Tony Blair's decade of peace and war

Britain's leader, who announced he will step down June 27, leaves a mixed legacy, from Northern Ireland to Iraq.

from the May 11, 2007 edition

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Blair championed greater powers for the United Kingdom's constituent parts, winning plaudits for the settlement in Northern Ireland but inadvertently encouraging those in Scotland and Wales who would like to break away from Britain.

"If one's looking at his big achievements, you have to look at the settlement of Northern Ireland," Professor Grant says, adding that the constitutional changes amount to "an important and irreversible change which may alter the whole nature of UK politics."

But when it comes to Iraq, there is less equivocation. Surveys show that about 7 Britons in 10 believe it will tarnish his legacy. An informal Monitor survey inviting Britons for their views of the best and worst of Blair moments elicited a broad range of positives – the minimum wage, better hospitals, an independent Bank of England, even free museums – but one four-letter word kept cropping up.

"Whatever good he did for this country – actually quite a lot – is totally overshadowed by his crimes in Iraq," says Andrew Sparke, a Londoner.

Iraq brought out the best and worst in Blair: memorable oratory – particularly an impassioned speech to Parliament on the eve of the war – and less glorious attempts to justify the war amid a succession of inquiries into the absence of weapons of mass destruction.

But some would argue that Iraq was part of a broader foreign strategy that did bring some success, most notably in Kosovo and Sierra Leone.

Stephen Twigg, a former Labour Member of Parliament and Blairite minister, says that Blair passionately believed democracies could not ignore dictators perpetrating genocide.

"The previous decade had seen the horrors of Rwanda and Bosnia, and Blair wanted to see a situation where the world would not sit by while ethnic cleansing and genocide went ahead," he says. Yet the legacy of Iraq may make it harder for Blair's successor, Gordon Brown, to mount similar missions.

The legacy of Iraq was also an aggravated terror threat. Though Blair argues that Britain was a target long before the Iraq war, the July 7 bombers invoked the war in their suicide video.

Blair's immediate response was statesmanlike and assured. Throughout his tenure, he impressed on the big occasion. But on law and order – 7/7 was the biggest such challenge – he played tough.

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