Retreat from Basra
Updated on 03 September 2007
Snowmail previewing tonight's programme...
Victory in our time or retreat? The fact is inescapable, British forces in southern Iraq have left Basra city and are now hunkered down in their barracks on the airfield.
The 550 British troops have now quit their city base in Basra Palace, which is now controlled by local Iraqi forces. This is not a portent of cutting and running, says Downing Street, but is a long-planned part of the process of handing over to the Iraqis.
It's not easy to report this development because there is, effectively, no-one in or around Basra to report it. A British journalist can these days only do so with the very active participation of the Ministry of Defence.
We have been asking the MoD for many weeks about going to Basra, and have been told persistently that there will be no opportunities before October.
You will, however, see footage of the British withdrawal on Channel 4 News tonight because the Ministry of Defence have shot it themselves. But that won't assist us in coming to a rounded assessment about this move, and whether it is indeed a victory (because stability and security are now assured via local authority) or more of a retreat.
I was also intrigued to discover that there is a journalist who has been allowed to witness these momentous events: the defence correspondent of The Sun newspaper .
Jonathan Rugman is trying to make head and tail of it, and we shall be talking to Bob Ainsworth, the defence minister.
Bush in Iraq
Just as the Brits leave, George Bush decides for the first time in several years to pitch up in Iraq himself. They have found a safe bit of desert in Anbar province for him to go bullet-proof jacketless.
No question that he's out to dress the set before General David Petraeus gives his key evaluation next week of the consequences of the military surge. Sarah Smith is on the president's case.
Brown's new politics
Gordon Brown has been out both doing and talking a new kind of politics - and perhaps an old one too. The new, contained in a speech, is about trying to provoke more people to participate. The old is to lay a few gloves on the opposition by hoovering up some of their people to do jobs for the Labour government.
So far two former front-bench spokesmen are in the hoover bag, together with one of the Tory party's key funders and former deputy treasurer. Gary Gibbon dissects, at seven.
Boris's mayoral bid
Boris Johnson has launched his bid to be mayor for London. He joins the serried ranks of monkey-suited characters across the country who have bid for mayoral power in the past. But he's not doing interviews, so his main opponent, one Ken Livingstone, will delve into the fray instead. Interestingly, I detect around Ken a whiff of concern about the Boris Tory challenge.
From India tonight, a whiff of the China syndrome. How some 130 female foetuses have been found across India in recent weeks as the phenomenon of female foeticide begins to show itself - that is, the active and gruesome desire to abort girl foetuses that have nothing wrong with them, in favour of boy babies.
Busking it
Finally, an incredible Irish film, made with pennies, that has swept the Sundance Film Festival and looks like going seriously big. It's about a busker who also makes it big. Stephanie West, at seven.
Got to run. See you at seven as ever. Jon.
