PrintNovember 30, 2006
Our undiplomatic Department of State (updated)
Once again, a high State Department official utters, publicly and in undiplomatic language, views which are harmful to our national interest. It's long past time for Secretary Rice to take action that shows that this is not acceptable behavior by firing Kendall Myers.
A senior American official has spoken of "the myth of the special relationship" between the United States and Britain, arguing that Tony Blair got "nothing, no payback" for supporting President George W Bush in Iraq.
Kendall Myers, a leading State Department adviser, suggested that Mr Blair should have been ditched by Labour but the party had lacked the "courage or audacity" to remove him.
David Cameron, the Conservative leader, was "shrewd, astute" to have distanced himself from America.
In candid comments that will embarrass Mr Bush and Mr Blair, the veteran official said America "ignored" Britain, and he urged Britain to decouple itself from the US.He asserted that the "special relationship", a term coined by Sir Winston Churchill in 1946, gave Britain little or nothing.
It has been, from the very beginning, very one-sided. There never really has been a special relationship, or at least not one we've noticed."
Update:
The invaluable EUReferendum has done more research on My. Myers, notes that he is not a high Department of State official, that his comments were nonsensical, and that the Department disavowed them.
Moreover, they are certainly at odds with remarks he made at the outset of the war:
[quote]But the real killer is the same Kendall Myers, speaking in December 2003 in a seminar entitled "Global Geopolitical Trends: Is the Iraq War a Major Turning Point?"
Then Myers seemed to have a completely different view of his subject, saying that "the Anglo-American relationship is very strong, but it faces significant challenges within Tony Blair's party", then adding:
The Iraq war clarified the reality of a squirming, complex world. Within the United States, foreign policymaking has been decentralized. The State Department is marginalized and even the Pentagon, which calls the shots, is frustrated because the war has put unlimited American power out of business.
I still see no reason for him to remain on the government payroll, however low down the food chain he is. If he is determined to set his own--however demented policy --he can pay himself to do so.
