Only acting on orders

Sir Ian Blair shares more than the Prime Minister’s surname, judging by his comments in The Times last week. Key sound-bite:

“It is not the police, it is not the intelligence services, that will defeat terrorism. It is communities that will defeat terrorism.”

Come again? Communities? Not cynical politicians? Not governments who wage illegal wars in spite of massive public opposition, after being warned by their own intelligence services that domestic terrorism would be the likely result? How did the chief of Scotland Yard come to overlook these clues? Seems pretty bum detective work. Sherlock Holmes would simply point to Tony Blair and suggest The Hague, but somehow Sir Ian managed to stumble upon a less obvious conclusion.

So who are these ‘communities’ that he believes to be capable, or rather culpable? Does he mean us? Well yes, but only some of us. For ‘communities’ read ‘Muslim communities’. He’s urging innocent British Muslim’s to question themselves, and blame each other. He’s encouraging non-Muslim Britons to focus their anger on Islam. After all Britain has done to the world since 911 the head of the Met chooses to point his finger at innocent members of his own citizenry. It’s their fault, not the powerbrokers. It’s up to them to sort this out.

Now is a good time to clarify the structural political inclinations of the police. If Sir Ian truly cared about protecting the public, if that really was his central concern, he would have to declare that Tony Blair bore great responsibility for what has happened. Blair was warned, he lied, thousands died, some in London. He should stand trial. But of course it would be career suicide if he did:

“Sir Ian must stick to his job and concentrate on catching the perpetrators. He must not allow politics to colour his judgement”

As if! As with all important public posts, Sir Ian’s job description was strictly circumscribed. The state simply cannot afford to employ senior policemen who are inclined to criticise British foreign policy, regardless of its effect on the home front. The bizarre reality is, before anything else, to be a senior policemen means accepting that you will have to parrot state policy even when it endangers the citizenry you are supposedly employed to protect. Whatever the UK does abroad, however we make our living, the job of senior policemen is to ignore it and just mop up the consequences. The first priority is to protect the state from the people, not the other way round.

Unfortunately for Sir Ian, the British government has given him a pretty ludicrous script to defend. As always, Tony Blair’s central concern has been to save his own neck. Even at this late stage a gentleman might concede defeat, take it on the jaw. Instead he swings the spotlight onto the perfectly innocent. People who actively opposed his imperialist adventure. People who just happen to look like the bombers, or happen to look Brazilian: “Blame them, not me!”

The unsurprising consequence is a massive increase in violence against innocent British Muslims. The rage and indignation generated by the bombings is hurled at those who had nothing to do with it. Those who created this situation walk free, unhurt, unhindered. Free to plan more raids abroad. And as for national security? Going along with Mr Blair’s fairy story means no end to UK terror campaigns. We just sit and wait for the next bomb. Wasting millions policing tube stations won’t make this problem go away. As long as key public figures won’t face up to the government’s culpability, as long as they are prepared to parrot state propaganda, we citizens will remain at risk.