London was bombed on 7 July 2005 because Prime Minister Blair volunteered Britain to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the US after 9/11, and subsequently invaded Afghanistan and Iraq alongside the US.  There was no inevitability about London being bombed: it was a consequence of a foreign policy choice made by Blair and endorsed by Parliament.  He chose to put Britain in the firing line, and Parliament endorsed his choice.

In a BBC 2 programme broadcast on 8 September 2002, Michael Cockerell asked the Prime Minister whether one of the elements of the UK-US special relationship was whether “Britain is prepared to send troops to commit themselves, to pay the blood price”.  Blair replied:

“Yes. What is important though is that at moments of crisis they (the USA) don't need to know simply that you are giving general expressions of support and sympathy.  That is easy, frankly. They need to know, ‘Are you prepared to commit, are you prepared to be there when the shooting starts?’”

The blood price he was referring to there was military casualties on the battlefield, and that price has been paid to the extent of nearly a hundred deaths and several hundred wounded to date in Iraq.  Another blood price was paid in London on 7 July 2005, when over fifty civilians died and several hundred were injured.  The price will continue to be paid.

Infallible defence

There is an infallible defence against this terrorism on the British homeland, and it doesn’t involve draconian anti-terrorism laws, or searching everybody boarding the Tube, or concrete bollards outside every public building.  It is that we stay at home as a country; that we cease stomping round the Muslim world in the wake of the US.

It’s a very straightforward, and a very cost effective, counter-terrorism strategy: we don’t spend money and blood invading Muslim countries, and we won’t need to spend money protecting the British homeland from terrorism emanating from the Muslim world in response.  And blood will not be spilled on our streets when the protection proves to be fallible.

Bringing our troops home from Iraq now would make us safer than any homeland security measures we could possibly devise – and would also save the lives of British service men and women.

Fabricated nonsense

Since the bombings in London, the British political establishment has been unanimous that Britain’s support for the US in general, and in the invasion of Iraq in particular, played no part in bringing them about.  Instead, we are told – as we have been told by Bush and Blair since 9/11 – that Western democracies are all under threat from Muslim extremists, who want to destroy our way of life (whatever that means) and it was simply Britain’s turn on 7 July 2005.

The ultimate “proof” of this, all sides say in unison, is that al-Qaida’s targets have been many and various, and started long before the Iraq war, as if it were impossible for al-Qaida to take account of ongoing events – such as the support of Britain and Spain for the invasion of Iraq – in choosing targets.

As we will see, this is fabricated nonsense.  Bin Laden came to public attention in 1996 with his declaration of war against the American military presence in Saudi Arabia.  In this, and in everything he has said since, he has not been concerned with changing Western societies but with ending Western interference in the Muslim world.

As for al-Qaida’s targets, up until 9/11, they were US interests abroad, but when other states, including Britain and Spain, chose to make common cause with the US in its invasion of Afghanistan and then Iraq, they became targets too.

Destroying our way of life?

Prime Minister Blair made a statement on the London bombings to the House of Commons on 11 July 2005.  He said:

“Together, we will ensure that, though terrorists can kill, they will never destroy the way of life that we share and value, which we will defend with such strength of belief and conviction that it will be to us and not to the terrorists that victory will belong.”

For the Conservative Party, Michael Howard agreed that our “way of life” was under attack:

“I want to begin by paying tribute to him [the Prime Minister] for the calm, resolute and statesmanlike way in which the Government responded to last Thursday's attack on our capital city, on our citizens and on our way of life. “

Only one MP, Scottish Nationalist leader, Alex Salmond disturbed this mindless consensus.  He referred to a remark by the Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, a couple of days earlier, who had blurted out the obvious fact that some countries are more at risk than others:

"Even intelligence from other countries shows the three Bs—Bush, Berlusconi and Blair—are considered the most exposed to this type of risk."

Salmond asked Blair if Berlusconi had “shared that intelligence information with our Prime Minister”, to which he replied:

“No. The one thing that is obvious from the long list of countries that have been victims of this type of terrorism that I read out is that it does not discriminate greatly between individual items of policy. I am afraid that I must tell the hon. Gentleman that it is a form of terrorism aimed at our way of life, not at any particular Government or policy.”

So, Berlusconi is wrong that the US and its prominent allies are most at risk.  Is Luxembourg about to be attacked?  Or, Sweden?  Or, Switzerland?

None of the Labour MPs who opposed the invasion of Iraq disturbed this mindless consensus.  One of their number, the normally rational Tony Wright, explicitly signed up to it, saying:

“As one of those who opposed the military action in Iraq, may I ask whether my right hon. Friend agrees that those who have been arguing over the past few days that what happened took place only because of that action are talking not only nonsense but dangerous nonsense? We are dealing with a group of Islamo-fascists who are against any form of democratic politics, and on that we should all be united. “

Needless to say the Prime Minister agreed.  In a sense, Wright is right: London didn’t get attacked “only” because of Britain’s support for the invasion of Iraq, but because of a history of supporting US foreign policy in the Muslim world, of which the invasion of Iraq is but the latest example.

Even Ken Livingston has joined the mindless consensus.  Before the invasion of Iraq he warned:

"An assault on Iraq will inflame world opinion and jeopardise security and peace everywhere. London, as one of the major world cities, has a great deal to lose from war and a lot to gain from peace, international cooperation and global stability." (quoted by Tariq Ali in The Guardian on 8 July 2005)

But now he pretends with the rest of them that objective of the London attack was “to destroy our free society” (Press Statement, 7 July 2005).

What does it mean?

The mantra that al-Qaida is out to destroy our way of life is repeated over and over again from all parts of the political spectrum, but what does it mean?  Are these people killing themselves because they object to our electing our leaders?  Or to our reading The Guardian?  Do they want the whole Western world to convert to Islam?  And order our societies according to Islamic law?  And how many bombs in Western cities is it going to take to bring this about?

This is mindless nonsense, and the Government knows it’s mindless nonsense.  The truth cannot be admitted, since to admit the truth would be to admit that the Government’s actions in the Muslim world have caused these awful events to be visited upon London.

The plain truth is that al-Qaida is not concerned with changing Western society.  Its objective is to change US foreign policy towards the Muslim world.  That is why it attacks the US and states allied to the US in pursuing this policy.

This is clear from the many public statements by bin Laden and his associates.  He is concerned with American foreign policy towards, and American actions in, the Muslim world – with US support for Israel in its ongoing theft of Arab land; US support for corrupt and repressive regimes in the Muslim world (Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states); and so on.  Post 9/11, the US has added to an already long list of Muslim grievances by occupying Afghanistan and Iraq.

Before looking at some of bin Laden’s statements, let me quote from two impeccable sources, which advance this view.

Michael Scheuer

First, from Michael Scheuer, who worked for the CIA for 22 years, and was the first head of its al-Qaida desk, serving in this capacity for two years.  While still working for the CIA, he wrote a book entitled Imperial Hubris: Why the West is losing the War on Terror, which was published in 2004.  His view, as summarised in this book, is as follows:

“… the greatest danger for Americans confronting the radical Islamist threat is to believe – at the urging of US leaders – that Muslims attack us for what we are and what we think rather than for what we do.

“Rhetorical political blustering ‘informs’ the public that Islamists are offended by the Western world’s democratic freedoms, civil liberties, intermingling of genders, and separation of church and state.  However, although aspects of the modern world may offend conservative Muslims, no Islamist leader has, for example, fomented jihad in order to destroy participatory democracy, the national association of credit unions, or coed universities.  …

“Al-Qaida’s public statements condemn America’s protection of corrupt Muslim regimes, unqualified support for Israel, the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, and a further litany of real-world grievances.  Bin Laden’s supporters thus identify their problem and believe its solution lies in war.

“[Scheuer] contends they will go to any length, not to destroy our secular, democratic way of life, but to deter what they view as specific attacks on their lands, their communities and their religion.  Unless US leaders recognize this fact and adjust their policies abroad accordingly, even moderate Muslims will be radicalized into supporting bin Laden’s anti-Western offensive.”

US Defense Science Board

A similar view was expressed in a report in September 2004 from the US Defense Science Board, which exists to provide independent advice to the US Secretary of Defense.  The report is on Strategic Communications, that is, the means whereby the US gets its message to the world.  It concludes bluntly that communicating with the Muslim world is impossible at the present time:

“Thus the critical problem in American public diplomacy directed toward the Muslim World is not one of ‘dissemination of information’, or even one of crafting and delivering the ‘right’ message. Rather, it is a fundamental problem of credibility. Simply, there is none – the United States today is without a working channel of communication to the world of Muslims and of Islam.”  (page 41)

And, according to the report, the US is not believed because of its policy towards the Muslim world, and the problem has got much worse since the US invasion of Iraq:

“American direct intervention in the Muslim World has paradoxically elevated the stature of and support for radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to single-digits in some Arab societ