The Eastern Question that haunted the chancelleries of 19th-century Europe has returned to haunt George Bush and Tony Blair; or rather, the consequences of the failure to find a satisfactory answer to it have blighted all attempts to create a new international order in the aftermath of the cold war. This book is required reading for anyone wanting to have an informed opinion on recent events in Iraq; the fact that its author worked for Blair's "Strategic Futures Unit" makes one wonder why the prime minister did not spend more time reading history and less commissioning dodgy dossiers. There are...