Oil, imperialism, "hypocrisy" -- this is a the charge sheet and lexicon of the "antiwar" movement. Whatever possible benefits might flow from military action are, it seems, rejected and disparaged, either on grounds of the means (the cure is worse than the cold), or on grounds of America and Britain's corrupt and hypocritical motives.

Before the outcome of any war in Iraq, critics will likely maintain this rhetorical arm-lock on Blair. But the prime minister has been here before. The same moral high tone, the same dire predictions of incalculable human misery and warnings of the impossibility and immorality of the mission were prognosticated by opponents and critics from the left before both Tony's Blair's previous wars, in Kosovo and Afghanistan. In fact, Blair emerged from both conflicts with enhanced authority and a rosy balance sheet in mainstream public opinion. Could it happen again? Possibly it could. But everything has to go right.

"He's between a rock and a hard place," the commentator Jonathan Freedland told me in a telephone interview a day after the march. Freedland is the U.K.'s current Columnist of the Year, and though he's far from a knee-jerk pacifist, he is "not yet persuaded" by the case for war. Freedland writes regularly for the up-market, liberal-leaning Guardian newspaper and the mass-circulation tabloid Daily Mirror, which has placed itself in the vanguard of the antiwar movement. "The stakes could not be higher for Blair," he says. "This is Afghanistan to the power of 10; the risks are perilously high and he's gambling everything on it. The scenario that most people now imagine is that the U.S. will go it alone if it has to -- the predicament Blair fears the most. It could destroy him. Although," he adds, "it has to be wondered whether the U.S. would really feel able to go it alone in the absence of any significant ally."

The internationally respected academic and Middle East specialist professor Fred Halliday of the London School of Economics believes that Blair now has no choice but to join the U.S., even if it defies the will of the U.N. and proceeds to war without a further resolution.

This realpolitik analysis contradicts the sentiments expressed by several of the protesters yesterday. "A lot of people here say they'd forgive him if he changed his mind and backed down," said Haydn Wood, a builder from the far southwest county of Cornwall. "If he joined the French and German side and went for more inspections, people would forgive him."

Both Freedland and Halliday demur, arguing that for Blair to flip-flop now would rob him of his strongest card: his steadfast "moral certitude." A conversion might be welcomed by a small minority of die-hard pacifists; for the wider world, it would surely convey wobbly nerves and a wildly irresponsible faint heart. In any case a victory with or without Britain seems likely. In this logic Blair can only stick with the U.S. and hope for a quick and (relatively) "clean" victory, with Saddam ousted -- perhaps even assassinated by a countryman -- and the invading troops hailed as liberators by overjoyed Iraqis dancing in the streets.

"The key factor for Blair is the outcome of the war. If it's quick and successful he'll be able to ride out the domestic difficulties," says Halliday, who wrote "Two Hours That Shook the World," the first academic analysis to be published in Britain after 9/11.

"The antiwar movement has to prepare itself for this scenario, which looks quite likely," says Freedland. "If the war works then the doubts will be drowned out. Once Baghdad is liberated, in the fogginess of the aftermath the right-wing press will crow victory and Blair will have prevailed."

As in Kosovo. As in Afghanistan.

Then there's the Middle East. With Palestinian flags fluttering in the hundreds along the route, this is perhaps the most potent entry in the antiwar movement's ledger of "hypocrisy." Harriet Martin, a Quaker from Birmingham, though born and educated in upstate New York, puts it bluntly:

"Look, if we're talking about U.N. resolutions, let's start with the resolutions on Israel and the Occupied Territories," she said. It was a refrain I heard over and over again. Palestinian literature was easy to find -- trodden underfoot in gutters and on sidewalks. I picked up a crushed leaflet in Trafalgar Square: "Friends of Al Aqsa: Did you know that Israel stands in defiance of over 80 U.N. resolutions?"

Tony Blair knows this. It is the issue that currently most clearly divides the U.K. and U.S. governments. Blair recently proposed rekindling the Middle East peace process with a London summit as a gesture of his personal good faith in seeking wider peace and justice in the Mideast.

"A Mideast settlement depends on the U.S., but any progress won't harm Blair domestically," Halliday says. "It can only help."

But on Palestine, Halliday points out a real-world irony for the antiwar movement. "We are far more likely to see real progress on Palestine if there is a war in Iraq," he says. "The Americans will push on it and compromised Arab leaders will probably try to revive the Saudi proposals that came through the Arab League last year and have since been on ice." Halliday points out that the aftermath of the last Gulf War produced the Madrid Conference, which eventually led to Oslo. "There was this positive linkage," he says.

"The Palestinians have also helped themselves by nominating a prime minister, Abu Ala, who Israel and the U.S. are willing to treat as a serious interlocutor, which is not the case with Arafat. So anyone who wants a just Palestinian solution should be supporting a war in Iraq. That's the reality of the situation. It would be good for Palestinian aspirations."

None of the protesters I spoke to on Saturday saw it quite that way.

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