To accuse a British Prime Minister of 'playing politics' with the lives of our young soldiers is a very serious charge. I could not have contemplated such as shocking thing before the Iraq war. But I believe Tony Blair knowingly lied to the British people in order to win support for his decision to invade. I was guilty of gullibility at the time - and gave my full support to our Prime Minister and to our troops because I accepted that our national interest was threatened. Gordon Brown would have known exactly what Blair was doing. He was complicit in the deceit.
On Tuesday, Gordon Brown flew into Iraq and announced the withdrawal of 1000 British troops. Brown's 'spin machine' in trying to tell us this was just the routine business of government. I believe that they are lying. It was the middle of the Conservative Party Conference. Brown is hoping to be in a position to call a General Election tomorrow, or early next week. The troop reductions had already been announced. Shamefully, the BBC gave this visit wall-to-wall coverage. It seems to me that the visit which the Prime Minister of Great Britain arranged was for the specific purpose of using our armed forces for his own partisan political purposes. He is a national disgrace.
The visit will prove to be a big mistake. The BBC may have swallowed the bait - but the British people will not be so gullible. Brown intends to call a General Election as an opportunistic 'cut and run' election while his premiership remains in its 'honeymoon' period (so opportunistic that I am converted to the idea of fixed term parliaments). It will give a massive advantage to incumbent MPs and will undermine our democracy. He would probably have got clean away with it, by persuading us that he needs his own 'personal' mandate. But the opportunism that Brown has so shamelessly exhibited by his visit to Iraq, added to his calling of an election (costing the taxpayer about 100 million) after not much more than two years will show the British people just what a shallow opportunist the man is. He has made a serious mistake. He should be punished by the voters.
7 comments:
> The troop reductions had already been announced.
To be strictly accurate, half of them had already been announced. But double- and even triple-counting in government announcements has been going on so long that the habit is now ingrained.
What worries me about the future for the British contingent in Iraq is that they will not be responsible for their own security, but have to rely on the Americans.
- Frank Little
Glyn. Long time, no comment. Just to let you know the Mont Witness blog has now moved to www.montgomeryshirewitness.wordpress.com. Can you update your link? Also, I'll be back to my commentary after a short break!
And he will be.
Please note that 275 members of the 'already' announced 500 are already back in Tidworth. The remainder are due back soon. The "other" 500 are members of 4 (Mech) Brigade who are in Germany and have not yet deployed to Iraq.
After the performance by Bob Ainsworth MP on Newsnight and on Today it is small wonder that the Armed Forces are served so poorly. That ignorant bluffer is the Minister of State for the Armed Forces. Paxton kept a straight face for most of the time.
Opportunistic, disgraceful and a flagrant two fingers to the British Public who were promised that Politics will change and that Parliament would be the first to hear of announcements.
Not Flash..Just Gordon! should be replaced by
Gordon...As Flash as a Rat with a Gold Tooth.
Cant log in properly so Anon but am Meifodboy
strong stuff glyn and not your usual reasonable self but fully justifid in the circumstances
I thought last night that this was the most cynical and despictable political stunt that I could remember.Thank goodness that it seems to have backfired spectacularly.Blatently to have tried to use our troops for electioneering purposes at their time and place of greatest danger is beneath contempt.We now know the true measure of Brown.Incidentally.did you see the wretched Ainsworth on BBC last night.He was transfixed with fear.He knew that he was trying to defend the indefensible.
So far, all I've seen is the media speculating that we will have an early election, which is no suprising seeing that we are still pretty much in "silly season"
Frank - I accept that only 500 had already been announced - but my substantive point stands.
Penlan - I totally agree. I didn't see Ainsworth last night, but I'm told by others that he was awful.
Anon - problem for Brown now is that if he doesn't go for it, he will have chickeded out. He's been caught out being too clever for his own good. I'm working on the assumtion that there's going to be an election on Nov 1st or 8th.
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