Regards, Ivan
Posted on 06/30/2004 10:22:42 PM PDT by MadIvan
Tony Blair called yesterday on leading members of the Nato alliance, including France and Germany, to demonstrate more commitment to the efforts of the United States and Britain to counter international terrorism.
In a statement to MPs on his return from the Nato summit in Istanbul, Turkey, Mr Blair said the alliance had begun to understand the terrorist threat and its implications.
But he was worried that Nato's response was still "not sufficient to the challenge we face".
He said the alliance's adversary was no longer the Soviet Union but terrorism and unstable states, which dealt in chemical, biological and nuclear weapons - "and the possibility of the two of them coming together".
Although Mr Blair did not name any members of Nato that were not pulling their full weight, he has faced opposition from both Jacques Chirac, the French President, and Gerhard Schröder, the German Chancellor, in pushing for a more active role for the alliance's forces in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Michael Howard, the Conservative leader, said France was reported to have insisted that there should be no Nato flags or insignia on the uniforms of soldiers sent to help Iraq.
In a clear reference to French and German opposition to the Iraq war, Mr Blair said that even those countries that "passionately disagreed" with the conflict should now be clear that they were "without doubt" on the side of defeating terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan. "Succeeding in it would be a fitting way to reinvigorate the trans-Atlantic alliance and heal its divisions," he said.
He underlined his frustration when he backed criticism from Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, the Nato secretary-general, of the attitude of alliance members over providing additional troops for the peace-keeping mission in Afghanistan.
Mr Blair said he would have liked to have had a larger number of troops in Afghanistan from the beginning. He announced that Britain had offered to provide the UK-led Allied Rapid Reaction Corps, one of Nato's high-readiness headquarters, to lead the international peace-keeping force in Afghanistan in 2006.
Andrew MacKay, the Conservative MP for Bracknell, said he had been to Afghanistan and came away with the impression "that there was an immense danger that unless Nato acted quickly there was going to be a disaster on our hands".
Mr Blair indicated that the Government would make an announcement on whether more British troops would be sent to Iraq by the end of July, when the new Iraqi government and the multi-national force would publish plans for dealing with terrorism.
He announced the award of a special civilian medal to mark the extraordinary contribution of the "many British public servants, policemen and women and volunteers" who had played crucial roles to help the Iraqi people rebuild their lives.
Regards, Ivan
Ping!
God bless Mr. Blair, of all times, now.
And the Poles too.
And Israel.
France and Germany won't do squat... leave them for the Islamofascist hordes.
Wouldn't want the terrorists to be able to identify the countries of origin for their pursuers, now would the weasels?
bttt
How do these people get elected?
Thanks Ivan.
I guess the fact that the US invoked article whateveritis right after 9/11 doesn't really matter now. Must be something in the fine print about a statute of limitations.
Appeasers - they deserve the fate they're making for themselves.
This turned into a renewed discussion of a French boycott, and an appeal to buy more Aussie wines!
Tony Lloyd (Manchester, Central) (Lab): "Let me continue the theme of Afghanistan. My right hon. Friend is entitled to exempt himself from the following criticism, but one of the worrying features of Kosovo and Afghanistan is that the world moves on quickly and loses interest in completing the job. It is vital, for reasons that my right hon. Friend has already mentioned, that we properly finish the job of reconstruction in Afghanistan, for both that country and the signals that that will convey elsewhere. Will he speculate on American reaction to the failure of NATO allies to play a proper role? The Americans have the opportunity to walk away from NATO."
The Prime Minister: "My hon. Friend's point is correct. The NATO alliance depends on strong American commitment and people should recognise how vital that is. The Americans have some 17,000 troops in Afghanistan, where the strategy is to put provincial reconstruction teams in the north and west of the country. Problems with various private militias exist there, but none the less the Afghan force capability can be built up reasonably successfully. We have been doing that at Mazar-e-Sharif. The real problem is therefore in the south, where pockets of the Taliban and al-Qaeda exist. That requires a fighting force, which the Americans are providing."
"The American contribution is vital to the security of our world. I have always said that the danger is not that the Americans exert their power, but that they could pull up the drawbridge and tell us to get on with our business. We need the Americans. The most powerful contributions at the NATO summit are by the east European countries, which are now democracies and know well the value of the transatlantic alliance."
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