Blair gets US medal as era ends

By Paul Reynolds World affairs correspondent, BBC News website

Blair and Bush: close alliance

The award by President Bush of the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Tony Blair marks not only the close alliance between the two men but the end of an era of British-American relations.

The former British prime minister will receive his medal, the highest civilian honour given by the United States, at the White House on 13 January.

Also receiving the medal will be the former Australian prime minister John Howard and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe - also allies in Mr Bush's "war on terror" and the war in Iraq.

Mr Bush and Mr Blair forged what became a personal as well as a political alliance at Camp David in early 2001, just after President Bush took office.

Camp David start

It was an unexpected meeting of minds and it was dramatically strengthened after 9/11.

Mr Blair went to Washington and was present in Congress when Mr Bush gave a speech in which the president declared his "war on terror".

He turned to Mr Blair, sitting in the balcony, and the members of Congress gave him a standing ovation.

There followed in due course the Iraq war in which Mr Blair fully agreed with the US president.

President-elect Obama does not come from the old American political establishment that produced Presidents Bush senior and junior

And now, with Mr Blair already out of office and President Bush on his way out, the medal ceremony will be a moment that prompts not only a look back but also a look forward.

It is unlikely that British-American relations will be as close for the foreseeable future.

President-elect Obama does not come from the old American political establishment that produced Presidents Bush senior and junior.

In fact he has cause to distrust the British, his grandfather having been imprisoned and tortured during the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya.

'Soft hat'

The British prime minister Gordon Brown is an ardent admirer of the United States and the alliance will continue, as it has done with its ups and downs since the end of World War II, but there are question marks over it now.

How far will the UK go in supporting the US surge in Afghanistan?

Will it be willing or able to erase the suspicion among the US military that its "soft hat" approach, tried and abandoned in both Iraq and Afghanistan, was mistaken and weak?

Will Britain still be fielding as many troops in 10 years' time?

What if the US and/or Israel decides to attack Iran's nuclear plants?

And beyond immediate policy considerations looms the issue of where European governments are going in their defence policies.

With such pressure on budgets these difficult days, defence spending might be an easy target.

There are already doubts in some US quarters that Europe will have the stomach for direct military action much longer and will not be able to field many forces in a decade's time.

Will Britain be part of that trend or will it try to hold to its traditional policies aligning it with the US? And will it be able to do so?

No doubt the usual pleasantries will be uttered when Gordon Brown visits the new president.

But the phrase "special relationship", long discouraged by the British Foreign Office, will not be heard that much, except from those describing its demise or, at least, its diminishment.

This moment also challenges British thinking about where the country is going.

The UK still occupies what it has always regarded as its comfortable position of being half-in and half-out of Europe and close to, but not necessarily tied to, the United States.

If the US distances itself under President Obama and Britain still hesitates about developing the joint defence polices that the Lisbon Treaty allows for, the UK could be heading for a further debate about where its place should be.

Paul.Reynolds-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk