Gordon Brown's Betrayal of America

The latest revelations by Wikileaks that the British government not only sought the "compassionate release" of the Lockerbie bomber, but also advised Libya on how best to secure that release, is devastating news for the Anglo-American relationship, as well as Britain as a whole.

This revelation shows even more just how morally bankrupt the Labour government was by the time it was approaching its end.  Most normal people, whether American or British, were disgusted at the fact that a known terrorist who had murdered hundreds of innocent people in the worst terror attack on British soil could be even considered for release on "compassionate grounds".

Yet to watch the man not only be released, but then to be greeted by a hero's welcome and much celebration at his arrival back in Libya should have made anyone feel physically sick.  It was clear then that the Labour government had capitulated on both its principles, and its American allies for the sake of some short term goal.  This can only be fully explained by looking at the anti-Americanism that pervades the British left.  One cannot possibly imagine a Labour government daring to offend our European colleagues in such a way!  Can you imagine Labour ever going against anything the European Union tells us to do?  Yet, because it is the Americans - who the left believe to be evil, and responsible for all the suffering in the world - the "compassionate release" was not so hard for Labour to contemplate.

Therefore it is beyond scandalous to discover today that the government was advising Libya on how to go about it from within a week of Megrahi's diagnosis of terminal cancer.  It shows not only a rejection of any principle of justice, morality, or true compassion from Brown's government, as well as an ambivalence to the families of those killed, but also it is a slap in the face of our American allies who lost significantly more of their citizen's in the terrorist attack than we Brits did.

As I have written many times before, the Anglo-American relationship is under severe strain, with an extremely anti-British President in office, and so this revelation could destroy the special relationship.  Hopefully, David Cameron can apologise on behalf of the former government, explain that the new government opposed the policy of "compassionate release" at the time, and does so today.  Maybe this can limit the fallout from this disgraceful revelation.

However, I fear that the chill in Anglo-American relations is about to turn into a deep freeze.  That is, unless we can get someone like Sarah Palin into the White House.