Britain’s new prime minister, Gordon Brown, has disappointed American and British critics of the war in Iraq by declaring that he believes the West is involved in a “generation-long battle” against radical Islamic terrorism, that he believes the American mission in Iraq is worthwhile, and that he will stand by President Bush in his efforts to promote democracy in Iraq and in the rest of the Middle East.

After a four-hour meeting yesterday, which followed a two-hour discussion with the president at Camp David over dinner Sunday night, Mr. Brown offered little encouragement to those who hoped that the departure of Prime Minister Blair from Downing Street would lead to a weakening of the traditional alliance between America and Britain or would diminish the British resolve in Iraq.

“We are at one in fighting the battle against terrorism, and that struggle is one that we will fight with determination and with resilience and right across the world,” Mr. Brown said at a press conference at the presidential mountain retreat.

While repeating his aim to hand over to “the democratic government of Iraq” the administration of the southern Iraqi province that surrounds Basra when security conditions allow, Mr. Brown did not flinch from his support of Mr. Bush, the war in Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, or the wider war against terrorism.

Mr. Brown said it was “a great honor” to visit with Mr. Bush and “to be able to affirm and to celebrate the historic partnership of shared purpose between our two countries.” The prime minister quoted Winston Churchill, who described the relationship between America and Britain as one of “the joint inheritance of liberty, a belief in opportunity for all, a belief in the dignity of every human being.”

“Terrorism is not a cause, it is a crime, and it is a crime against humanity. And there should be no safe haven and no hiding place for those who practice terrorist violence or preach terrorist extremism,” he said. “This is a battle for which we can give no quarter.”

Mr. Brown ignored the political risk of associating himself with Mr. Bush — who, along with the Iraq war, is immensely unpopular in Britain — and showed that although his personal style is more earnest and less eager to please than that of his predecessor, he would not abandon Mr. Blair’s steadfast support for the democratization of Iraq.

“In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government and in support of the explicit will of the international community, expressed most recently through U.N. resolution 1723,” he said. “Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities — to the Iraqi government and to its security forces — as progress is made.”
“Our aim, as is the aim of the United States government, is threefold: security for the Iraqi people, political reconciliation, and that the Iraqis have a stake in the future,” he said.

Press outlets on both sides of the Atlantic had presaged the meeting between the two men as a key indicator of whether the new prime minister, who took power June 27, would begin to allow America to bear the burden of the Iraq war alone. There was also intense interest in how the men appeared to react to each other. In contrast to the initial Camp David meeting between Messrs. Bush and Blair in February 2001, when the president and the prime minister appeared relaxed and in casual clothes, on this visit a besuited Mr. Bush welcomed a similarly smart Mr. Brown.

The tone of the hours of conversation between the pair, much of it conducted without officials present, was purposeful and businesslike. Mr. Brown was determined to avoid the accusations made against Mr. Blair that he was unnecessarily eager to accommodate Mr. Bush’s wishes and had become “Bush’s poodle.” Instead, Mr. Brown elicited compliments from the president, suggesting that Mr. Bush’s new friendship with Mr. Brown is of quite a different order to his closeness to Mr. Blair.

The president described Mr. Brown, who lost most of his sight after a sporting injury as a teenager and whose young daughter is suffering from an incurable disease, as “a man who suffered unspeakable tragedy, and instead of that weakening his soul, strengthened his soul. … I was impressed, and I’m confident that we’ll be able to keep our relationship strong, healthy, vibrant.”

If American critics of the war expected that Mr. Brown would offer them some encouragement, they were to be disappointed. The prime minister declined an invitation from opponents of the war to suggest that violence in Iraq has more to do with a nascent civil war between factions than Al Qaeda.

“In Iraq, you’re dealing with Sunni-Shia violence, you’re dealing with the involvement of Iran, but you’re certainly dealing with a large number of Al Qaeda terrorists,” Mr. Brown said. “There is no doubt, therefore, that Al Qaeda is operating in Iraq.”

The president described the two leaders’ shared mission as “writing the initial chapters of what I believe is a great ideological struggle between those of us who do believe in freedom and justice and human rights and human dignity, and cold- blooded killers who will kill innocent people to achieve their objectives.”

He was quick to grasp Mr. Brown’s assessment of the situation in Iraq. “There’s no doubt in my mind that Gordon Brown understands that failure in Iraq would be a disaster for the security of our own countries, that failure in Iraq would embolden extremist movements throughout the Middle East, that failure in Iraq would basically say to, you know, people sitting on the fence around the region that Al Qaeda is powerful enough to drive great countries like Great Britain and America out of Iraq before the mission is done. He understands that violence could spill out across the region, that a country like Iran would become emboldened.”