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| Europe |
| The American Embassy gets the boot |
| 2007-05-12 |
| Goodbye, Grosvenor Square THE HEADLINE ON the cover of the April 13, issue of the Evening Standard read, '"The US Embassy Siege." Inasmuch as Britain had just endured the unfortunate saga of the 15 marines and sailors captured by Iran and then released with goody bags, one might have assumed this was a feature about the truly terrible Iranian hostage siege in 1979 that ultimately brought down the Carter administration. One would have been wrong to do so: the subtitle of the article read "How the Residents of W1 Saw Off the Yanks." Aha! This was to be yet another piece about the Americans besmirching Grosvenor Square. There has been an American presence in the Square since 1786, though the actual Ambassador lives in Winfield House in Regent's Park, a home donated by Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton. The much-beloved Ambassador during World War II, John Gilbert Winant, was adored by Londoners from the East End to Mayfair to Clapham to St John's Wood. His personal generosity and solidarity with Britain during the darkest days of the Blitz endeared him to the country for a generation. One of the many legends about Winant was his insistence on distributing luxury foods to Londoners sheltering in tube stations during the nightly bombings. After the war, when he visited London, theatregoers would run over to him to greet him, tears in their eyes. He was given the Freedom of the City by various British municipalities. Sixty years on, the attitude of Londoners towards Americans is radically different. After September 11, 2001, the U.S. Embassy building in Grosvenor Square was supplied with large concrete barriers and bollards to ward off a car or truck bomb. Armed policemen patrol day and night and unsuccessful efforts were made to turn some streets into no-entry zones. Now, after years of protests that the Embassy is the number one terrorist target in the world, the Mayfair Residents association has finally succeeded in driving the Embassy from its historic residence. The U.S. Navy Department has already moved from its beautiful offices; shortly after 9/11 a friend who had been activated to Reserve duty in London told me that her uniformed colleagues were fearful of going out for a walk because several had been at the receiving end of stunning verbal abuse. This I can believe, because no sooner had 9/11 happened than I was being lectured on the cowardice of the Yanks and how their support for Israel had left the world in turmoil. (One cab driver told me that British pilots and passengers would have seen off all four sets of hijackers.) As early as September 13, 2001, retired American Ambassador Philip Lader was foot-stomped and shouted down by a hostile London audience on the BBC's "Question Time." So, here we are in 2007, and Mayfair residents have staged hunger strikes and loud protests at meetings with representatives of the Federal government in an effort to shut down the embassy. The reasoning presented by Mayfair protestors was that the local residents have been in mortal danger since 9/11. Another obvious reason is the depreciation of local property and the cost of home insurance. In the end, the present ambassador, Robert Tuttle, instructed real estate agents Knight Frank to put the site on the market. It is believed the Embassy staff will be moved to Kensington Palace or Greenwich, if the local residents there do not go on hunger strike as well. What is so objectionable about the fury shown by Mayfair residents is that the attitude and actions have been so hostile and at times so extreme. One Embassy staffer is reported to have said he would welcome a transfer to Manchuria, and the former Ambassador Bill Farish is reported in the Evening Standard article to have loathed every minute of his posting save those with Her Majesty the Queen. The city that endured the relentless bombings and rocket attacks by Hitler night after night for years is now furious that the presence of the Americans will make London a target. When the July 7, 2005, bombers struck, did they single out locations popular with Americans? How nice it would have been if Mayfair residents had shown generosity of spirit and solidarity with America instead of staging ugly protests to remove them from their environment, as if they were the Taliban or worse. Had Britain been attacked in 2001, and had she then waged a war that evolved into an internationally detested conflict, it is doubtful Washingtonians would have raised such a fuss about the British Embassy in the nation's capital. If, in fact, the British Embassy had been considered a top target in Washington, it is likely the authorities would have laid on extra protection. The vitriol of many Londoners towards the Yanks was driven home when I attended a dinner party after the Easter holiday. Someone brought up the topic of the American Embassy and CIA leaving Grosvenor Square. The otherwise elegant, upper- class dinner host spat out, "Actually, I wish someone had wrecked that building and the bloody CIA long ago!' True story. In the same week the Americans were officially banished from Grosvenor Square after 221 years, the head of Arsenal football club, Peter Hill-Wood, declared that hell would freeze over before an American, tycoon Stan Kroenke (mistakenly identified as a Jewish tycoon in the Evening Standard) would be allowed to buy a major share in the club. Mr Hill-Wood said Americans know 'sweet FA' about British football, and, besides, "We don't want your sort here" he said to Kroenke. That is the sort of thing bigots said at the turn of the twentieth century about Jews and other migrants from Europe. Interestingly, long-time Arsenal funder David Dein, indeed Jewish, was unceremoniously bundled off the Board last week amid rumours he had brought Kroenke into the picture. Anti-Americanism has become nasty in Britain these days. It is all-pervasive and creeps into the social discourse as if picking on Americans is the new Jew-baiting. Well, I have some observations to make about those who detest Americans and what they have to offer the world. In the past fortnight I have made two train trips. I have had to drag my suitcase up and down hundreds of stairs at various train and tube stations. This is because Britain has yet to realize that it would be awfully nice for people with luggage and wheelchairs to have the use of a lift, as we do in Washington. Today we have been told that this year people will die on the London Underground because of heat stroke. This is because (unlike the American subway systems and buses, fitted with air conditioning since the year dot) there is no air conditioning in any tube trains or buses. What is even more bizarre is the redundancy of Bob Kiley, the American who was brought in at staggering expense to transform the London Transport system. He is now confined to home ill; did he find it unbearable trying to accomplish something with a team that did not want to cooperate with his Yank ideas? Americans might know 'sweet FA' about football but Mr Hill -Wood might like to find out why it is that 99 percent of sports events in the USA throughout the year are violence -free family outings. A stadium full of 100.000 people on a hot night will go home happy and sober, without one incident of loutishness. Britons in the USA enjoy a good life and the unconditional love of the native populace. Instead of hunger strikes and tirades to see Americans off, it would be nice if the affection shown to all Britons in the States could be reciprocated here. |
| Posted by:Zhang Fei |
#23 RD wrote:I'm a big fan of Newton, Churchill, Bill Shakespeare, Benjamin Disraeli, Maggie Thatcher, Mark Steyn, Monty Python etc. and the the Brits general. ;-) Mark Steyn is a Canadian. |
| Posted by: Chuck 2007-05-12 23:02 |
| #22 E: Zhang Fei: Of course, the Anglosphere did not include US public opinion until after Pearl Harbor. Until then it was a George W. style FDR doing his best to fund and equip the British, the Canadians, the Australians, the Kiwis and the Indians against Nazi Europe. But hey better late than never. In fact, it would be interesting to see the British response to an attack on the US from a neighboring country that involved millions of troops and hundreds of thousands of dead on the US side. I bet the Brits would just sit back and laugh at the silly buggers having a go at each other. In fact - didn't Britain support the Confederacy during the Civil War? |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2007-05-12 22:31 |
| #21 E: Zhang Fei: Of course, the Anglosphere did not include US public opinion until after Pearl Harbor. Until then it was a George W. style FDR doing his best to fund and equip the British, the Canadians, the Australians, the Kiwis and the Indians against Nazi Europe. But hey better late than never. No offense - Germany was a threat to Britain, not the United States. Both times. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2007-05-12 22:25 |
| #20 FRANK, *ahem* NS - can you name one? Otherwise your observation is false as well as being dated. Jeebus. Anglophobia? dittos, My family were colonists who fought in the Revolution against King George. But hey, the revolution was over before i was born Nimble, and inspite of my Irish blood and a few Catholics in my family I have always considered the IRA to be a terrorist org. Absolutely No Simpatico whats so ever from me. The English have contributed far to much to civilization to be discounted because of a certain % of bad apples. I'm a big fan of Newton, Churchill, Bill Shakespeare, Benjamin Disraeli, Maggie Thatcher, Mark Steyn, Monty Python etc. and the the Brits general. ;-) One more 7/7 attack and the British silent majority will rise up and cull the shitheads, immigrants and native born. |
| Posted by: RD 2007-05-12 18:12 |
| #19 so they lash out at a handy substitute. You screw your friends because your enemies won't let you get close enough. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-05-12 15:44 |
| #18 Yawn. In 1862, the London Times condemned the Emancipation Proclamation. |
| Posted by: mrp 2007-05-12 15:14 |
| #17 "I suspect this guy won't be talking politics or economics to me anymore..." It's a terrible loss, Mac... but I imagine yuu'll be able to bear up. Myself, I wonder how much of this British anti-Americanism was just always there (because historically there always was a certain level of resentment among certain classes of Brit, about those crass and vulgar Yanks) and how much is a very new and ugly kind of scape-goating. They can't really bring themselves to face that which they really fear, and which could hurt them a lot... so they lash out at a handy substitute. |
| Posted by: Sgt. Mom 2007-05-12 15:05 |
| #16 No apologies needed, Excalibur, your eyes are focused on the real goals we all need to reach for international security. Now, after years of protests that the Embassy is the number one terrorist target in the world, the Mayfair Residents association has finally succeeded in driving the Embassy from its historic residence. ... no sooner had 9/11 happened than I was being lectured on the cowardice of the Yanks and how their support for Israel had left the world in turmoil. These stupid pommy asstards seem to have forgotten what it is like to be an island of freedom surrounded by hostile forces. Israel is the ONLY democratic nation in a sea of tyrannical Arab cesspits. Anti-Semitism is still well and alive in Europe and represents a fundamental societal flaw in European thinking. If this is what allows them feel so closely aligned to their Muslim colonizers then they can be damned right along with Islam. I'm far more confident that European anti-Semitism is really a streak of sublimated yet abiding racism that will finally re-emerge when the charnel house doors are once again flung wide open to engulf their Muslim population in another, perhaps more deserved, bout of incredible slaughter. Europe seems unwilling or incapable of implementing sane measures that would forestall such carnage and instead is doomed to repeat the same grotesque set piece of the World Wars all over again. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-05-12 14:58 |
| #15 Zhang Fei: Of course, the Anglosphere did not include US public opinion until after Pearl Harbor. Until then it was a George W. style FDR doing his best to fund and equip the British, the Canadians, the Australians, the Kiwis and the Indians against Nazi Europe. But hey better late than never. |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2007-05-12 13:14 |
| #14 ZF, I just had a long conversation with a Kool-Aid drinking Frenchman who was telling me all about how global warming was going to kill us all. He had a novel approach, however; it was the West's fault that there was so much pollution in China and India because we had "driven" the manufacturing industries there. He was of the opinion that we had to "force" those countries to "stop polluting the world." After I asked him if France wouldn't have been better off keeping some of those "polluting" industries so as to diminish a bit of the banlieue's 40% unemployment, I told him he needed to lose the idea of "forcing" China and India to do anything. He got quite offended when I told him that I would be happy to provide him statistics showing that not only the Chinese PLA but the Indian Army would currently whip France hands down in a stand-up fight. I'm afraid I didn't do much of a job hiding my amusement at the idea of the EU "forcing" anyone anywhere outside of the EU to do anything. I suspect this guy won't be talking politics or economics to me anymore. Oh well, c'est la vie! |
| Posted by: Mac 2007-05-12 10:47 |
| #13 *ahem* NS - can you name one? Otherwise your observation is false as well as being dated. Jeebus. Anglophobia? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-05-12 10:37 |
| #12 NS: Plenty of Americans send money to the IRA to sate their Anglophobia. That would be Irish Americans only. Mainly from the New England area. I'm no Anglophobe, but I'm tired of carping from Brits after losing a few hundred men in Iraq. We lost about half a million men during during the two World Wars pushing the threat back from British shores. Against a country that did not attack the US. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2007-05-12 10:37 |
| #11 I think part of becoming "EUropean" is hating Americans. I blame the State Department for encouraging this. Things like this are why I am rapidly becoming convinced that our policy of extending a defense umbrella to the world is not tenable in the long run. It is not only expensive in men and money, it is making foreigners hate our guts. It is time to bring our men back from far-flung locations and have them employed in free market vocations that will strengthen our economy and make America a better place. It is time to let foreigners do their own fighting and dying. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2007-05-12 10:30 |
| #10 No worry, Excal. Plenty of Americans send money to the IRA to sate their Anglophobia. Part of the strength of our mutual culture is that we tolerate such nonsense until the chips are really down. The bad news is that we've farther to fall before we get there. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2007-05-12 09:46 |
| #9 This leaves me once again shamed to be English. For what it is worth, I apologize on behalf of my selfish, blinkered countrymen. If we fall to the scimitar we will only have ourselves to blame. |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2007-05-12 09:03 |
| #8 I think an intellectual inferiority complex has been tweaked. They are ashamed to be of the same Anglo-Saxon strain and have such weed-grown, stammering kin. It's Sophistication Syndrome gone awok. In WWII, no one had the luxury of such pretensions and foci when bombs were raining down on their homes-all that mattered was a decent heart and courage. What, besides violence, can push the Brits back into common sense and graciousness towards friends? |
| Posted by: Jules 2007-05-12 09:00 |
| #7 Mac, your analysis sounds like Victor Hanson's discussion on global jihadism (see Opinion post today), but without the violence. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-05-12 08:02 |
| #6 Yes, there are a lot of Britishers who hate us. I think it's because they know how far they have fallen both morally and physically, and they simply can't bear to face the reality of what they have allowed to happen to themselves and their country. It's much easier to take out their cowardly rage and anger on their friends than to face their dangerous internal demons and vanquish them. The men who fought at Lucknow, Sevastopol and Rorke's Drift would despise the character of today's Britain, and honest Britons know, and are ashamed, of that fact. |
| Posted by: Mac 2007-05-12 07:51 |
| #5 Three years ago my daughter went to London on their honeymoon. Found anti-American sentiments widespread. Americans are seen as the cause of the problems of the world, & everything would be fine if we would alll just go home and stay there. 1938 worldview again. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-05-12 07:34 |
| #4 During a family trip to Lady Besoeker's relatives near Manchester in 1986 many of the WWII generation were still alive. Time for these dear people was told in terms of "before the war" or "after the war." Most men and many of the ladies had been in the services at some point. They were a great generation and most definately pro-American. Twenty years changes things and oftentimes not for the better. I suggest we move the embassy to a sprawling estate near Windermere and the District and leave Mayfair to the National Trust. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2007-05-12 05:44 |
| #3 We're in you world growing your foodz We're in you drive makin you crash We're in your movies makin you payz Maker me a samich! |
| Posted by: Shipman 2007-05-12 04:56 |
#2 Apparently anti-Americanism & anti-Semitism have been running together in some circles in Europe for quite a while. I found a speech by a French Canadian man who did research on his ancestry in France in 1973:I turned toward the vicar RÂ… and told him that I was pleased to discover that the family of RÂ…, contrary to mine, was still living at Saintes. I also added, by way of an explanation, that the wife of my first ancestor, Etienne Gellineau who came to America with his 12 year-old son on 1658, shared the same family name as he did (Hugette RÂ…) and that she died in the parish of Saint-Eutrope. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-05-12 02:24 |
| #1 These people are no different than San Francisco Democrats, self-absorbed hedonistic self-righteous twits that believe that the protection afforded them by America is their natural due. People like this are why the sun set on the British Empire. Too many good men lost in WWI, WWII, and Korea thinned the bloodlines. These Mayfair swells are the progeny of the men who didn't go to war, the ones unwilling or unfit to defend their way of life. |
| Posted by: RWV 2007-05-12 00:19 |