DAVID Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy were at pains to stress they had not come to Libya in search of lucrative reconstruction contracts and easy-terms oil deals. Their tone in Tripoli on Thursday was far too high-minded for that. But in truth, like self-styled conquering heroes through history, the British and French leaders arrived in hot pursuit of victors’ laurels that may, in time, produce a handy financial payback. This was, first and foremost, the Dave and Sarko spoils of war tour.

Not since Tony Blair single-handedly liberated Kosovo from the Serb oppressor (with secondary back-up from Nato and the US air force) has a British prime minister been able to claim plaudits as a successful war leader. Afghanistan and Iraq certainly don’t qualify. The time lag is even longer for France’s president. The Crimea in 1856 was a win. After that, the French record is patchy. Cameron is no Churchill and does not pretend to be. But Dogged Desert Warrior beats the Bullingdon Champagne Charlie image every time.

Politically speaking, the descent of the Anglo-French dynamic duo on an unsuspecting but dutifully grateful AFE (Almost Free Libya) was an opportunity too good to miss. Battered and buffeted at home by recycled recession, joblessness, penniless Greeks, and electoral unpopularity, Cameron and Sarkozy had a chance, briefly, to walk tall.

It was not exactly a Roman triumph. But, according to Ryan Lucas of the Associated Press in Tripoli, “several Libyans clapped and reached out to touch the British and French leaders as they walked towards a hospital where they met with amputees and other patients who were injured in the fight against Qadhafi. Doctors, nurses and other staff also offered a round of applause.”

Such affecting scenes are rare when Cameron enters a British hospital ward. More likely a crutch round the earhole than a pat on the back.

Symbolism aside, Cameron and Sarkozy’s visit served several useful purposes. One was to give a practical boost to the still shaky National Transitional Council (NTC), the unelected and not universally popular would-be successor to Muammar Qadhafi. This is vital as long as Qadhafi and his sons and clansmen are on the loose, regime loyalists in key cities maintain their defiance, and doubts persist about whether the cobbled-together NTC alliance of armed factions and regional tribal groups will hold up.

The visit sent a clear message to Qadhafi that he was finished and there was no way back. “It’s over. Give up ? It is time for him to give himself up and time for Libyan people [to see] him face justice,” Cameron said. It paved the way for a new UN mission to Libya that will assist postwar governance; Britain will introduce a draft resolution in the UN Security Council authorising the unfreezing of billions of dollars of Libyan state assets. London will also offer funds for mine clearance, weapons decommissioning, medical assistance for war casualties, and help in locating Gaddafi’s supposed chemical weapons stockpiles.

The visit made another diplomatically useful point about the effectiveness of Anglo-French defence collaboration. Britain and France, Europe’s two military heavyweights, took the lead on the Libyan intervention in the teeth of outright opposition from Germany and pusillanimity in Washington. — The Guardian, London