The English press has subjected Shawcross’s apparent rightward turn to searching psychological and cultural analysis (finally inheriting the family estate; marrying a ”socialite heiress”; cozying up to the royal family; re-enacting his father’s own political pattern, etc.). Since ”Allies” is silent on this subject, it’s more instructive to consider the possibility that Shawcross has remained true to his principles, but that a morally driven foreign policy looks very different after 9/11 than it did before.
Emphasis mine. From James Traub’s review of William Shawcross’s Allies, in the New York Times. Link courtesy of Jeff Jarvis. And there’s more:
Shawcross is scarcely the only liberal or leftist to see the war in Iraq as the consummation, rather than the contradiction, of his principles…Shawcross notes that while the neocons are considered “radical” for their insistence that evil regimes have sacrificed their absolute right to sovereignty, these arguments “sound close to mainstream liberal internationalist thought.”
I do like to think, from time to time, that I have basically the same politics as I did on September 10th, and that it’s all my former fellow travelers who’ve lost their way.