The shadow education secretary, David Cameron, this morning seized the initiative in the party's leadership race with a speech comparing Islamic extremists to Nazis - and formally ruled out a joint ticket with Kenneth Clarke.
Addressing the Foreign Policy Centre thinktank this morning, Mr Cameron encroached on the territory of his main rival, David Davis, with a speech devoted to "homeland security" and British values.
In it he warned that Islamist thinking has developed which, "like Nazism and Communism, offers followers redemption through violence".
"Just like the Nazis of 1930s Germany, they want to purge corrupt cosmopolitan influences."
"Jihadism feeds into the bewilderment, alienation and lack of progress felt by many in the Muslim world," he said, emphasising that "it often bewitches the minds of gifted and eduacted young men".
He also claimed that the west's failure to act in the 1990s fed Osama bin Laden's belief that it lacked the strength to defend itself.
"The lesson from all of this with respect to our presence in Iraq is clear. Premature withdrawal - and failure to support the Iraqi authority - would be seen as a surrender to militant Jihadism. Nothing would embolden the terrorists more."
Unlike the third likely challenger, the former chancellor Kenneth Clarke, Mr Cameron supported the Iraq war, and today compared those "well-meaning" people calling for withdrawal of British troops to "assuage Jihadist anger" to the appeasers of the 1930s who allowed Germany to remilitarise the Rhineland and reoccupy the Sudetenland.
Mr Cameron also repeated his party's call for a dedicated border police force and 24-hour security at major ports.
In the wake of the home secretary's announcement today on further deportations of extremist Islamic clerics, Mr Cameron also criticised the European convention on human rights.
He told BBC Breakfast this morning: "One of the things that is stopping us is the court cases under the European convention of human rights, that says that no matter how dangerous an individual is to the UK, if there is any chance of him being harmed when being sent back to his country of origin, you simply can't do it.
"I think as a country you have to have got to have the right to say to people who may threaten this country, I am sorry you can't come and we are going to deport you."
Yesterday Mr Cameron's camp made it clear that he would not be tempted by a coalition with the 65-year old Mr Clarke. Today he put that on the record himself.
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I am not interested in tickets and deals. I am interested in ideas and approaches and trying to get the right approach for the future of this country."
"I have great respect for him [Mr Clarke] but we don't agree about the issue of Europe, which is a very important issue facing this country.
"He believes we should have an ever closer union of European states and I believe we need a new sort of Europe, much more open and free trading, more flexible and we should be returning some powers to nation states."
"You can do a deal with Mother Theresa but, if you haven't got the right ideas, you aren't going to contribute to the future of the Conservative Party or the future of the country.
"I'm interested in putting forward the ideas and approaches that can get the Conservative party back in the mainstream of political debate and make the right decisions for the future of the country."
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