Cameron's ?essential? relationship with Obama | The World ...

Every time a British prime minister visits Washington, he knows that he will be measured against sepia photos of previous ?special relationships? between British prime ministers and?US presidents: Churchill and Roosevelt, Thatcher and Reagan, Blair and Bush. So David Cameron both needs to emphasise his closeness to Barack Obama ? but not lay it on too thick, lest it sound desperate or ?slavish?, to use a word that Cameron once employed in opposition.

It certainly looks as if Obama is going out of his way to give Cameron face. There is the specially-arranged trip on Airforce One to go and watch a basketball game in Ohio. There is a state banquet. (The British keep having to emphasise that this is not a state visit, only the Queen does those.) There is the joint article in the Washington Post, emphasising the ?essential? nature of the relationship between the UK and the US. (The word ?special? is worn thin through over-use.) And there is the tribute from the American ambassador in London, who claimed in an interview, given just before the Camerons? arrival, that President Obama?s first call in an international crisis, is to No 10 Downing Street.

So how seriously, should one take all this?

Cameron and Obama certainly get on well, even if their personalities and backgrounds are hardly a natural fit. Cameron is more bluff, outgoing and instinctive; Obama more reserved and calculating.

The stuff on Obama?s first call in a crisis being to Cameron also needs to be taken with a pinch of salt. In the run-up to the Libyan war, Cameron was not able to talk to Obama as much as he wanted to. The feeling in Downing Street, in retrospect, was that Obama was consumed by the internal White House debate and -?until that was resolved ? was not available for long chats with the British prime minister. More broadly, although Britain is clearly relevant to important parts of US foreign policy: Iran, Afghanistan ? there are other issues, such as China ? where the UK role is much less relevant.

The fact that Cameron is accompanying Obama on a trip to Ohio, a battleground state in the presidential election, might also raise a couple of eyebrows. But, in fact, the Cameron wing of the Tory party would probably prefer an Obama victory in November ? rather than a win for the Republicans, who are nominally their sister party. That is because Obama remains popular in the UK, so a special (or essential) relationship with him, would be a political plus for any British prime minister.

A Republican president is potentially more problematic. The right-wing parts of Mr Cameron?s own party would get very excited by a Republican ascendancy in Washington and would start pushing for radical right-wing policies back home ? whether on tax-cuts, or new military adventures in the Middle East, or confrontation with Russia. That, in turn, would create problems for Cameron. His own party would become harder to manage and photo-ops with an unpopular US president might suddenly become tricky to handle.

No Tory prime minister wants to ?frighten the horses?. A second Obama term would keep the horses calm in Britain.

Source: http://blogs.ft.com/the-world/2012/03/camerons-essential-relationship-with-obama/

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