Everyone is still asking: Why did Britain go to war in Iraq? Why did Prime Minister Blair support America at every turn? How has the bulldog become a lapdog? And, is Britain now forever just a part of the American empire? In his new book Sidekick Stephen Haseler answers these highly topical and urgent questions. Drawing on research over many years, and on his own experiences in public life on both sides of the Atlantic in London and Washington think-tanks, he outlines the key reasons for Britain's supine attitude towards the USA. Dr. Haseler suggests that it was Tony Blair's desperate need to become a 'celebrity world leader' that led him to become a 'sidekick' to America. He shows how this British 'sidekick' strategy goes back to 1940, and even beyond. And he also shows how the 'lingering imperial illusions' of Britain's official class has led them into becoming a subaltern of Washington in the American empire; and how Whitehall special interests - in the intelligence services and the military - are no longer independent, but serve this empire. Sidekick amounts to a history of how a whole post-war British political generation has turned Britain into a virtual province of the American empire - and in the process shunned improving our relationship with Europe. Finally, he argues that in the new century Britain needs to make a choice between, on the one hand, continuing in 'the unhealthy' relationship with Washington, and, on the other, making a real contribution to building Europe.
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Interesting, but opposes the democratic policy of letting the people vote on the Lisbon Treaty,
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This review is from: Sidekick. Bulldog to Lapdog: British Global Strategy from Churchill to Blair (Paperback)
Professor Stephen Haseler is Director of the Global Policy Institute at London Metropolitan University and Senior Research Fellow of the Federal Trust. In this absorbing book, he traces leading British politicians' attitudes to the EEC/EC/EU and argues that we should end the `special relationship' with the USA and instead integrate with the European Union.He outlines the history of this `special relationship', which he rightly calls `an unhealthy colonial master and servant relationship'. Our current rulers want to be `the USA leading ally' and also to `lead in Europe'. This fantasy of leadership is outdated and arrogant. Haseler believes that it derives from the establishment's inability to adapt to losing the empire. He notes that Whitehall, Westminster, the armed forces and the mass media may be pro-USA, but the British people are not. A YouGov poll of August 2006 for the Spectator found that only 14% believed that we should continue to align ourselves with the USA. Haseler shows how Thatcher and her sons Blair and Brown want to impose a US-style economy on Britain and Europe, creating in Britain `a new, rigid, class system based on inherited wealth'. Already, the richest 1% own 63% of the country's liquid assets; the poorest half own just 1%. Britain's total marketable personal wealth is £2,594 billion, while inheritance tax yields just £2 billion. The inevitable result of boosting the rich has been a rise in the number of the poor: the USA has the highest percentage of low-income persons in the OECD countries. Under British influence, the EU is becoming more and more like the USA. Haseler recounts how in 1997 Labour pledged a referendum on the euro, but never risked holding the referendum because it knew it would lose. Again, in 2004 Labour pledged a referendum on the EU's Constitutional Treaty, but never risked holding the referendum because it knew it would lose. Rather than accept that the people have the right to influence decisions, the ruling class has decided to try to force both the Constitution and the euro on us, over our express objections, whatever the damage to democracy. Haseler backs this decision to override democracy and decries the idea of national sovereignty. But we need to assert our sovereignty and demand our democratic right - a referendum on the Treaty.
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