The second Blair administration is almost synonymous with the crisis which began with the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 on the United States, developed into the war in Afghanistan and culminated in the long-drawn-out disputes over Iraq, from 2002 through to the present day. How this crisis will end is still not clear, but its various manifestations continue to shape British politics even after Blair's third election victory in May 2005. Indeed, apart from those few months after the second victory in June 2001, when the Labour Party was governing, exceptionally, with the confirmation of a huge parliamentary majority, the whole of this period was consumed by debate and anxiety about what was happening in the world, and what Britain's role in international affairs should be.

One particular paradox about these events from a British viewpoint is that while they precipitated more public interest in foreign policy than any event since the 1982 Falklands war, and possibly since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, the actual making of British policy took place in an even more restricted circle than usual. Indeed, most observers have concluded that this was a period of highly personalised foreign policy-making, with the prime minister and a small coterie of advisers driving through policies which were not only highly contentious on the wider political scene, but also the subject of grave doubts on the part of large parts of the Establishment, particularly the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), as the government department with formal responsibility in this area.