Jon Bright (London, OK): You might be interested in this report published by the Oxford Research Group yesterday: "Towards sustainable security". In it our regular openDemocracy contributor Paul Rogers describes the consequences of the 'War on Terror' - specifically how a muscular style of military intervention might have played into the hands of militant groups.
Rogers is meticulous, accurate and correct, but this isn't really the significance. One of the blurbs on the back rather enthusiastically describes Rogers as a secular prophet, but the fact is people were queuing up to tell the coalition of the willing that an invasion of Iraq might quite literally blow up in their coalesced faces (I certainly remember telling anyone who would listen). This report is important, as one of the speakers at yesterday's anti-war rally said (whose name annoyingly escapes me), because it comes from a respected and trusted source, which is much more likely to grab Brown's attention that the few thousand who were briefly camped outside parliament yesterday. What impact will it have on Iran policy? I understand that White House sources are saying that the conversations being had about Iran at the moment are very different to those that were being held about Iraq - the military option is on the table, everyone knows, but the policy isn't fixed by any means. Reports like this, from places like ORG, might hopefully tip the balance away from conflict. But we will see.
