Long Knife Warning

Matthew d'Ancona, the Editor of The Spectator, writes an interesting op-ed in today's Telegraph. It should be considered a warning to Mark Malloch Brown. The former UN deputy general secretary has been ensconced in a position within Gordon Brown's government, but has already become a problem. His massive ego, coupled with his blatant anti-Americanism is making the new PM have to scramble.

How quickly talent can turn into torment. When Gordon Brown unveiled his "government of all the talents", there was no outside recruit of whom he was prouder than Sir Mark Malloch Brown, the former UN deputy general secretary, now ennobled and installed at the Foreign Office.

I wonder how the Prime Minister feels this morning about his star signing who let rip in an interview of breathtaking pomposity with The Daily Telegraph yesterday.

The President and Prime Minister, Malloch Brown told the Telegraph, should no longer "be joined at the hip". Mocking the faith of George Bush and Tony Blair, the new foreign minister said that their shared experiences were "enough to put you on your knees and get you praying together".

In the prelude to the Iraq war, "everything I had worked for and fought for was suddenly under attack". He urged his new colleagues to negotiate with extremists; boasted that his allies in Washington are already "calling me when they have problems that they want to see fixed"; and postured as the back-seat driver of the Foreign Office, "the wise eminence" to David Miliband, the new Foreign Secretary.

It was a car-crash of an interview, the words of a UN mandarin who has no conception of what it means to be a minister of the Crown.

It was also entirely predictable that this would happen, as the PM ought to have known. The appointment of Malloch Brown, an outspoken critic of the war with many foes in Washington, was only the loudest of the "poodle whistles" the PM has blown to signal a new approach to US-UK relations and the Iraq conflict…….

…….Lord Malloch Brown is another matter entirely. Used to the grandeur and pieties of the UN, he has double-barrelled trouble written all over his ermine. Mysteriously, Mr Brown wanted him badly and Lord Malloch Brown struck a hard bargain, demanding the right to attend Cabinet. Well, now he has got him.

I wonder how long it will take the PM to regret that decision. Be in no doubt: if this loose-tongued minister gives Mr Brown much more trouble he will find himself surplus to requirements before you can say long knife.

Malloch Brown has a long history as a serial basher of all things American, of course. He also managed to lose track of vast sums of UN development agency money. There is also the matter of his close ties to George Soros and the allegations - by UN staffers - that he allowed a UN staff member to work on the John Kerry presidential campaign. I have no idea why Gordon Brown wanted this guy in the first place. But I'm guessing that if Malloch Brown continues to be an embarrassment, he will be gainfully unemployed in short order. Gordon Brown does not have a reputation for being politically suicidal.

Malloch Brown has a long history as a serial basher of all things American, of course. He also managed to lose track of vast sums of UN development agency money. There is also the matter of his close ties to George Soros and the allegations - by UN staffers - that he allowed a UN staff member to work on the John Kerry presidential campaign. I have no idea why Gordon Brown wanted this guy in the first place. But I'm guessing that if Malloch Brown continues to be an embarrassment, he will be gainfully unemployed in short order. Gordon Brown does not have a reputation for being politically suicidal.