On September 1st former British PM Tony Blair’s memoir titled ‘A Journey” hits the book stalls in the United Kingdom, and on the 2nd – in the US.
Long before its official release, the book already sparked a lot of controversy, even though most of it contents still remain hidden from the public.
First, the news of the memoir were made public in March, but Blair thought it better to postpone the release of the book until after the general elections held on May 6. The purpose was clear: he feared that the revelation of a long inside battle between himself and his long-time rival and eventually successor Gordon Brown would harm the electoral prospects of the Labour Party.
Postponing the release did not help Labour who lost the elections in May.
More so, now it is hardly an appropriate time for the release, since now Labour are still amidst an in-party battle for leadership, and the whole story of the inside problems of the party is unlikely to bring the voters back. And Gordon Brown has already promised that he is going to hit back at any revelations.
But what is even more important, is that the release of the book has reopened an old discussion of whether Tony Blair’s legacy was good for Great Britain or bad.
And here the central point is what Blair’s role in Iraq war was? Blair would like to picture himself as a visionary and peacemaker, and one of the first political leaders of the West who realized the threat posed by Islamic fundamentalism. In this context he clearly has no remorse for what the US and Great Britain did in Iraq, notwithstanding more than 100,000 civilian deaths among Iraqis and 179 British soldiers killed in combat.
The public does not seem to agree, and questions, for what end our young ones sacrificed their lives in Iraq seem to sound louder and louder.
Members of the Stop The War Coalition have already promised to hold a ‘mass protest’ outside Waterstones' flagship shop in central London on September 8, when Tony Blair is going to sign the copies of his book, and also warned that activists would try to arrest Mr. Blair for alleged war crimes.
The voices of the bloggers all across the Internet sound even louder. As one of them wrote on the BBC website, ‘Blair is unlikely to be remembered for the Labour Government’s progress on social policies, the significant increase on money that was appropriated for the poor, the ill and the aged. Instead his legacy will be an unnecessary and horrible war in Iraq’, and that is ‘thousands and thousands of lives lost, thousands and thousands of horribly wounded persons, deformities in newborn babies (likely due to the depleted uranium and/or white phosphorous that was used in bombs), destabilization of Iraq, leading to terrorism and suicide bombing.’
Probably anticipating this, Tony Blair has promised that all the advance money received for the memoir from Random House (which amounts to £4.6 million or $7 million) will be donated to the Royal British Legion in order to help the wounded veterans. But even this did not appease his critics.
Some called the donation “conscience money”, saying that in fact it was “blood money” and an attempt to salve his guilty conscience over the Iraq war. And almost everybody is recalling the fact that Tony Blair’s annual income amounts to £7 million, so the donation will not make too large a hole in the family budget, but rather reduce the income tax.
At the same time, some observers note that the highly advertized memoir may not really become a best-seller. The ordinary copy is to be sold for £25 ($40), but, for example, the Amazon website has already slashed the price by half to $20 due to the lack of demand.
Of course, it is too early to predict the financial success or failure of the publication, and more so, it is probably too early to predict how Mother History will eventually judge Tony Blair and his legacy. But right now one thing is clear: the Iraqi campaign is still the hottest theme, and while its memories are still fresh, no impartial judgement is possible.
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