Frank Johnson

If you want to get ahead in the Tory party, do not become an assassin

If you want to get ahead in the Tory party, do not become an assassin

issue 10 May 2003

We shall probably never know what drove someone like Crispin Blunt to carry out a suicide attack on Iain Duncan Smith. The young man was from a respectable, middle-class, and pro-European background. That is, he came from the Tory breeding ground of moderation. But not all respectable, middle-class pro-Europeans try to assassinate their leader.

His neighbours on the backbenches said that they were amazed and shocked when they heard the news. To them, he was a rather ordinary man, polite and nice. None of them suspected that he would get mixed up in terrorism.

One theory is that he was manipulated by the godfathers of

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