ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a detailed examination of public opinion in Britain towards the overseas military interventions its armed forces have participated in the post-9/11 era. It focuses on the actual projection abroad of the country’s hard power capabilities—specifically, the public’s approval or disapproval of Britain’s conventional forces’ involvement in recent military interventions of varying duration, extent and, of course, significance and controversy for domestic politics. The chapter provides an overview of the key features of recent cases of military interventions involving British forces. It explores a detailed assessment, in turn, of the views of the British public towards the military interventions in the post-9/11 era, looking in turn at Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and action against Islamic State of Iraq and Syria in the Middle East. The war had a significant detrimental impact on Blair and his government. In partisan terms, Iraq was the most divisive foreign policy issue in British politics since the Suez invasion of 1956.
