Blair as trapeze artist

last updated 8 January 2015

London

Britain could be the link that brings Europe and America back together, Prime Minister Tony Blair said in a major speech in London this week. “Call it a bridge, a two-lane motorway, a pivot—or call it a damn high wire, which is how it often feels—our job is to keep our sights firmly on both sides of the Atlantic.” Blair said that the U.S. insistence on unilateralism and military force had been self-destructive, and not only in Iraq. But he also said that Europe had been too quick simply to “ridicule American arguments and parody their political leadership.” He added: “I know of one thing. If we were under direct threat, America would be our ally. If America were to pull up the drawbridge, retreat from its obligations and alliances abroad, the terrorists would attack the rest of us.”