New wave foreign policy

Gordon Brown in his Treasury straight jacket made only a handful of comments on foreign policy during Blair's ten years, so it is not surprising that this trend continues. Brown obviously had to establish his position over the critical issues - Iraq, the Special Relationship, global poverty - early in his tenure, but the detail has rightly been left to the new Foreign Secretary. David Milliband's predecessors had declining influence over the Blair decade, from Robin Cook's ethical but underachieving first term effort, through Jack Straw's ultimate flattening by Blair's post 9/11 Iraq war juggernaut, to Margaret Beckett's complete awe then subservience with last year's Lebanon war marking the nadir for the Blair era FCO role. Milliband will seek to reassure the FCO staff that this tide is being reversed. But remember only three months ago, he was the Blairite candidate for the next leader and hence with a Blairite foreign policy.

Not unexpectedly, Milliband told Labour conference delegates that lessons had been learnt in the previous years, that multilateral diplomatic solutions were the priority, and that flawed military actions were the cause of current predicaments: "The lesson is that while there are military victories there is never a military solution. There's only military action that creates the space for economic and political life." Current crises in Darfur and Burma were touched on, plus Europe, although this is more political battle with the Murdoch press than a genuine foreign policy issue these days. In the "second wave" of New Labour foreign policy, "progress is possible. Britain has a vital role to play. And the prize is immense."

This is all optimistic stuff, but new crises will emerge and fault lines will develop. Britain can carve out a unique international position or fall into America's slipstream. Brown's frosty encounter with Bush this summer suggests a change, but the unpopularity of Blair's Middle East policy has left such a mark that a change of direction is inevitable. A refocus away from the Middle East is the most likely change ahead, Burma and Zimbabwe are two immediate concerns that will assist this shift. Blair's current role for the Quartet and the Iraq withdrawal, allows Britain to create some distance and unalientate millions of Muslims offended by recent actions. Recreating a positive image of Britain in the Islamic world is surely Milliband's priority. Britain's withdrawal from region also makes involvement in the most serious crisis on the horizon - Iran's nuclear programme - easier. With the end to a proxy war with Iran in Basra, Britain is less likely to be swept along in this crisis. As the diplomatic fulcrum, Britain can carve out a diplomatic role between Iran, America and Israel, improving its world standing immeasurably in the process. An optimistic vision, I admit. There remains a painful contradiction in Britain's foreign policy: the link between business interests and support for repressive regimes. Until we move beyond the BAEs, annual DSEI arms supermarkets and support for military regimes like Pakistan, our foreign policy will continue to be self-defeating.

Rapid global power shifts, climate change and the obvious unexpected crises, mean that the next ten years could look very different to the proceeding decade. India and China are superpowers in the making, but it does not take much for small events to create diplomatic crises - look at Russia-British relations since the Litvinenko murder. Climate change may well supersede all these international spats, when such a global issue arises, it makes diplomatic difference seem irrelevant. Foreign policy may well decline over the next decade and be replaced by International policy. Dramatic changes in environmental conditions could make the idea of an independent foreign policy self defeating and of minor importance.