Brendan O’Neill writes: “While President Bush and Prime Minister Blair stand shoulder to shoulder, their forces in Afghanistan can barely see eye to eye.” The American Prospect. O’Neill, a London-based journalist and editor at spiked, has his own weblog here, in which he writes more about the Bush-league US-UK fractiousness.

Also: “Senior officials in the Prime Minister’s office have launched an astonishing attack on America’s handling of the hunt for Osama bin Laden and al-Qa’eda fugitives.

They have told The Telegraph that troops carrying out house-to-house searches in the remote tribal areas of Pakistan along the Afghanistan border were “blundering” with a “march-in-shooting” approach.

The US action was “backfiring”, increasing support for terrorism and making it harder for bin Laden and his henchmen to be caught.”

And: John Simpson writes: ‘Arrogant’ Bush shakes British bedrock of Atlantic Alliance

“In 32 years of reporting on international affairs, I have never seen Britain and the United States more separated from each other: not during the terrible last years of the Vietnam War, not during President Reagan’s Iran-Contra dealings or his espousal of the crackpot Star Wars system.

The way George W Bush’s administration deals with the outside world is affecting even the most traditionally pro-American elements in British society.

On two occasions last week I met senior civil servants from government departments in London who would normally be regarded as the natural bedrock of support for the Atlantic Alliance. In both cases I found open contempt for current American policy, especially towards the Middle East.”

Telegraph UK [gratitude for all of these links to the relentless Blowback]