I'm not sure the idea of Britain suffering after 2001 holds much water, though.  For one thing, the dollar was already going to fall against the pound, given the downturn in America and the expansion in Britain.  Bush also doesn't have the capacity to significantly weaken the dollar.  From a policy perspective, the Fed is the big player on the dollar.  Congress can spend money to weaken it, but the other factors will ultimately swamp that.  America wasn't in a position to severely damage Britain, even at the height of the Dot-Com Era.

The military subsidies are another issue, but I'm not sure that produces more than a temporary setback, since the next president would have likely brought the subsidies back around.  It wouldn't make sense to weaken one's closest ally over the long haul, unless Bush was planning to cut ties with Britain.  That's, I suppose, not out of the realm of possibility (given his arrogance and generally vindictive personality), but -- and I say this even while taking the treatment by the American press of countries like France and Germany into account -- it would've raised more than a few eyebrows among average Americans, especially knowing how much Blair was talked up by the Bush administration after 9/11.

So, in my opinion, RogueTrooper's argument, in part, makes no sense; and, in another part, gives what can only be described as an incomplete story, at best.

If I were a betting man, -- and people who've seen my incredibly bad poker game can tell you I'm not -- I'd bet that Blair was somewhere on the fence in deciding whether or not to join.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.