Blair pays tribute to the statesmanship of President Bush, speaks of the humanitarian effort to help the four million Afghan refugees who are 'on the move -- (we may hope, not towards the Channel Tunnel.)

Sunday, October 7, 2001
(Key West, Florida, USA)

12 midday at [. . .] for lunch. At 1:15 pm I see a knot of people round the TV behind the bar, and it is George W Bush on the screen -- speaking with as much colour and verve as the artificial electronic voice Agnes on my Macintosh, even the "high quality" variant -- announcing that US and British forces are attacking Afghanistan. By which he means Tomahawk cruise missiles, launched at Kabul and at "terrorist camps", it turns out, from a safe distance, underwater, by British submarines.

Heigh-ho, so Bush and Blair drag us in to their mad operation Operation Enduring Freedom: It may well turn out that this should be called Operation What Goes Around.

At 1:51 pm Tony Blair comes on the screen, live from No. 10 Dowing-street, spewing all the phoney sincerity for which he is justly well known.

He pays tribute to the British armed forces, calling them the very best in the world. "We made it clear on Sept. 11 that we would take part in an action once it was clear who was responsible. There ns no doubt in my mind, nor those who have been through the available evidence, that these attacks were carried out by the al-Qaida network masterminded by Osama bin Laden, harboured and supported by the Taliban regime inside Afghanistan." It is clear that they have refused to accept our ultimatum. They could have sided with justice, but they sided with terror.

Military attacks will be targeted against al-Qaida or Taliban targets, says Blair, and says he is "mindful of our determination to do all we humanly can to avoid civilian casualties." Last Wednesday the US Govt requested that Britain use British military assets and "I gave authority" for the use of bases at Diego Garcia, recce aircraft and British missile-firing submarines. "The missile-firing submarines are in use tonight."

Blair pays tribute to the statesmanship of President Bush, speaks of the humanitarian effort to help the four million Afghan refugees who are "on the move" -- (we may hope, not towards the Channel Tunnel.)

Blair also tells the British why it matters "so much" to Britain. He recalls rightly that the Sept. 11 attacks in new York and Washington were the worst terrorist outrage against British citizens in our history, and he speaks of the effect on the British economy and unemployment.

More interestingly, he says that the al-Qaida network funds the drug trade, claiming that 90 percent of the heroin on British streets comes from the Taliban. It is not, he stresses, a war on Islam. "People are bound to be concerned about what the terrorists will do in response." There is, he says, no threat to the UK "that we know of," and "we have contingency plans." This cause, he says, "is just." The murder of the 7,000 in America was an attack on our freedom. "We will not let up or rest until our objectives are met in full."

BLAIR has toured Russia, India, and Pakistan, drumming up support. On Tuesday Oct. 2, speaking to the Labour party conference, Blair said he would be with the United States "to the very end", which seems an unfortunate turn of phrase. When you fight an unseen enemy, how do you know when the end is nigh, or for that matter who has won or lost?

Blair and Lord Robertson have loudly pronounced that they have been shown "compelling evidence" to shore up the US claim that Osama bin Laden is the culprit.

The American public might well wonder how it is that they, the American people, are not being trusted with the stuff that foreigners are shown. The fact is of course that Washington is following the dictum espoused by Dr Joseph Goebbels in 1940 -- one of his famous four guidelines for effective propaganda: When you are about to propagate a government-inspired lie, instructed Goebbels, never do it in your own domestic media -- always plant it abroad, for instance in an authoritative Swedish or Mexican source, and then quote it from there in your own. That way, if the lie is exposed as such, it can be disclaimed. Plausible deniability, but the other way round.

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