“Let us say one thing: if we are wrong, we will have
destroyed a threat that at its least is responsible for
inhuman carnage and suffering. That is something I
am confident history will forgive. But if our critics
are wrong, if we are right, as I believe with every
fibre of instinct and conviction I have that we are,
and we do not act, then we will have hesitated in
the face of this menace when we should have given
leadership. That is something history will not forgive.”
In the Rose Garden on May 17, he repeated this conviction, though more concisely:
“And we took a decision that we thought was very
difficult. I thought then, and I think now, it was the
right decision. History will make a judgment at a
particular time.”
And perhaps this is the difference between Blair and Bush: the prime minister is not haunted by the possibility that history will judge him on the basis of comparisons with others who were also prime ministers. Bush, who still has 19 months in his second term, more and more will have his presidency tied to one issue: the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. To escape this fate, he must somehow play down the idea that history is a formative influence more than it is a record of the past. Blair, I think, understands that real history looks more to the future than the past, and that when he is judged, it will not be by today’s critics (or supporters) but by today’s fourth graders who will have to live his legacy.
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