LONDON: Their invasion of Iraq made them hate figures for the global anti-war lobby.
Their domestic popularity has plummeted, leaving them vulnerable in forthcoming elections. And both face damaging probes into their government’s conduct on Iraq.
But while British Prime Minister Tony Blair has cause to believe his long political nightmare over Iraq may be past the worst, his American ally and counterpart George W. Bush is lurching deeper into trouble, analysts and diplomats believe.
“Blair has ridden his storm. From here on, he may even see a bit of a recovery,” said Professor Michael Cox, a UK-based expert on international relations.
“For Bush, the clouds are only just gathering.”
Until recently, Bush had looked on with pity as Blair took a political beating before and after the Iraq war — with only a brief respite when British soldiers were engaged in combat.
The US president was relatively immune because Americans were from the outset more supportive of war than the sceptical British, and in the aftermath less fixated on the failure to find weapons of mass destruction.
Neither did Bush face an official inquiry. Until now.
In a development mirroring the probe over the suicide of British scientist and Iraq weapons expert David Kelly, the US Justice Department opened this week a criminal investigation into the leak of a CIA agent’s identity.
The leaking of Kelly’s name, as the source for a BBC report saying Blair’s office “sexed up” the case for war, caused major damage to the British government over the summer.
In the US case, the leak allegedly came from Bush administration officials seeking revenge for criticism of the war by the diplomat husband of the undercover CIA agent.
IMPERIALISTIC HUBRIS: “There are tremendous similarities between this and the Kelly case. Theirs appears to be at the end of the third act, we’re at the first act,” said Stephen Hess, of the Brookings Institute think tank in Washington.
“I think that this actually has more potential to do him (Bush) harm than the Blair one.”
Blair’s ratings have already tumbled as the Kelly inquiry ran through the summer, but a better-than-expected reception at this week’s Labour Party conference appeared to indicate the party will not ditch him and he will run for a third term.
The Kelly inquiry’s findings, due in December, may bring a resignation or two but can hardly embarrass Blair more than he has already been, analysts say.
And despite his collapse in trust, Blair has no strong challenge from opposition parties. Analysts see him on track for a 2005 election win, albeit by a reduced majority.
In the United States, the CIA case has exposed Bush’s White House team to claims they vengefully outed agent Valerie Plame to get back at her husband Joseph Wilson, a former US ambassador who criticized pre-war intelligence on Iraq.
That could compound Bush’s recent slump in popularity to about 50 per cent. And it comes as the American public show increasing irritation with the mounting financial cost and toll of dead US soldiers from the occupation of Iraq.
Unlike Blair, Bush faces a much more serious threat from the opposition Democrats in his 2004 poll.
“Blair in my view is safe. Bush is highly vulnerable,” said politics professor Anthony King, of Britain’s Essex University.
“In the case of Tony Blair, Labour benefits hugely from the fact that the (opposition) Conservative Party for the time being is out of it, simply not taken seriously by voters... In Bush’s case, it all really turns on whether the Democrats can find a candidate to take him on successfully.”
With Iraq now a major negative for both leaders, the only lifelines would be a big improvement in security and conditions within Iraq or the discovery of weapons of mass destruction. Those scenarios, however, look unlikely for now.
For some, it’s simply a case of a plague on both their houses.
“Their falling fortunes are history’s revenge on imperialistic hubris,” said Andrew Murray, head of Britain’s Stop the War movement. The group is preparing for mass demonstrations during Bush’s visit to England in November.—Reuters