Blairwatch on Brown and Iran

There’s some very useful commentary on Seymour Hersh’s latest piece over at Blairwatch.

In particular Tom notes something very significant about the passage I highlighted earlier this week, in which Hersh reported Bush telling the US ambassador to Iraq that the British were onboard for an attack on Iran.

Hang on, early summer?  Blair went end of June, we’re fairly confident
he would have been ‘on board’, the sacking of Jack Straw as Foreign
Sec. is generally taken to be a slap down to suggestions that attacking
Iran was off the agenda.  I sincerely hope that any risk of the British
being ‘on board’ with another engineered, illegal Middle East war died
with the late Premiership.  Did it? (Sy Hersh with the latest from La-La Land)

Obviously the latest British troops reductions in southern Iraq strengthen the argument that Brown has little to gain from a new conflict.

Even without British involvement, a US attack on Iran might would still be an issue in Brown’s election calculations. If he thinks it will happen he would surely have to factor in the potential for a major oil shock in 2008.

Update: Blood and Treasure suggests that some of Hersh’s US sources may be trying to bounce Britain into taking part, and that increased tempo of troop reductions in Iraq may be related to this.