Frank Johnson

The armchair historians are wrong: this isn’t Munich or Suez; it’s Sarajevo

The armchair historians are wrong: this isn't Munich or Suez; it's Sarajevo

issue 01 March 2003

We are either at Munich, 1938, or Suez, 1956. Depending on whether we are for or against this coming war, one or the other is the favoured comparison.

President Bush and Mr Blair, even more so Mr Rumsfeld, would have us believe that we are at Munich. Mr Bush, Mr Blair and, again even more so, Mr Rumsfeld each thinks that he is the Churchill. Except that he is already in office, which Churchill was not yet in 1938, and the West does not give in. We stand up to the dictator, go to war and win decisively. The dictator and his evil regime fall. Democracy and human rights reign in the region concerned.

Opponents of the coming war have equally little difficulty in placing us at Suez, 1956. Mr Bush is Eden. Saddam is Nasser, except that Saddam has not seized anyone’s canal. Mr Bush becomes convinced that he must destroy the dictator.

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