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Terror: Blair for hard military power

Hasan Suroor

LONDON: British Prime Minister Tony Blair has warned that the "war'' against Islamist terrorism is likely to last another 20 years and that Britain should be prepared to use its "hard'' military power to defeat it.

In a major speech, outlining what has been dubbed the "Blair doctrine'' ahead of his planned retirement this summer, he accused his political critics and the media of giving succour to terrorists by attacking his policies.

Acts of senseless terrorism were sought to be blamed on "failed'' Western tactics rather than on its perpetrators, he said addressing a gathering of senior military officers and academics on board a warship in Plymouth on Friday.

"They [terrorists] now know that if a suicide bomber kills 100 completely innocent people in Baghdad in defiance of the wishes of the majority of Iraqis who voted for a non-sectarian Government, then the image presented to a Western public is as likely to be — more likely to be — one of a failed Western policy, not another outrage against democracy,'' Mr. Blair said.

Responding to criticism of his military approach to tackling terrorism instead of addressing its causes, he admitted that terrorism could not be defeated by "military means alone'' but insisted that it "cannot be defeated without it.''

Mr. Blair repeatedly stressed that Britain should not fight shy of using its "hard'' military power to deal with terrorism. There were countries, he said, which had opted to use their defence forces only for peacekeeping but Britain "must do both''— peacekeeping as well as fighting.

Defending his decision to support the U.S.-led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, he rejected the criticism that they were "ill-advised adventures''.

His speech provoked criticism for its "aggressive'' tone and one anti-war Labour MP called it the "delusional ramblings'' of a lame-duck leader.

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