Tony Blair’s Nightmare Vision of a European Superstate

Nile Gardiner / June 10, 2011

Tony Blair’s interview in yesterday’s Times deserves to be widely read on both sides of the Atlantic. Why? Because it shows that the Eurofederalists’ delusions of grandeur are firmly alive and remain a huge threat not only to British national sovereignty but the future of the transatlantic alliance, especially the Special Relationship. It is also a further demonstration of just how far removed Tony Blair is from political reality and public opinion in the UK, but that’s never stopped him before.

Blair has always been a European idealist at heart, even though he found out the hard way during the Iraq War that you can’t be both America’s best friend and ally and cosy up to Brussels at the same time. Over Iraq Blair found himself isolated among the ruling elites of Old Europe, especially with Germany and France, and at odds with the leadership of the European Union. He took the right decision to go to war to remove Saddam Hussein but was scorned by the EU establishment. Despite all this, he still remains wedded to the idea that Britain must be at the heart of a federal Europe, and believes that London should be at the forefront of driving the process of further European integration. (more…)