This column captures something of my own dismay at European hostility to Anglo-American intervention in Iraq, hostility that has begun to morph into a more worrying loathing of market capitalism as a whole:
The issue was debated many times, but it took shape, for me, in the course of a lengthy and brilliant discourse on the future of the market economy, from a French speaker. While outlining thoughts on financial regulation that would have sat perfectly well on this page, he devoted one section of his speech to the “symbolism” of the September 11 attack on the World Trade Centre. It was of course, he said, an evil act, but the twin towers, as symbols of Western capitalism, had become an almost inevitable target for terrorists; their collapse had something of the Old Testament about it – the razing of a monument to untrammelled power. If we were to counter future threats, we should create different symbols – a form of capitalism that would be less divisive than the American version.
It slipped in so neatly, so rationally, that no one, not even the Americans, listening intently through their earphones, thought to challenge it. Indeed, it was only as I considered it afterwards that I realised what had been said. The implication, not openly stated, was that US economic power was, in itself, a justification for terrorism, that if it was not modified, then it might expect more of the same, and that Europe, if it was wise, should adopt a different model if it was to avoid similar attacks. No mention of 3,000 lives lost; no condemnation of the worst terrorist act of our age; instead, the unmistakable whiff of compromise hovering in the air.
Not compromise. Appeasement. And they are appeasing still. As the shock of that terrible day wears off, the cynics and the carpers will do everything to undermine the huge steps forward we have made since then. The reassertion of American will has provoked an inevitable backlash of resentment that is as much a background noise of the war we are now in as the mortar-fire of guerrilla Baathists in Iraq. And it must be exposed and opposed every bit as vehemently. It’s time to shake off the notion that this war is over or in abeyance. It is absolutely in full swing. And we have to fight back continuously – by arms and words – in case the carpers of defeat overwhelm the prospects for victory.
The Dish 