Editing John le Carré (section)

==Politics==
===Threats to democracy===
In 2017, le Carré expressed concerns over the future of [[liberal democracy]], saying: "I think of all things that were happening across Europe in the 1930s, in Spain, in Japan, obviously in Germany. To me, these are absolutely comparable signs of the rise of [[fascism]] and it's contagious, it's infectious. Fascism is up and running in Poland and Hungary. There's an encouragement about".<ref>{{Cite news|last=Brown|first=Mark|date=7 September 2017|title=John le Carré on Trump: 'Something seriously bad is happening'|work=[[The Guardian]]|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/sep/07/john-le-carre-on-trump-something-truly-seriously-bad-is-happening|access-date=8 September 2017|archive-date=7 September 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170907235916/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/sep/07/john-le-carre-on-trump-something-truly-seriously-bad-is-happening|url-status=live}}</ref> He later wrote that the end of the Cold War had left the West without a coherent ideology, in contrast to the "notion of [[individual freedom]], of inclusiveness, of tolerance – all of that we called [[anti-communism]]" prevailing during that time.<ref>{{Cite news|title=Novelist John Le Carré Reflects On His Own 'Legacy' Of Spying|publisher=NPR|url=https://www.npr.org/2017/12/28/572625559/novelist-john-le-carr-reflects-on-his-own-legacy-of-spying|access-date=14 December 2020|language=en|archive-date=18 September 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200918142937/https://www.npr.org/2017/12/28/572625559/novelist-john-le-carr-reflects-on-his-own-legacy-of-spying|url-status=live}}</ref>

Le Carré opposed both U.S. President [[Donald Trump]] and Russian President [[Vladimir Putin]], arguing that their desire to seek or maintain their countries' superpower status caused an impulse "for [[oligarchy]], the dismissal of the truth, the contempt, actually, for the electorate and for the [[democratic system]]".<ref>{{Cite news|last=Scott|first=Simon|title=John Le Carré Fears For The Future In 'Agent Running In The Field'|date=19 October 2019|url=https://www.npr.org/2019/10/19/771089425/john-le-carr-fears-for-the-future-in-agent-running-in-the-field|access-date=13 December 2020|publisher=[[NPR]]|language=en|archive-date=1 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200701165533/https://www.npr.org/2019/10/19/771089425/john-le-carr-fears-for-the-future-in-agent-running-in-the-field|url-status=live}}</ref> Le Carré compared Trump's tendency to dismiss the media as "[[fake news]]" to the [[Nazi book burnings]], and wrote that the United States is "heading straight down the road to [[institutional racism]] and [[neo-fascism]]".<ref>{{Cite web|date=7 September 2017|title=John le Carré on Trump: 'Something seriously bad is happening'|url=http://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/sep/07/john-le-carre-on-trump-something-truly-seriously-bad-is-happening|access-date=13 December 2020|website=The Guardian|language=en|archive-date=6 December 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201206171537/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/sep/07/john-le-carre-on-trump-something-truly-seriously-bad-is-happening|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":02">{{Cite news|last1=Banville|first1=John|author-link1=John Banville|last2=le Carré|first2=John|date=11 October 2019|title='My ties to England have loosened': John le Carré on Britain, Boris and Brexit|url=http://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/11/john-le-carre-truth-was-what-you-got-away-with|access-date=13 December 2020|work=[[The Guardian]]|language=en|archive-date=13 December 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201213233913/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/11/john-le-carre-truth-was-what-you-got-away-with|url-status=live}}</ref>

In le Carré's 2019 novel ''[[Agent Running in the Field]]'', one of the novel's characters refers to Trump as "Putin's shithouse cleaner" who "does everything for little Vladi that little Vladi can't do for himself". The novel's narrator describes [[Boris Johnson]] as "a pig-ignorant foreign secretary". He says Russia is moving "backwards into her dark, delusional past", with Britain following a short way behind.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Gilbert|first=Sophie|date=26 October 2019|title=John le Carré's Scathing Tale of Brexit Britain|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2019/10/john-le-carre-agent-running-in-the-field-review/600631/|access-date=14 December 2020|website=[[The Atlantic]]|language=en-US}}</ref> Le Carré later said that he believed the novel's plotline, involving the U.S. and British intelligence services [[colluding]] to subvert the [[European Union]], to be "horribly possible".<ref name=":02" />

===Brexit===
Le Carré was an outspoken advocate of [[European integration]] and sharply criticised [[Brexit]].<ref>{{Cite news|last=Carré|first=John le|date=1 February 2020|title=John le Carré on Brexit: 'It's breaking my heart'|work=[[The Guardian]]|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/feb/01/john-le-carre-breaking-heart-brexit|access-date=5 February 2020|archive-date=4 February 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200204165247/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/feb/01/john-le-carre-breaking-heart-brexit|url-status=live}}</ref> Le Carré criticised Brexit advocates such as [[Boris Johnson]] (whom he referred to as a "mob orator"), [[Dominic Cummings]] and [[Nigel Farage]] in interviews, claiming that their "task is to fire up the people with nostalgia [and] with anger". He further opined in interviews: "What really scares me about nostalgia is that it's become a political weapon. Politicians are creating a nostalgia for an England that never existed, and selling it, really, as something we could return to", adding that, with "the demise of the working class we saw also the demise of an established social order, based on the stability of ancient class structures".<ref name=":02" /><ref>{{Cite news|date=14 October 2019|title=John le Carré: 'Politicians love chaos – it gives them authority'|language=en-GB|work=BBC News|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50012504|access-date=13 December 2020|archive-date=19 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201119014620/https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50012504|url-status=live}}</ref> On the other hand, he said that in the [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour Party]] "they have this [[Leninism|Leninist]] element and they have this huge appetite to level society."<ref name="John le Carré on Corbyn">{{cite news |last1=John |first1=Banville |title=Interview: 'My ties to England have loosened': John le Carré on Britain, Boris and Brexit |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/11/john-le-carre-truth-was-what-you-got-away-with |access-date=15 July 2022 |work=The Guardian |date=11 October 2019 }}</ref>

On Brexit, le Carré did not mince his words, comparing it to the 1956 [[Suez crisis]], which confirmed post-imperial Britain's loss of global power. "This is without doubt the greatest catastrophe and the greatest idiocy that Britain has perpetrated since the invasion of [[Suez]]", le Carré said of [[Brexit]]. "Nobody is to blame but the Brits themselves – not the Irish, not the Europeans." "The idea, to me, that at the moment we should imagine we can substitute access to the biggest trade union in the world with access to the American market is terrifying", he said.<ref name=otoole/><ref name=rte/><ref name=sands/>

Speaking to ''[[The Guardian]]'' in 2019, he commented: "I've always believed, though ironically it's not the way I've voted, that it's [[compassionate conservatism]] that in the end could, for example, integrate the private schooling system. If you do it from the left you will seem to be acting out of resentment; do it from the right and it looks like good social organisation." Le Carré also said: "I think my own ties to England were hugely loosened over the last few years. And it's a kind of liberation, if a sad kind."<ref name=":02" />

===US invasion of Iraq===
In January 2003, two months prior to the invasion, ''[[The Times]]'' published le Carré's essay "The United States Has Gone Mad" criticising the buildup to the [[Iraq War]] and President [[George W. Bush]]'s response to the [[September 11 attacks|11 September 2001 terrorist attacks]], calling it "worse than [[McCarthyism]], worse than the [[Bay of Pigs Invasion|Bay of Pigs]] and in the long term potentially more disastrous than the [[Vietnam War]]" and "beyond anything [[Osama bin Laden]] could have hoped for in his nastiest dreams".<ref>{{Cite web|last1=Meier|first1=Andrew|title=Coming in from the Cold|url=https://www.bookforum.com/print/2304/the-many-masks-of-ex-spy-and-novelist-john-le-carre-16789|access-date=15 December 2020|website=[[Bookforum]]|date=January 2017|language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=le Carré |first=John |title=Opinion: The United States of America has gone mad |url=http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0115-01.htm |access-date=8 February 2011 |newspaper=[[The Sunday Times]] |date=15 January 2003 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101204033616/http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0115-01.htm |archive-date=4 December 2010 }}</ref> Le Carré participated in the London [[protests against the Iraq War]]. He said the war resulted from the "politicisation of intelligence to fit the political intentions" of governments and "How Bush and his junta succeeded in deflecting America's anger from bin Laden to [[Saddam Hussein]] is one of the great public relations conjuring tricks of history".<ref name="dn111010">{{cite web |title=Exclusive: British Novelist John le Carré on the Iraq War, Corporate Power, the Exploitation of Africa and His New Novel, "Our Kind of Traitor" |url=https://www.democracynow.org/2010/10/11/exclusive_british_novelist_john_le_carr |website=Democracy Now! |access-date=17 December 2020 |language=en |date=11 October 2010}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=John le Carré, Iraq War Critic and Legendary Author of Spy Novels, Dies at 89 |url=https://www.democracynow.org/2020/12/14/headlines/john_le_carre_iraq_war_critic_and_legendary_author_of_spy_novels_dies_at_89 |website=Democracy Now! |access-date=17 December 2020 |language=en |date=14 December 2020}}</ref>

He was critical of [[Tony Blair]]'s role in taking Britain into the Iraq War, saying: "I can't understand that Blair has an afterlife at all. It seems to me that any politician who takes his country to war under false pretences has committed the ultimate sin. I think that a war in which we refuse to accept the body count of those that we kill is also a war of which we should be ashamed."<ref name="dn111010"/>

===Iran===
Le Carré was critical of Western governments' policies towards Iran. He said that Iran's actions are a response to being "encircled by nuclear powers" and by the way in which "we ousted [[Mohammad Mosaddegh|Mosaddeq]] through [[1953 Iranian coup d'état|the CIA and the Secret Service here across the way]] and installed the [[Mohammad Reza Pahlavi|Shah]] and trained his ghastly secret police force in all the black arts, the [[SAVAK]]".<ref name="dn111010"/>

Le Carré feuded with [[Salman Rushdie]] over ''[[The Satanic Verses]]'', stating: "Nobody has a God-given right to insult a great religion and be published with impunity".<ref>{{cite news|title=The spy who came in from the cold|url=https://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21677181-secretive-life-becomes-open-book-spy-who-came-cold|access-date=30 October 2015|newspaper=[[The Economist]]|date=30 October 2015|archive-date=30 October 2015|url-access=registration|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151030023357/http://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21677181-secretive-life-becomes-open-book-spy-who-came-cold|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Israel===
In a 1998 interview with Douglas Davis, Le Carré described Israel as "the most extraordinary carnival of human variety that I have ever set eyes on, a nation in the process of re-assembling itself from the shards of its past, now Oriental, now Western, now secular, now religious, but always anxiously moralizing about itself, criticizing itself with Maoist ferocity, a nation crackling with debate, rediscovering its past while it fought for its future." He declared: "No nation on earth was more deserving of peace—or more condemned to fight for it."<ref>{{Cite web|title=Le Carré: 'Extraordinary' Israel, 'crackling with debate, rocked me to my boots'|url=https://www.timesofisrael.com/le-carre-israel-rocked-me-to-my-boots/|access-date=11 May 2021|website=[[The Times of Israel]] |date=14 December 2020}}</ref>