In today's Wall Street Journal (subscription only), William Shawcross writes scathingly about the "Little Englanders" who attack Blair over Iraq with, roughly, "what's in it for me?". In today's Guardian, Geoffrey Wheatcroft offers a prime example of the crowd Shawcross properly holds in contempt.

I would have a large bet that if the 60th anniversary of VE-day on Sunday were marked by a poll of MacDonald Fraser's surviving contemporaries - the men and women who served this country in 1939-45 - an easy majority of them would be opposed to the Iraq war.

Does Michael Howard have any inkling how deep-rooted that sentiment is? Or does the "high Tory" Charles Moore, who writes in the Daily Telegraph that Blair deserves to win because of his brave determination to "maintain our most important alliance"? Not only is that stance deeply unpatriotic, it is frankly ridiculous. For years these people have worked themselves into a lather about threats to our sovereignty from bureaucrats in Brussels. And yet they are happy to see this country become a client state of Washington, and for the British army to serve as the American foreign legion.

From tomorrow morning the Tories will have ample opportunity to think about their future as a party, if there is one. They might begin by turning to Kenneth Clarke and Malcolm Rifkind, both former cabinet ministers and critics of the war. They might suggest that the Tories' next historic task is to rethink this country's servile relationship with America. It's time the Tories remembered Leo Amery's words in 1939: "Speak for England".

UPDATE: Brad DeLong once delivered a nice kick to the little prat.

I thought it was interesting to note that the Guardian piece followed one by Wheatcroft in the Wall Street Journal the day before, which avoided any mention of servility. He merely notes the existence of an anti-American brigade in Europe outside the Left without disclosing that he's a fully paid up member:

This may seem surprising, but is not really so: Anti-Americanism has by no means always been a preserve of the left in Europe, and there is lingering resentment of the way the Yanks took over from us as global superpower. But among old-fashioned instinctive Tories there is also a deep sense of anger--memorably expressed by George MacDonald Fraser, author of the "Flashman" novels and a World War II infantryman--at what seems to them a needless, foolish and morally dubious war.

Interesting to compare the tone.

--and there is lingering resentment of the way the Yanks took over from us as global superpower.--

We didn't want their birthright, and frankly some of us still don't want it.