Terror struck at Tony Blair's finest hour. As host and driving force of the Group of Eight summit, the British prime minister was close to assuming the role akin to that of a world president on Thursday morning. His dream of forging a global political agenda for the planet was coming to fruition at the moment the explosions ripped through London's subways and a double-decker bus.
Blair said that it was "particularly barbaric" that the attacks occurred on the day that world leaders were sitting down to address the problems of Africa and climate change. Terrorism had trumped his well-orchestrated plan to get leaders deeply divided about the wisdom of the Anglo-American war in Iraq to unite around a larger agenda.
Whether the Gleneagles summit can reach substantive agreements on those issues in the wake of the deadly bombings, Blair's ambition makes the goals of other world leaders -- President Bush, French President Jacques Chirac and U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan -- seem parochial by comparison.
Take the G-8. (In past years one would have been tempted to add "--please!") Those stately conclaves of world leaders have traditionally specialized in the production of dull communiqués from remote fortresses while provoking youthful protesters to take to the empty streets and aging reporters to write condescending dispatches about their ineffectual rage against the machine of global capitalism.
Not this year. Blair has forced the G-8 leaders to confront what the BBC describes as a "hugely ambitious" agenda focusing on ending African poverty and addressing global warming. Expectations, say the left-wing editors of the Guardian, "must surely be higher than for any other comparable event in living memory."
As the summit host, Blair could have gotten by with the usual incantation of the G-8 gospel: Globalization is inevitable if not glorious (as well as its implicit subtext: Don't complain about free-market failures). Instead, Blair took up the challenge of the non-governmental organizations that want to Make Poverty History. He welcomed the Live 8 concert series, orchestrated by pop stars Bono and Bob Geldoff, which force-fed the urgency of Africa's plight into the pop culture mainstream.
As the right-wing Daily Telegraph noted, Blair "set the agenda" by insisting that big achievements are possible: "100 per cent international debt relief for the poorest [African] countries and a doubling of aid to US $50 billion (£28 billion) a year by 2010."
What's more, Blair insists that long-term progress depends on capitalist reform: "Britain has also been pushing for agreement on changes to world trade rules to allow African nations to compete on a level playing field, and . . . wide-ranging reforms of the systems of tariffs and subsidies for farmers in the EU and US," noted the Telegraph.
In comparison with Blair, other world leaders seemed to be playing catch-up.
President Bush, said Liberation in France, "is looking to restore his image as a leader attentive to the problems of the world." The American president's conception of world leadership has focused on the "war on terrorism" as waged in Iraq and Afghanistan. But in pre-summit comments reported by the Financial Times, Bush inched toward Blair and the non-U.S. consensus on climate change. He acknowledged that global warming is caused by human activity and said that diversification of energy sources to reduce carbon emissions was a good idea. But he made clear that the United States would not agree to limits on carbon emissions.
Bush has been more proactive on Africa, boasting of doubling U.S. aid to the continent. While Democrats say the true figure is more like 56 percent, Liberation still credited the American president with "a notable effort."
But Bush's approach is less ambitious than Blair's. In other pre-summit remarks, Bush said the United States would reduce its politically popular agricultural subsidies when Europe does the same, knowing full well that Chirac is unlikely to call his bluff. Liberation describes the French president as "an incorrigible defender of European agricultural subsidies denounced by the South."
Secretary General Annan echoed Blair in saying that the G-8 must offer "fairer leadership" to the world. But Annan's bureaucratic prose, as published in the Scotsman [by subscription] could never galvanize world attention the way Blair's public relations blitz has.
Until the London attacks, the biggest story from the G-8 summit was not the nihilistic outbursts of the anarchists (though violence did flare briefly), but rather an excess of hope.
"Making poverty history is a terrific slogan and a noble ambition, but even its most enthusiastic backers acknowledge that it will only be achieved in a long, drawn-out and multi-faceted process over many years rather than at a single event lasting less than three days," said the Guardian.
Blair faces a backlash, said the Times, "if his ambitious targets for helping Africa are watered down by his fellow world leaders."
In Italy, La Republicca (translated by the BBC) said that Blair's very public agenda amounts to a "threat" to his guests: "If the summit fails to produce a concrete and relevant deal on aid to Africa and the defence of the environment, it will be clear to all who bears the responsibility."
When the terrorists struck, Tony Blair was leading the world. The question is still whether his fellow leaders will follow.
