to adopt the posture of the three monkeys.

And that is not all. For decades, Palestinians have been suffering a reign of terror at the hands of Israel, and in recent weeks this has escalated considerably. Amazingly, a mainstream publication, New Statesman, printed an article on the 14th January by maverick left-wing journalist John Pilger which showed that Tony Blair, no less, is up to his eyeballs in complicity with all this. Said Pilger:-

‘Tony Blair's heroic peacemaking is not as it seems. Take the Middle East. When Blair welcomed Yasser Arafat to Downing Street following 11 September, it was widely reported that Britain was backing justice for the Palestinians... The meeting with Arafat was no more than a public relations exercise designed to placate the Arab world. It served to disguise Blair's support for the Zionist project and his role as Ariel Sharon's closest ally in Europe.’

Pilger went on to say:

‘Under Blair, British support for Israeli repression has accelerated. Last year alone, the Government approved 91 arms export licences to Israel, in categories that included ammunition, bombs, torpedoes, rockets, missiles, combat vessels, military electronic and imaging equipment and armoured vehicles. In answer to questions from George Galloway MP, the Foreign Office minister Ben Bradshaw said there was "no evidence" that British arms and equipment had been used against the Palestinians. There is abundant evidence, such as Amnesty's report that Apache helicopters used to attack the Palestinians are kept flying with British parts.’

And:-

‘With no objections from Britain, Israel hopes to open an army recruiting office in London - even though it would be recruiting for a war that stems from the occupation of the Palestinian territories which the British Government says is illegal. This will be in violation of the Government's new anti-terrorism legislation, as Israel's attacks on the occupied territories are, by any definition, terrorism. Of the hundreds killed and thousands wounded during the uprising, 90 per cent have been Palestinian civilians, 45 per cent have been under 18 years of age and 60 per cent were shot while in their homes, schools and workplaces.’

Just as with terrorism in ‘Zimbabwe’, Blair is doing nothing in the slightest way effective to oppose, least of all prevent, butcher Sharon's terrorism against the Palestinian people. The reason? This should not be difficult to ascertain. Blair is head of a country which accommodates an Israeli lobby second only in power and leverage to that of the United States. He is head of a party in which Jews have for long played a role out of all proportion to their numbers. Last but not least, his ‘political office’ which provided the main springboard of organisation and propaganda that enabled him to win the last two general elections has been financed almost exclusively by Jewish businessmen, among whom his tennis-partner pal Michael (Lord) Levy has been a leading light. Nothing approaching this exists in the way of Palestinian pressure groups in Britain.

Revolting performance
Tony's comic opera performance as a world missionary against terrorism is revolting enough to the nostrils when one observes his and his wife's ludicrous dressing-up antics and his constant meddling in other nations' affairs. It is all the more so when we look at the mammoth domestic problems we have here in Britain crying out for the attention of a national leader whose preoccupation seems to be with photo-calls, one moment in the Balkans, the next in Afghanistan, the next in India and then in Pakistan - followed, we are informed, by a tour of Africa as the next stop on the prime ministerial itinerary.

But the ultimate revulsion comes when it is realised that the whole thing is utterly phony from top to bottom. Blair is not really interested in combating terrorism per se; his record makes a mockery of the idea. He simply wants to be seen opposing particular forms of terrorism where he will win the approval of the people who call the political shots both nationally and internationally, who put him in office and serve to keep him there. He wants to remain the blue-eyed boy of the ‘New World Order’ crowd, the globalist elite who currently wield the supreme power and who can make or break politicians like him at will. He is the bought puppet of these people, and at their bidding he will shake his fist at one group of terrorists while ignoring another group of terrorists - when he is not actually helping them!

It is the tragedy of Britain, in one of the darkest hours of her history, to be afflicted with a creature like this as prime minister, surrounded as he is by other creatures equally disgusting in their craving for office, status, rank and the illusion of ‘power’, and equally willing to sanction criminality of the most subhuman kind just as they speechify against it.

In healthier times in our long island and imperial story we have hanged people for much less.