How will the British react to casualties?
Since Bush did his “Top Gun” impression last May and declared an end to “major combat operations”, there have been very few British deaths in Iraq. For Americans, the famous “Mission Accomplished” banner has proven bitterly over-optimistic. Most days at least one US soldier is killed in Iraq, often it is more than one. The British Army though, with far fewer troops concentrated in much quieter areas, can go months without losing a man to hostile fire.
This may be about to change should Shi’ites in British-controlled Basra heed Moqtadar al-Sadr’s call to arms. There is the possibility of daily British casualties if relations between the occupying forces and Iraq’s largest religious group continue to deteriorate. How will the British public react to this?
Part of Britain’s national myth is the idea of the “stiff, upper lip” – the calm and stoical response to loss and suffering. For Little Englanders the ability to “take” casualties without making a fuss is an article of faith. Idiotic waste of life, such as the Charge of the Light Brigade, is actually venerated.
According to this viewpoint, while Americans (“Yanks”) will wallow in self-pity at the first sight of a body-bag, the hardy Brit simply shrugs his shoulders and makes the best of a bad situation.
Much of this attitude can be traced back to the Second World War. In 1940 and 1941 the British civilian population suffered terrible losses from German bombing. The stoicism of this period: “the Blitz spirit” is still evoked in Britain whenever a crisis occurs.
This cosy myth of courage and perseverance ignores the salient fact that Britain hasn’t sustained significant casualties in any war since 1945. While British soldiers have been killed in many wars over the past sixty years, nowhere has the loss been remotely comparable to the scale of American casualties in Vietnam.
Put another way, mass casualties are a memory for every American over forty but only Britons over seventy can recall this large-scale loss of life in war. When you consider it like that, American sensitivity to casualties seems more reasonable.
Nevertheless, Second World War mythology is so strong in the UK that it will surely come into play should British troops come under attack in Basra. Pro-war politicians and journalists will raise the spectre of past glories when they exhort the people to “stand firm against tyranny”.
A new demon, perhaps al-Sadr, will quickly be found. Like Saddam, Milosevic, Galtieri and Nasser, he will find himself likened to Hitler. Anyone who suggests pulling out the troops will be branded an “appeaser” like Chamberlain. I can almost see the headlines in “The Sun” already.
Those who support the war will of course join in this nostalgia-fest. Some agnostics may respond favourably to the propaganda out of a desire to “support our boys”. A large section of the British public, perhaps even the majority, however will not join in the flag-waving. For them the loss of British life will only reinforce their belief that the war is wrong.
The Iraq war is the first conflict since Suez which hasn’t enjoyed solid support from the British people. Two million marched in London against the war, even before it had begun. Many opinion polls have showed over 50% of people against the war. This is remarkable since the British usually love a good war. In many ways it brings out the best in them.
The problem for Blair and other hawks is that this conflict, unlike Afghanistan, Kosovo, Gulf 1 and the Falklands, was not preceded by a clear act of aggression by Britain’s adversary. Rather, the causus belli in this case hinged on the possibility of a future act of aggression. The British, more familiar than anyone else with their Prime Minister’s fondness for deception, were sceptical about the threat posed by Saddam from the outset.
For once it’s not just the “anti-everything” far left who oppose British military action. It’s millions of “normal” Britons of all political persuasions. With local and European elections in June, these millions of voters can give Tony Blair a bloody nose. Rather than helping the war-time Prime Minister, British casualties may in fact hurt him.
This is a shame. It shouldn’t take a few puddles of British blood to mobilise British anger. The lakes of Iraqi blood already spilt should be more than sufficient. That’s not how the world works though. Still it bears repetition; this war is wrong, whether it kills ten British soldiers, or a hundred, or a thousand.