Power Play

It was always ‘perhaps’ and ‘up to a point’ with Fraser Davis, and finding exactly where that point might be was a special skill of mine. I guessed that he never thought I was good enough for his sister, although it took some time for Fiona to come round to her brother’s opinion.

In those first days of October two years ago, no one expected Theo Carr and Bobby Black to win the White House. The opinion polls had been consistent for months. Carr was way behind, more than ten points adrift against a comfortable, competent incumbent President. The American economy had at last picked up, and the smart people I knew in Washington–diplomats, journalists, members of Congress–dismissed Carr and Black as too extreme, too right wing, too out of touch with the mood of America. Their rhetoric was all from the past, talk of taking the War on Terror to ‘the Bad Guys’ and ‘the Worst of the Worst’, whoever they happened to be. When I raised the prospect of a meeting we were in the private sitting room in Number Ten Downing Street–the Prime Minister, me, his special adviser, Janey Masters, and the Director of Communications, Andy Carnwath. Fraser Davis joked that Theo Carr and Bobby Black talked as if they had an ‘Enemy of the Month Club’.

‘Y’know, a calendar of men with beards they plan to bomb. One Dead Beard a Month until the War on Terror is won.’ Fraser Davis prided himself on his sensitive political antennae and expertise on the United States. He turned to me. ‘Forget Bobby Black, Alex. Waste of my time.’

‘Meeting Bobby Black is never a waste of time, Prime Minister,’ I contradicted him. ‘Trust me.’

You can get away with contradicting the PM’s judgement about once per meeting. More can be perilous.

‘I simply don’t see why I should bother with Losers,’ he responded, looking up from his briefing papers and pouting a moist lip in my direction, the way he did when he was annoyed. ‘Fix me up with the Winners, for God’s sake. Get the President or Vice-President in here. That’s what we pay you for.’

I pointed out that unfortunately the incumbent President and Vice-President were not coming through London. Bobby Black was.

‘Thirty minutes of your time,’ I persisted. ‘At Chequers.’ Chequers is the Prime Minister’s private retreat in the countryside just outside London. ‘Tea and biscuits. A chat. It can do no harm, and it could do a lot of good. It will raise your profile in Washington and—’

‘Nonsense,’ he snapped, arching a prime ministerial eyebrow and pouting once more. Davis is a toff, of course, even though he tries to hide it. He makes a big thing of his love of football and is forever telling newspaper feature writers that his iPod is full of Kill Hannah and Nickelback, though I have never once heard him enquire about football match results, nor have I ever seen him listen to his supposedly beloved rock music. He’s Eton to the core, Oxford PPE, once a City smoothie, a stint as a management consultant, and then time in a hedge fund where he made a lot of money and decided that he understood ‘how the market works.’ At moments when we disagree he and I are like two different species sizing each other up. My own background as a soldier in Northern Ireland gives me a bit of an edge. Davis likes to joke that his brother-in-law had ‘strangled IRA terrorists with his bare hands.’ Perhaps he likes this joke because the closest the Prime Minister ever came to serving his country in uniform was wearing a tailcoat at Eton and the Bullingdon dining club.

‘Look, I simply haven’t got time to listen to Yesterday’s Man.’ Davis smiled that way he has which looks like a smirk. ‘Black and Carr want to continue making the same mistakes in their War on Terror that we made thirty years ago in Ulster. Why, oh why, do these bloody Americans persist in thinking you can wage war on a tactic, for goodness sake?’

The British ability to suck up to the Americans and to patronize them simultaneously should not be underestimated. Janey Masters and Andy Carnwath shook with laughter at this Prime Ministerial aperçu. I didn’t.

‘Prime Minister, you are making a serious mistake,’ I contradicted them all firmly. The chorus of laughter stopped. I was now on the edge of being rude, but I had the floor and so I used it. ‘You should not make unnecessary enemies.’

‘Unnecessary enemies?’ Davis repeated, rolling the words around his mouth like a sip of unexpectedly good wine.

‘Bobby Black wants to meet you,’ I explained. ‘And he is a man who plays favourites and bears grudges.’ I advised that even if Black and Carr lost the presidential election, Senator Black would eventually have a position of considerable leadership, one day Senate Majority Leader. ‘A good friend and a bad enemy. His reputation is as Washington’s silent throat-slitter.’ All eyes were on me now. Very busy people in power remind me of children: self-obsessed, in their own little world. Any device that catches their attention is legitimate. ‘You cross Bobby Black at your peril. He’s coming to London and we should be nice.’

The Prime Minister sighed and then agreed. Reluctantly.

‘Very well then, Alex. If you say so. Fix it. Fix it. Please ruin my weekend at Chequers.’

And so I fixed it. I felt confident that ruining his weekend was the right thing to do and that Fraser Davis would soon be grateful. It really is what I am paid for.

On that day of Bobby Black’s visit I drove myself down to Chequers from central London while Andy Carnwath, Janey Masters and the Prime Minister travelled by helicopter. Another of Fraser Davis’s routine jokes at my expense is that I was brave enough to interrogate IRA suspects face to face but too timid to get on a ‘heavier-than-air machine’. He regards such schoolboy teasing as a sign of affection. I went to a different type of school.

The Chequers event was–how shall I put it in the language of diplomacy?–not a meeting of minds. Bobby Black and Fraser Davis had little in common, except for one fact: each of them always thought that in any meeting, in any gathering, he was the smartest person in the room. On that day, when we brought these two super-egos together at Chequers, at least one of them had to be wrong. Perhaps both of them. Bobby Black had flown from Washington to Heathrow and then helicoptered over to meet the Prime Minister. I remember it as an unseasonably warm day, early October, a day belonging more to summer than the start of autumn. The fine weather put everyone in a good mood. The American helicopter came down on the lawn, picture perfect. Unusually for Chequers, which is by tradition always private, we allowed a tight pool of British and American TV crews to film the occasion. What everyone saw on the evening news on both sides of the Atlantic was Davis and Black greeting each other with all the false bonhomie demanded on such occasions. The American network TV coverage–as I had predicted–helped raise Fraser Davis’s profile in the United States.

We carry out confidential public opinion surveys in key allies once a year, and the most recent showed that when you asked Americans about British prime ministers they could name Churchill, Thatcher, and Blair. Fraser Davis, like the rest of our political leaders, simply did not exist. That night, thanks to me, for a few seconds on the American TV evening news, Fraser Davis did exist. The two men ran their hands up each other’s arms to show how touchy-feely they were. They grinned. They exchanged pleasantries. The Prime Minister said he was ‘delighted’ to meet the grizzled Senator, more than twenty years his senior. Bobby Black, his owlish eyes glinting behind thick glasses, managed to appear as if he had just flown the Atlantic on the off chance he might catch a few words with our own esteemed Dear Leader, the Bright New Thing in London.

‘I’ve come to learn how to win elections,’ he joked for the cameras. ‘Like you did, Mr Prime Minister.’ Bobby Black’s Chief of Staff, Johnny Lee Ironside, winked at me as we stood on the edges of the photo-opportunity, our faces split by broad grins. He’s a tall, lanky southerner with a South Carolina accent that makes me think of the warmth of a hit of Southern Comfort.

‘Good work on this get-together, Ambassador Price,’ he whispered.

‘Please call me Alex,’ I introduced myself. He seemed like someone I could do business with.

‘Johnny Lee.’

I had checked him out beforehand of course. Born Charleston. Rich Old South family, Anglophile, Harvard Law, Rhodes scholar. And now, as I could see, polite and generous. My kind of American. We moved to the main Chequers dining room. It was scheduled to be a half-hour visit before Bobby Black headed to a Republican fund-raising dinner in the City to tap rich donors resident in the UK. Afterwards he was flying to Paris and Berlin for quick photo-calls with the French President and German Chancellor, and more fund-raising, then back to Washington. Well, that was the plan. We sat across the big shiny walnut dining table on the opposite side to the Americans. Bobby Black started talking about the challenges of international terrorism. It was–disappointingly–a cut-down version of his standard campaign speech. I had heard it so often that, like the Lord’s Prayer, I could recite passages by heart.

‘Afghanistan … Taleban … hearts and minds … stay the course … democracy and freedom … al Qaeda … the Worst of the Worst … lessons of Iraq … shared values, shared sacrifice …’

It was warm and stuffy, Senator Black spoke quietly, and my mind wandered. I began to think of my own future.

Another two years as Ambassador to Washington and I would be in line for a knighthood, then promotion to Head of the Foreign Office, and eventually a peerage. Or–as Fraser Davis had hinted–I might be interested in quitting and thinking about going into politics. I could undoubtedly secure a safe seat under his patronage. As Bobby Black droned on, I started thinking of other things–of lunch, of the drive back to London, of seeing Fiona, and of the difficulties we had been having.

‘… Iranian threat … shadow on the Gulf … oil supplies … nuclear proliferation … Islamic bomb … generations to come …’

I love and admire the United States, especially ordinary Americans, but so many of their top-tier politicians struck me as even worse than ours–difficult though that may be to believe. The kind of people with whom, after you shake hands, you feel you should count your fingers just to check none has been stolen. Bobby Black made me especially nervous, which was one of the reasons I wanted him to meet Davis. Besides, it helped me enormously back in Washington that Black and others knew how close I was to the Prime Minister. I tuned in again. Bobby Black was offering clues about a future Carr presidency. It struck me as unlikely that I would ever need this information. Theo Carr worried, he said, that ‘Russia wants its Empire back and we’re not about to give it to them,’ but the main struggle would continue against ‘militant Islam.’ The new President would demand from all America’s allies ‘more commitment of blood and treasure’ in this ‘existential struggle against terrorism.’ Prime Minister Davis rolled his eyes.

‘Guts,’ Bobby Black was saying softly, waggling a fat white finger in our direction. I watched the finger’s reflection in the polished walnut of the table top. ‘Old fashioned guts, when it comes to facing down the Russians, the Iranians or al Qaeda. Guts, and leadership, Mr Prime Minister. Moral fibre.’

I sipped the weak black coffee and nibbled at the digestive biscuits that mark British hospitality on these occasions. Suddenly the man Black had called ‘Mister Prime Minister’ sprang into life.

‘Leadership demands Followership,’ Davis snapped, the wet, pouty lip directed at Bobby Black. ‘Don’t you agree, Senator? And what kind of leadership are you expecting to offer that others will follow?’

Bobby Black winced and then smiled. He did not like to be interrupted, and I did not like his smile. He replied softly and deliberately, so you had to lean towards him to hear.

‘There are some very Bad People out there, Mr Prime Minister, and—’

‘Forgive me, Senator Black,’ Prime Minister Davis interrupted again, with a degree of condescension that grated even on me. Johnny Lee Ironside shuffled uncomfortably in his chair and raised an eyebrow in my direction. The Prime Minister was in no mood to hold back. ‘Forgive me, but most people across Europe understand that there are “Bad People”, as you put it, “out there.” We’ve had terrorist attacks for years–decades. We had them in Belfast from Nineteen Sixty-nine, and in Glasgow, in London, Madrid, Amsterdam, Berlin, Istanbul, Rome. Our experience tells us that the challenge is to avoid creating more terrorists than you can possibly kill or arrest. So how do you propose to do that when the way you talk sounds like you are still making the same mistakes we made decades ago? The IRA taught us that subtlety and sophistication would help. That’s why Ireland is now–mostly–at peace.’

Like Harrow, Fettes, and Winchester, Eton is a school that produces many brilliant minds but very few humble ones. Bobby Black sat bolt upright and blinked behind his glasses at the Prime Minister. What I saw in his eyes was something akin to hatred. He did not like being interrupted and he certainly did not like being contradicted by a Prime Minister young enough to be his son. At that moment I hoped that the opinion polls were correct and that Black and Carr would lose the presidential election by a landslide. When he spoke, it was again so quietly I had to strain to hear him.

‘Mr Prime Minister,’ Bobby Black said coldly, stressing certain words as if they deserved to have capital letters, ‘the IRA did not do suicide bombings or fly planes into buildings. This is a different world. Neutrality is immoral. Appeasement is immoral. Subtlety and sophistication–as you call it–to folks where I come from in Montana, are just European excuses to do nothing except wring hands, wet the bed, and complain about the wicked Americans. There was nothing subtle about your British citizens trying to blow up American airliners halfway over the Atlantic Ocean. And let me be clear. When Governor Theo Carr is elected President of the United States next month, the Carr administration will expect and require full cooperation on matters of national security from all allies of the United States.’

Expect and require. Your British citizens. Oh, shit. I put my coffee cup down. Now it was Fraser Davis who looked as if he had been shot. He began finger-pointing as he spoke. His lower lip was exceptionally moist, the way it gets when he is irritated and wants to start lecturing. I do not usually get these things wrong, but the informal Chequers meeting was unravelling before my eyes and I could do nothing to stop it. I looked over to Johnny Lee Ironside who nodded. He shared my pain.

‘Senator Black, of course you will have our full cooperation and friendship. But for our part, we will expect the new President–whoever that might be–to lead an American administration that listens to its friends as opposed to lecturing them, and that upholds the way of life you say you want to defend. We urge you to look at the mistakes of the past and at your own country’s record on human rights, the detention without trial of terrorist suspects–including British nationals–and matters that clearly fall under the United Nations’ definition of torture.’

‘Fuck the United Nations,’ Bobby Black said softly. The room fell silent. Fraser Davis’s lower lip dropped an inch. Bobby Black said it so quietly but with such unmistakable anger that I thought for a moment I had misheard him. Looking at the stunned faces I knew that I had not. Everyone held their breath. Bobby Black’s eyes stared intensely from behind his glasses. The Prime Minister’s pouty lip formed a single response.

‘Pardon?’

‘Fuck the United Nations,’ Bobby Black repeated, without raising his voice. ‘Fuck ‘em. We’ll do it alone if we have to. We’d like help. Everybody likes help. But we’re the United States of America and we don’t need it.’

Prime Minister Davis smiled although, yet again, the smile could look just like a smirk. He tried to make light of what we had just heard.

‘Fuck the United Nations–would that be the official policy of the incoming Carr administration?’

I caught Johnny Lee’s eyes again. They had an expression that said, ‘Get us out of here.’

‘If necessary,’ Bobby Black answered, and brushed some imaginary fluff from his suit sleeve. ‘On international terrorism, there is no middle ground. There is Right, and there is Wrong. Any country or organization that is not with Right is with Wrong. It would be a sad day if the United States had to withdraw from the UN. A sad day for the United Nations. The US would get over it.’

He stopped speaking. A silence fell upon us while we thought about what he had said. The meeting was effectively over, after ten minutes of the allotted thirty. Bobby Black pushed his seat back so it scraped on the floor. Johnny Lee Ironside stood up.

‘Thank you for your time, Mr Prime Minister. Our helicopter is waiting. I’m heading for the City of London.’

‘And thank you for sparing time in your busy schedule, Senator Black.’