ABSTRACT
That the United Kingdom was a close and supportive ally of the United States in the various incarnations of the Global War on Terror during the presidency of George W. Bush is scarcely a matter of dispute. When President Bush visited London in June 2008, Prime Minister Gordon Brown spoke of ‘the special partnership’ between the United States and the United Kingdom, ‘a partnership not just of governments but of peoples . . . driven forward not simply by mutual interests, but by our shared values’. Bush responded: ‘First thing about Gordon Brown, he’s tough on terror, and I appreciate it’.1 The 2008 visit, though it generated some street protest, stood in fairly vivid contrast to Bush’s state visit of November, 2003, when shops ran out of rubber Bush masks, and the idea of a presidential speech to parliament was rejected in face of the likelihood of a protest by MPs.2
