President Bush summed up the feeling of the afternoon nicely yesterday when he said of Prime Minister Blair, “He is a true friend of the American people. The United Kingdom has produced some of the world’s most distinguished statesmen, and I’m proud to be standing with one of them today.”Indeed, history may not find it a stretch to compare Mr. Blair to Winston Churchill in his ability to perceive clearly a new type of threat to world peace. As Churchill understood the Nazis, so does Mr. Blair understand the threat of militant Islam, as he made clear in his speech before a joint session of Congress yesterday, excerpted in the adjacent columns.

“The threat comes because in another part of our globe there is shadow and darkness, where not all the world is free, where many millions suffer under brutal dictatorship, where a third of our planet lives in a poverty beyond anything even the poorest in our societies can imagine, and where a fa natical strain of religious extremism has arisen,” Mr. Blair said. “The virus is terrorism.” And aside from his recognition of this new threat, the prime minister also made it clear that he understands one crucial fact as to how this threat must be dealt with: As with Nazism, there can be no negotiation. “The political culture of Europe is inevitably rightly based on compromise,” Mr. Blair said. “Compromise is a fine thing except when based on an illusion. And I don’t believe you can compromise with this new form of terrorism.”

Most remarkable, however, is the sense of historical purpose that Messrs. Blair and Bush share.”This is the work history has given us, and we will complete it,”Mr. Bush said. “Destiny put you in this place in history,”Mr. Blair said of America,”and the task is yours to do.” Movingly, he added: “You are not going to be alone. We will be with you fighting for liberty.… And if our spirit is right and our courage firm, the world will be with us.”