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| The Accidental American | 
| Author: James Naughtie
Publisher: Pan Books
Category: Book
List Price: $11.88
Buy New: $4.80
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Avg. Customer Rating:  3 reviews
Sales Rank: 250598
Media: Paperback
Pages: 356
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 5.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 0330435612
Dewey Decimal Number: 327
EAN: 9780330435611
ASIN: 0330435612
Publication Date: April 1, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com Review
British Prime Minister Tony Blair was regarded as something of a maverick in the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He broke ranks with the majority of his own Labour Party in England, as well as the prevailing opinion among European leaders, to support George W. Bush's plan to topple Saddam Hussein. But according to veteran British newsman James Naughtie, such a maverick approach is completely in character for Blair, who has a long history of sticking with his convictions even if it puts his own popularity at risk. Curiously, that mindset has actually led to a great deal of popularity for Blair, first among the British people and then among American war supporters who lauded Blair for his consistent support of Bush. Contrary to characterizations of Blair being an advocate of invasion purely for political interests or as a victim of neo-conservative brainwashing, Naughtie presents Blair as a man of genuinely independent thought, convinced of not just the viability but the necessity of using force to bring greater security and freedom to the world. The Accidental American focuses heavily on the hours and days following the 9/11 attacks, detailing the urgency Blair felt reacting to the crisis and along the way providing candid (and newsmaking) glimpses inside the corridors of power, such as Colin Powell's characterization of the Dick Cheney-Donald Rumsfeld-Paul Wolfowitz group as "f---ing crazies." While Naughtie interviewed Blair for the book and explains Blair's beliefs and motivations in tremendous detail, the Prime Minister is never laid bare, remaining intriguingly enigmatic throughout. Still, The Accidental American is a valuable look at one of the more fascinating and important figures in modern global politics. --John Moe
Product Description
Tony Blair's affair with America is one of the most compelling stories of our time. He is the Prime Minister whose bonding with George W. Bush imperilled his political future in Britain, while becoming a hero to many Americans after 9/11. In this powerful and compelling narrative, James Naughtie asks why America has so taken him to their hearts, and what this means for our politics, our leaders and the kind of country we are. In seven years, Tony Blair has turned the 'special relationship' into something of a love affair. With unparalleled knowledge and using the testimony of a wide circle of intimate contacts, Naughtie traces the roots of Blair's American obsession - through intimacy of the Clinton years to controversy of the Bush administration's War on Terror - showing how he has revelled in the adulation and respect showered up on him. However this veneration has come at a price. As Blair is attacked by recalcitrant members of his own party and distrusted by an increasingly suspicious electorate, America is remains in his thrall. But should John Kelly prevail over George Bush, how will Blair react? The Accidental American is an important and timely book, written with wit, verve and an acute eye for the contradictions and intrigues behind the Prime Minister's American adventures. This is essential reading for anyone hoping to understand the enigma of Tony Blair.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Why the "special relationship" didn't work for Blair March 6, 2005
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
This book represents a great achievement in explaining what drove the seemingly strange pairing of a UK Labour prime minister and a US Republican President on a venture that hardly any other major political leader in the world supported, being the war on terror post 9/11 which ultimately led to the invasion of Iraq and its ongoing occupation at great cost to the occupiers and the Iraqi people.
The writer is a UK political correspondent with great experience of the Labour Party (he has written the best account to date on the Blair relationship with Gordon Brown, whose unwillingness to remain Number Two features to the end of this book) and the US and while he covers the US aspects very well his real story is on the road that led Blair to a policy that few in his party really supported and has since cost him dear in public perceptions of his leadership.
After a rather unfocussed start (where the story seems to be continually jumping around in time) it settles down into an incisive chronological analysis of how Blair having reached his agreement with Brown to be leader then became prime minister without any prior government office experience and with an unassailable parliamentary majority started to develop links with Clinton which then had to be replaced with Bush after his slim victory over Gore.
That both have developed such a strong personal bond despite very different backgrounds and world views is skilfully explained in the context of Bush badly needing Blair to have international credibility for his very US neo-conservative driven strategy and Blair having taken a very personal decision with little input from his Cabinet in seeking a great international issue to grasp. The book gives a very good feel for the inner workings of Blair's "presidential" style of government especially in Cabinet that led to this being so easily done and which Naughtie demonstrates led to Bush underestimating how far Blair had gone out on a limb and was then exposed to UK parliamentary revolt against that decision.
Naughtie includes lots of personal off record comments that flesh out how the end result was Bush and his Executive conceding little to their end gameplan (the book should kill any remaining views of the UK ever being likely to benefit from the much touted "special relationship" unless US and UK interests are aligned on an issue) and Blair having made a personal commitment based on his early views of Islamic revolutionaries then being moulded post 9/11 into a intransigent loner who trusted his instincts and not the counsel of his colleagues and advisers plus other political leaders. The book is worth buying just for the chapter on the failings of the various Intelligence Services and how in the UK their role was to try and provide evidence and justification for a decision which Blair had already made and in which they failed him plus fooled themselves into not providing the clarity that may have stalled (if not stopped) him.
A very unique book with one of the best book covers I have seen in years!
 Bush is his Co-Pilot: Blair, Bush and the Iraq War January 5, 2005
4 out of 7 found this review helpful
The political behavior of British Prime Minister Tony Blair is something of an enigma - why does he support the American president, so despised in the UK, at great harm to his popularity? Why did he back Bush into the war in Iraq, ostensibly in quest of weapons of mass destructions, even though the UN inspectors urged for more time?
As Blair followed George W. Bush, his popularity in the UK plummeted, his party is in something close to an open revolt, and his standing in Europe has deteriorated. And for all his trouble, it appears that Blair got precious little in return from the American administration. As French President Jacques Chirac recently put it "I am not sure that it is in the nature of our American friends at the moment to return favors systematically."
British journalist James Naughtie, author of another acclaimed book about Tony Blair (the Rivals, about the relationship between Blair and Gordon Brown), tries to answer these questions precisely. His answer is that Blair is a true believer; he believes that the 9/11 has been a wake up call for the world. "I could see this Islamic Extremism... bring about a very dangerous conjunction of terrorism and states that are utterly unstable and repressive" (quoted on p. 203). These views of Blair's antedated 9/11. They were the impetus for his promotion of the Kosovo war. Already in the late 1990s, Blair saw a new international order rising, one based on the struggle against evil. The terrorist threat required a whole new political philosophy:
"Before September 11th the world's view of the justification of military action had been changing. The only clear case in international relations for armed intervention had been self-defence, response to aggression. But the notion of intervening on humanitarian grounds had been gaining currency" But after 9/11, "What had seemed inchoate came together." The need for security required preemptive action. Countries which suppressed freedom, harbored terrorists or had weapons of mass destruction had to be dealt with. In effect, Blair agreed with Condoleezza Rice's claim that "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud".
So is the Labour PM really in accord with Bush, Cheyney and Rumsfeld? In Naughtie's thorough discussion, it is not so simple. There is a great difference between Bush and Blair. Naughtie quotes Blair as saying "I never quite understand what people mean by that neocon thing" (p.71)
That may be the key to explain the great divide between Blair and the Bush administration. Blair may not be aware of the gap, or of its enormity. The Prime Minster believes in the importance of democracy. For him, the military action against Iraq or El Qaeda is only a part of a greater attempt to create international security and peace. "You cannot deal with terrorism security as simply a security issue. You also have to deal with the more compassionate side of the issue... the poverty, the lack of interfaith understanding. All these things need to be part of the agenda." Although Bush and his administration may pay lip service to these ideals, for them internationalism and real international cooperation are anathema. They cannot possibly support them.
In my view, Blair's partnership with Bush committed him to the Bush administration's incompetent, corrupt and extremist policies. Naughtie seems to think that Blair's support was essential or at least important, to Bush (see for example p. 203). But I disagree - in the Bush administration, the moderates, as Paul O'Neal observed, act as cover only. Bush would use Blair for all he is worth - but he would concede nothing in return.
I have much sympathy for the ideology Blair advocates, but Bush is no partner for promoting it. Blair's collaboration with the Bush administration not only diminishes his popularity - it also discredits his cause.
Useful account of Blair's links with Bush October 24, 2004
5 out of 7 found this review helpful
James Naughtie, the Today presenter, has written a useful account of Blair's links with the USA, particularly with Bush and his colleagues. Naughtie recalls that when he asked Pentagon insider Richard Perle what came next after Afghanistan, Perle replied, "The really important thing is that there is a next."
So, in January 2002, Bush set the timetable for invading Iraq and told Blair. Blair then promised to join Bush's war, secretly changing government policy from peace to war, without telling anybody.
Naughtie writes that the `bloodstream' of the US-British special relationship is the intelligence linkage. Indeed, the USA's intelligence services are the world's biggest and most expensive. Yet all the US intelligence claims about Iraq's WMD - the uranium oxide bought from Niger, the mobile chemical laboratories - have been proven false. US intelligence was so bad that the CIA's head resigned, and his deputy left too.
The Labour government had all these intelligence resources behind them. Yet their notorious government dossier on WMD was largely pilfered from a ten-year-old PhD thesis! So what, exactly, did Britain gain from this so-special relationship and its precious `bloodstream'?
As a result of the illegal invasion of Iraq, there is now an illegal occupation of Iraq. Naughtie quotes a senior Foreign Office man who described the US's occupation policy as `a catastrophe from beginning to end'.
When Naughtie asked Blair if he agreed with the White House lawyer who said that the Geneva Conventions were `quaint', Blair replied, "Of course not. Neither do the Americans." Typically, Blair was denying the evidence just put in front of him.
Labour's war (for the Labour Party could have stopped it, but didn't even try) has weakened all that it holds dear. The link with the USA is in danger, the EU split, NATO divided, the Labour Party eviscerated, and Parliament, the Foreign Office and the intelligence services all discredited. But worse, Labour's war has made Israel increase its killings, thrown the Middle East into chaos, worsened the risks of terrorism to Britain and elsewhere, and added the danger of endless wars in a `clash of civilisations'.
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