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REVIEWS - BLAIR'S
WARS 'The most perceptive book about the Blair government to appear since Andrew Rawnsley’s Servants of the People . . . The author shows a shrewd understanding of the way in which Blair’s international thinking has developed . . . He has written a fair and dispassionate piece of instant political history – never the easiest of genres – and has taken considerable trouble in painting in the background, not just in Westminster and Whitehall, but in Washington and, indeed, at the UN in New York.' ANTHONY HOWARD, Sunday Times 'The book everyone in London is talking about...by the current star of British political journalism’ Le Figaro 'Understated, careful and illuminating . . . The major part of the book deals with Iraq, up to July [2003]. Kampfner leads us to a set of compelling conclusions that will not inspire confidence’ PHILIPPE SANDS, Observer '[Kampfner] bases his account on interviews with a wide range of actors, including authoritative sources at the Foreign Office, No. 10, France and the United Nations . . . Kampfner’s revelations . . . have already made headlines. But the value of the book goes deeper . . . [It] is at its most devastating when it gets on to the Bush/Blair relationship and the route to war . . . I strongly recommend Blair’s Wars to anyone who wants to try to understand how Blair persuaded himself into making the catastrophic mistakes of his Iraq policy’ CLARE SHORT, New Statesman 'A brilliant book by one of Britain’s most distinguished political writers’ Mail on Sunday 'Kampfner [traces] the steps that led to war while explaining the historic context that impelled us towards it . . . Insiders’ conversations with key players provide a treasure trove for future historians’ ALAN MILBURN, The Times 'Mr Blair has been to war five times in six years. No British Prime Minister and few world leaders come close to equalling him. That extraordinary statistic impelled John Kampfner to write this assiduous and highly readable account of the Prime Minister’s foreign policy’ MICHAEL PORTILLO, Sunday Telegraph '[Kampfner’s] well-paced and timely book is the best account of Britain’s involvement in Iraq that one is likely to see for some time . . . Ably evokes the atmosphere in Downing Street and the Prime Minister’s view of events’ ANTON LA GUARDIA, Daily Telegraph 'As Kampfner rightly points out, the fascinating aspect of all Blair’s campaigns was their motivation. He sums it up in one glorious paragraph: “A combination of self-confidence and fear, or Atlanticism, evangelism and Gladstonian idealism, pursued when necessary through murky means” . . . Kampfner’s analysis is beyond dispute’ ROY HATTERSLEY, Guardian 'This is instant history at its best. John Kampfner, the New Statesman’s political editor, is well versed in the intricacies of recent British foreign policy as biographer of Robin Cook. His range of political and diplomatic contacts has ensured we have a compelling and often devastating exposure of what is increasingly becoming the tragedy of Tony Blair and his “New” Labour project’ ROBERT TAYLOR, Tribune 'Excellent . . . Blair doesn’t come at all well out of Kampfner’s book, which is forever putting him on the rack without having to do much more than spell out the unfavourable facts. A fair number of these were already public knowledge, but many others – and very telling they frequently are – have been extracted from unnamed insider sources . . . A truly disturbing story' JOHN STURROCK, London Review of Books |
Copyright 2003 John Kampfner et al, All Rights Reserved.