The Imperial Controversy: Challenging the Empire Apologists [Paperback]

Andrew Murray meticulously uncovers the intimate links between the war on terror and the history of empire, between colonialism and Nazism, between the occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq and Britain's bloody imperial record - and shows why the cheerleaders for today's western military interventions now want to rehabilitate it. The Imperial Controversy is a powerful and damning account of the real nature of 21st century liberal imperialism. --Seumas Milne

A terrible complacency has for some time been seeping into centre-left discourse on the question of empire; in this short book Andrew Murray, best known for his work as chair of Stop the War, looks critically at how a humanitarian reading of imperialisms, past and present, is becoming obscured by the dogmatic rantings of pro-imperialist celebrity journalists such as Christopher Hichens. A good chunk of the first half of this book consists of a straightforward comparison between the violence inflicted on Europe by Nazi Germany and the barbarism of British colonialism and US neo-colonialism in order to highlight significant parallels of brutality and repression. That such a comparison is likely to be dismissed as tenuous and reductive by many commentators, and politely ignored by others, is symptomatic of the problem Murray is examining. His analogy is pertinent, if only because the priority given to the Second World War in our school curriculum has tended to define British values in terms of irreconcilable opposition to the barbarism of the Third Reich and everything it stood for. Britain s finest hour became the foundation of her credibility in world affairs in the post-war period. The effect has been to facilitate the operation, in the court of public opinion, of a presumption of good faith with regard to British military adventures, past and present, so that the horrors of torture, cruelty, indiscriminate killing and systemised brutality that facilitated British colonial expansion have been consigned to that singularly vague condescension traditionally reserved for victims of less important atrocities. But whereas, until relatively recently, the polite thing was to gloss over the more sordid aspects of British imperialism and its post-war American successor, the past few years have witnessed the rise to prominence of a number of less fastidious historians who have acquired some degree of celebrity status by espousing a forthright and bullishly pro-imperialist line. Their rise has coincided neatly with the war on terror and its associated conflicts, and it is surely a measure of the progressive values of publications such as The Guardian and the New Statesman that they have repeatedly given substantial column inches to the work of Niall Ferguson and his ilk, thus helping to enhance the credibility of an anachronistic and neo-colonialist adventurism as well as furnishing the cynicism of New Labour s foreign policy with something resembling an intellectual component. Men like Niall Ferguson are dangerous, and that is why The Imperial Controversy is an important and timely book. --Nathaniel Mehr, Tribune

The Stop the War coalition successfully mobilised millions to oppose the Iraq war and there's no-one better better placed than its chairman Andrew Murray to assess the imperial history leading up to the conflict and blow the pro-war arguments of the "left" unceremoniously out of the water. Murray's book is a concise, hard-hitting account of the arguments surrounding the build-up to war and the resulting occupation of Iraq. It provides both an easy to read historical account of British imperialism leading up to the war and counteracts justifications for the war. Star readers will need little reminding of how the "existence" of WMD was the original justification for the assualt on Iraq. But when peace campaigners and even Republican card-holding former weapons inspector Scott Ritter exposed this as a lie, justifications from media pundits began to circle around "liberal interventionism." Murray points the finger at leading pro-war journalists such as John Lloyd and Nick Cohen and historian Niall Ferguson for dressing up imperial invasion under the guise of imposing "freedom and democracy" in Iraq. Using direct quotations from a range of sources, Murray exposes the fallacy that empire was somehow a positive development for countries throughout Africa and the Middle East as well. The historical revisionism of the British Empire by right-wing historians and pundits whom Murray quotes at length is at times shocking. For historian Lawrence James, "Britain's empire was a moral force and one for good. None has been survived by so much affection and moral respect." Such a statement might get the reader's blood boiling, but Murray also cogently demonstrates how such a rose-tinted view of British imperialism serves to justify modern 21st century imperialism. "It is now more important than ever to rescue the real record of Empirefrom those who would like to bury it in obscurity and those who would like to use it as a model for contemporary world governance," he states. And Murray goes on to break a taboo in British politics by direct comparison of the crimes of nazi Germany with those of the British empire. He challenges a comfort zone that the British empire's racist crimes can be offset by the notion that the building of railways and infrastructure helped to develop countries like India. During the period of imperial plunder, life expectancy fell by 20 per cent and per capita income did not rise between 1757 and 1947. The final chapters let rip at ex-PM Tony Blair and so-called left proponents of the war through scrutiny of the little-known Euston Manifesto - worth a read after this book. Murray contends that Blair is not simply a warmonger but a product of a politics stretching back to Victorian times. "Blair tapped into a current of thought as old as the British empire - that a little imperialism in the right hands is good thing" he writes, along with the promotion of social improvements among the conquered. One cavil in this otherwise excellent and essential read is that it perhaps strays into the realm of "my enemy's enemy is my friend" in commenting that the 2001 Twin Tower terror attacks were directed at reversing the policies of sanctions on Iraq and the repression of Israel by of the Palestinians. But this book is a must-have for anti-war activists. It puts fire in the belly and is an invaluable tool for exposing those who justify the Iraq war. --John Millington, Morning Star

Foreword by George Galloway MP. The imperialist urge, rooted in the dynamics of the world economy, continues to cast a long shadow. Andrew Murray subjects the leading pro-imperial historians, including Niall Ferguson, to a withering analysis. He presents an alternative reading of the record of the British Empire, and of other colonial powers, ... the better to develop an understanding as to why the last thing the great majority of the world wants to see is a repetition, however dressed up. The history of imperial intervention in the Middle East and the phenomenon of liberal interventionism in general, and Blair s premiership in particular, is located in a history of argument within the progressive movement concerning imperialism. The record and role of the pro-war left in relation to the Iraq war comes under scrutiny.