Never again. The war in Iraq must, and will, be won, but it should not be repeated. Behind the coalition’s military unity, a growing political divergence has emerged this week about post-war policy. While naturally playing down differences, Tony Blair and Jack Straw yesterday underlined the limits to British support for American attempts to reshape the Middle East.

None of these doubts affects the coalition leaders’ continuing confidence about the outcome of the war, hopes reinforced by yesterday’s reports of US advances towards Baghdad. Of course, there are tensions over “friendly fire” incidents and the treatment of civilians. The British are more experienced than the Americans in peacekeeping, as typified by the offensive picture on Tuesday night’s news of a gung-ho American soldier on top of a tank celebrating as if he had just scored a football touchdown. But such friction and endless second-guessing of military decisions are common to wartime coalitions and minor compared with Montgomery’s rows with American generals.

Nor are there any real doubts in the Blair inner circle about the correctness of going to war. First, Mr Blair has, for a long time, believed that traditional ideas of national sovereignty have been undermined by rogue states and terrorist groups with, or seeking, weapons of mass destruction, justifying intervention. Second, the September 11 attacks changed America’s view of its own security. The rest of the world should not allow the US to address these problems on its own. Third, Iraq presents a uniquely serious threat because of its past use of chemical weapons. However, it is crucial to Mr Blair’s case — and to maintaining public support — that Iraq is now shown to have weapons of mass destruction, as British Intelligence believes and told Cabinet ministers in briefings before the war.

Yet the past fortnight has underlined the political, as opposed to the military, risks. Many Iraqis, let alone other Arabs, are suspicious of the coalition. While America obviously has the military power to prevail, that does not win “hearts and minds”. Allies matter. President Bush’s attempt to claim that his “coalition of the willing” of 48 countries is larger than his father’s in the 1991 Gulf War is ludicrous. Several are minnows — Micronesia, Costa Rica and Palau — while the number of active military participants is much smaller than in 1991, largely the US, Britain and Australia, with minor contributions from Poland and Denmark. Most of the “new” European supporters have kept a low profile because of domestic opposition. The West, let alone the Middle East, is far more divided than in 1991.

The breakdown at the UN and the war have shown the limits of Mr Blair’s attempt to nudge Mr Bush in a multilateral direction. His pro-European strategy has been damaged. He has been hailed as a hero by Eurosceptics and American conservatives and reviled by many Europeans and social democrats.

As always, Mr Blair is the eternal optimist. He believes he can head off American unilateralism. The bridge over the Atlantic can be repaired. As he told MPs yesterday, differences over the future of Iraq were “reconcilable”.

Many Americans, particularly at the Pentagon, want to control the reconstruction of Iraq, minimising the UN role largely to humanitarian relief. By contrast, the Europeans emphasise a leading UN role. Mr Blair also believes that the UN should be actively involved, organising a conference of a wide range of internal groups, while the Security Council should authorise postwar arrangements. But, “as soon as possible”, Iraq should be run by Iraqis themselves with outsiders, whether the US or the UN, in an advisory role. We should have a clearer idea about the possibility and nature of any deal after Colin Powell meets EU leaders and Nato foreign ministers today in Brussels.

Equally important, yesterday, was Mr Straw’s firm statement that Britain would have nothing to do with action against Iran and Syria, which American officials have recently threatened. Similarly, Britain favours negotiations to deal with the more immediate threat of North Korea’s nuclear programme. Mr Blair created alarm some weeks ago among Labour MPs when he said that these threats were next to be addressed. But he meant diplomatically, not militarily, and multilaterally.

The test case for the Blair strategy is the Middle East peace process. Mr Blair has clutched at any sign of movement from Mr Bush, usually to be disappointed. The British are now emphasising Mr Bush’s commitment not just to publishing the road map for a settlement between the Israelis and Palestinians, but also to implementing it. But many in Europe and the Middle East are sceptical about Mr Bush’s willingness, in practice, to put pressure on the Sharon Government to make genuine concessions.

On many issues, Britain is closer to the rest of Europe, including France, than to the US. Europe is, for example, co-operating well together on most foreign policy issues, notably the Balkans. The old- versus-new Europe split is exaggerated, despite attempts by some in Washington, for the first time since 1945, to encourage division rather than integration in Europe by picking and choosing allies.

Mr Blair says a postwar priority is to rebuild the transatlantic alliance. But, first, relations within Europe need to be rebuilt. That will involve movement from both France and Germany, whose anti-US approach has left them without influence, and from Britain.

Mr Blair’s instincts are correct: rejecting both the unipolar American dominance sought by Pentagon neoconservatives and the multipolar rivalry envisaged by France and Russia. Neither will work. The Iraqi war will be a Pyrrhic victory unless these lessons are learnt.

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