Day 4622: Syrians versus Badgers

Tuesday:

One day, I would hope, people will stop thinking that the solution to a problem is to throw ordinance at it.

But apparently that’s not today. No, today we are talking about curing cows by shooting badgers and curing a civil war by lobbing bombs into Syria.

Since being dead means they don’t have TB any more this is supposed to be “better for the badgers too”; presumably Lord Blairimort – hmm, “TB” – will pop up shortly to make the same argument about Syrians.

In either case, we’re in danger of making the cure worse than the disease.

Can we please resist this drift into military action in Syria.

It seems that a successful intervention in Libya has cleansed military minds of the cataclysm that we brought about by wading into Iraq.

This accelerating drum beat to war is being driven by some pretty horrific stories in our newspapers and on the television.

Why do our media seem to care more about massacres in Syria when we barely hear a report on the ongoing conflicts in Africa, the more distant parts of Asia and Latin America? Partly, I suspect, it’s immediacy, novelty even; partly it’s because of the effect on our so-called “national interests”, our allies in Turkey and Israel being closely affected by the conflict, and then there are all those nearby oilfields (although of course the war in the African Congo is paid for by the mining rights for those rare metals that we need for our smart-phones and sadPads); partly even it may be that after years of reporting on “Middle Eastern Crises” (from Cyprus to Yom Kippur War, from Lebanon to Intifada; from Iraq to Arab Spring) there’s just a core of embedded, committed journalists there with on-the-ground knowledge and stories to tell.

But are highly emotive stories of the horror of civil war entirely the best way to be deciding on whether we throw our armed forces into yet another conflict?

It would be nice to think that everyone agrees that gassing civilian populations is an act of evil. Although clearly not everyone agrees or it wouldn’t happen.

But do we really protect people from bullies by being the bigger bully?

We certainly don’t seem to be willing to take these people out of harm’s way by offering them safe haven thousands of miles from the conflict in the United Kingdom. No, it appears we’d much rather they stayed there in the firing line while we take some pot-shots at the Syrian army to “give them a taste of their own medicine”. (Not, obviously the poison gas kind of medicine.)

“There are no good outcomes in Syria,” we are warned, “but non-intervention is the worst.”

Really?

Because this civil war is the outcome of nothing but interventions, ever since the “great powers” decided to carve up the Ottoman Empire, and since perfidious Albion (that’s us, by the way) promised the same small acreage to about a dozen different mutually-antagonistic factions, we’ve kept on sticking our noses into the Middle East, picking sides for proxies in the Cold War, supporting dictators because they promised to keep the oil flowing, supplying billions of dollars (to Israel, to Egypt, we don’t discriminate) with which their military can buy weapons from us for “self-defence” in order to support jobs at home without thought as to where those weapons might one day be pointed (that means at us, by the way).

For decades, Presidents and Prime Monsters have talked about “draining the swamp” of the Middle East. Instead, we just keep pumping in more mud.

There are hard questions to ask: Can we do anything? Can we actually stop this sort of thing happening? Are we sure we will make things better? Regardless of what good we do, what harm will we also cause? What will be the consequences?

If we say we will intervene, will this provoke the Assad regime to greater atrocities in an attempt to “win” before our forces can reach the battlegrounds? Or will our tacit support of the rebels drive them to recklessly assault government-held positions in the assumption that we will arrive to back them up? How will Vladimir Putin’s Russia – already feeling isolated, ignored, insulted and impotent – react? Does the West’s reputation for selfishly hoarding the World’s resources and randomly blowing up any bits of the planet that get “uppity” about it really need any more sullying?

Civil war is very rarely the best route from dictatorship to democracy; replacing one regime with another does not a liberal democracy create. What you need is time, rule of law, stability, broader education and even a dollop of affluence. But imposing a democracy from outside is even worse. You cannot, after all, impose self-determination.

John Stuart Mill, writing in 1859, had a Few Words to say on Non-Intervention [pdf]. At a time when the British Empire saw itself as a “civilising influence” he may have rather gone along with that attitude towards “barbarians”, but when it came to civil war, his answer was this:

“When the contest is only with native rulers, and with such native strength as those rulers can enlist in their defence, the answer I should give to the question of the legitimacy of intervention is, as a general rule, No.”

And he explains:

“The reason is, that there can seldom be anything approaching to assurance that intervention, even if successful, would be for the good of the people themselves.”

As for the badgers: I am constitutionally against the assassination of fluffy animals!

But even if I wasn’t, would it not be better to await the outcome of the vaccination trials currently being conducted in Wales? As I recall the evidence from the last time a cull was tried was that the cases of bovine TB actually went up, (presumably because badgers are territorial and wiping them out allows for greater movement of badgers and hence greater chance of infection and cross-infection) and even DEFRA’s own scientists only estimate a reduction in new TB cases of 12% to 16%.

Killing things hardly seems to be a solution.

Who’d have thought!


PS:

There is an E-petition to stop the badger cull (care of Dr Brian May!).

Having already gained more than double the 100,000 signatures threshold this ought to be debated in Parliament, were they not all off on recess, but please continue to sign to increase the pressure on them to do so.

Day 4056: South Atlantic Sabre Rattling

Wednesday:

Apparently sending a PRINCE and a BOAT to the Falklands counts as a "dangerous militarisation". At least that is what the President of Argentina is to complain to the United Nations about. Mind you, according to the BBC's then-and-now comparison, it looks like these days the Falklands would stand a better chance of taking Argentina if the islanders invaded them. Fortunately, the Argentinians have Oscar-winning Sean the Sheep on their side. So that's all right then.

Accusation
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Day 3559: Defence Foxed

Wednesday:


It's the BIG story of the day and it could well end in the end of a career in frontline politics… so obviously the meeja have completely ignored the highly damaging leak of a confidential letter from the Defence Secretary to the Prime Monster in favour of camping about outside Dead Millipede's Caravan of Sulk™.

(Seriously, if he WANTED to go quietly could he not have just said so rather than drawing all the attention by refusing to make a statement until after the moment when it was OBVIOUS what he'd done? No, no, no, now I'M doing it!)

A couple of weekends back, Radio Four's Saturday morning-when-Parliament-is-on-holiday slot Beyond Belief Westminster ran a very special episode (no, not like THAT) about the STAR CHAMBER, with Mr Andrew Rawnsley actually explaining REAL STUFF rather than the usual overheated opinion from hacks of any flavour except Liberal.

The Star Chamber, in case you don't know, is where the spending ministers go to justify their budgets or, at the moment, prove their cuts are good enough. It involves standing up in front of a panel of judges and doing you piece and getting ejected if you fail… yes, exactly like X-Factor.

It takes its name from the court of Privy Councillors that used to be convened in the Palace of Westminster to try prisoners of the highest rank.

We haven't actually HAD a Star Chamber for the last thirteen years, because Mr Frown preferred to execute people in person. Er.

Mr Rawnsley therefore had to interview a number of former senior Conservatories – but in spite of that it was pretty interesting (probably 'cos they were all so past it they had no interest in not telling it like it really is) – about some of the PITFALLS of going through the Star Chamber process.

You can, for example, try getting your cuts in FIRST. The rewards for this are MANIFEST as discovered by Mr Eric "In A" Pickles and Ms Caroline "Magic" Spellman who have been rewards with seat on the judging panel for being good little boys and girls.

But this can be high risk, too, as a too enthusiastic approach to cutting your own department is likely to leave you without visible means of support – something called "doing a John Moore" in Whitehall circles, after the former darling of Queen Maggie who went out on a limb for her, and then sawed it off after himself.

If you find things getting too TIGHT, of course, you have the option of appealing to the Cabinet. The problem there is that you are basically asking your RIVALS to give up their own cash for you. Which can end up making it even trickier for you unless you have a cast-iron case or a copper-bottomed manifesto pledge (or possibly a silver tongue) in your portfolio.

One approach is to offer bigger savings LATER in return for a little investment NOW. This is clearly what Mr Iain Drunken Swerve is up to, offering to show huge benefits from reforming, er, benefits if he can just have a little start up cash. The problem here is that the Treasury is likely to say that they like the big savings later, but they would like some saving now AS WELL. This, of course, is one of the reasons why the 'Eighties were so GHASTLY, so we have to hope Mr Drunken Swerve does a better job than his predecessors.

Another way is to bring PUBLIC PRESSURE to bear by the strategic use of the LEAK. This too has its disadvantages. It's usually pretty obvious who is leaking. The Cabinet are NOT stupid, and remember THEY are the ones judging your case. So, good people to irritate. Also, the Treasury does not like to be pushed about – in fact, Mr Nigel "Blip" Lawson said that he used to make a point of NEVER giving in to the demands of leakers. As he saw it, they punished themselves: if they hadn't leaked they stood a chance of PRIVATE humiliation; given that they had leaked, they make PUBLIC HUMILIATION inevitable.

This, of course, was the strategy so inexpertly adopted by the current-but-probably-not-for-long Minister for Explosions, swivel-eyed Euro nut, "Fantastic" Dr Fox, leaking the "suggestion" that the Trident atomic weapon system was supposed to be funded "by the Treasury" rather than from the defence budget.

This, incidentally, was one of the most AMUSING moments of the programme as they went over to a Whitehall Mandarin for a response. It was all he could do not to laugh like a HYENA at this idea, suggesting that perhaps the Defence Secretary could pay for our Nuclear Defence but the Treasury would take over the air-force instead, or maybe the Health Department would like to exclude AMBULANCES from the Health Budget on the same basis.

It was the general consensus of the talking heads that the Fox had shot himself.

Of course the MOST risky strategy of all was to go over the heads of the Cabinet direct to the Prime Monster. Most risky because if the PM intervenes on your behalf EVERYONE is going to know it pretty darn quick, and you will definitely use up all your goody-points with Number Ten, so it had better be worth it.

Of course the WORST thing that can happen is if you are FOUND OUT running to daddy in Downing Street behind everyone else's back.

Oh very fluffy dear.

Basically, you've nailed your Ed Balls to the mast of saying no more cuts just at the point where you've also put the Prime Monster in a position where he cannot be seen to act in your favour (because he'd have to publicly overrule the Chancellor). One of you is going to have to GO, and let's face it it's NOT going to be him.


Look, defence spending is budgeted last year, this year and next year, at 3% of GDP (about forty billion pounds). That doesn't sound like much, but it IS up from the roughly 2.6% of GDP where it sat for most of the last decade (having come crashing down from an enormous 5% of GDP during the Cold War 'Eighties and 4% during the Milder War 'Nineties). What that means is that a 12% cut would only take the Defence budget BACK to where it was for most of the Hard Labour era. (Although yes, the Treasury WAS giving out extra handouts for, you know, fighting TWO WARS, but there's an easy saving there of, perhaps, NOT fighting any wars, maybe?)

Playing the "it will undermine morale" card is the worst kind of moral blackmail, and frankly stupid. We should be devoting our primary resources to supplying the army in the field… at least up to the point where we can pull it OUT of the field… and THEN worrying about what else we can afford by way of aircraft carriers and aircraft to park on top of them and so on.

The REAL question, though – the one the Strategic Defence Review OUGHT to be answering, but I bet it doesn't – is do we really WANT or NEED an army that can "project British military might anywhere in the world" or would we perhaps be better off with one that can defend Britain without PIS-BAD WORDING off people on the other side of the Earth?

So anyway BAD NEWS for swivel-eyed Dr Fox; GOOD NEWS for, probably, Mr Davis David who is the obvious choice to replace La Foxy as right-wing eminence gris in residence. And PROBABLY OKAY NEWS for the rest of us (except Mr Balloon who hates him) as Mr David is about sixty percent less swivel-eyed than Dr Fox.
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Day 3235: Mr Frown – an apology

Monday:


That so-called “newspaper”, “the Scum” has found a whole NEW way to be OBSCENE. They’ve taken the hurt and anger of a grieving mother and USED it, used HER, as an excuse to attack the Prime Monster… for his HANDWRITING.

We KNOW that Mr Frown cannot see from one eye and has problems with the other. We KNOW that fiddly handwriting is DIFFICULT for him. Nevertheless, he – quite RIGHTLY – takes the trouble to PERSONALLY write to the families of each fallen soldier.

You can UNDERSTAND Mrs Janes’ anger. But what does “The Scum” get out of it?

Is it their point to criticise Mr Frown for not thinking much of the soldiers whose lives are lost in Afghanistan? That seems to be a particularly CRUEL twisting of the facts: he does something that is personal and unmediated – un-SPUN – and for him actually quite physically difficult. It would not be the same if he got someone else to write it, or to check it or, worst of all to TYPE it – yes, I know that’s what Mrs Janes asks for, but she is angry and hurting and being used.

Is it a legitimate question about Mr Frown’s Afghanistan policy, a policy that looks increasingly difficult to UNDERSTAND let alone support, in the light of the election fiasco? “The Scum” certainly don’t seem to be addressing any of the REAL issues: are we helping or hindering the Afghan people; does this “war” (or “occupation” really) make Great Britain safer or in fact more dangerous; can we actually WIN against the Taliban without TALKING to them; do our soldiers get the support and equipment that they need to do the job we ask of them?

So is it just MOCKING someone for making a spelling mistake? (And in fact, Mrs Janes criticises his spelling of “comfort” claiming Mr Frown wrote “cumfort” when clearly it actually a POORLY-FORMED first letter “o”, not a misspelling.) Because surely there would never ever EVER be a TYPO in the pages of “The Scum”? Oh wait…!

It is a TERRIBLE SHAME that Mrs Janes has felt insulted by what was meant to be a gesture of comfort. You can see how it must be awful for her, and how she could react with ANGER to even a kindly meant letter. Mr Frown has now phoned her to apologise and I hope this helps her pain.

I wonder though that “the Scum” does not feel the urge to apologise too. Because they’ve only made things worse not better.

PS:

In best Doctor-Who-companion style, Daddy Richard has twisted his ankle. It has BALLOONED up like… well Mr Balloon’s opinion of himself, and all he can say is: “Dear FLUFF, how did Auntie Jennie stand the PAIN!”


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Day 3167: There are men out there, young men, dying for it…

Wednesday:


A pay rise, obviously.


Well, no, let's not be frivolous when there are good people genuinely putting their lives on the line for what we can at least HOPE is a good cause in Afghanistan.


But what this SHOULD show is an insight on New Liberal Democrat thinking: the idea being we can spend FAIRER and SMARTER without spending MORE. So here we make a new spending commitment that will be more FAIR than what Hard Labour are paying our troops, but we ALSO say where we will cut spending so that we don't increase the burden of debt.


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Day 2997: Credit Crunch – Russia do their bit

Monday:

Announcing their own SPECIAL kind of "fiscal stimulus", Russian President Dimity Mediocre said:

"We have learned lessons of history. Cure for Depression is MASSIVE REARMAMENT followed by WORLD WAR… Dos vedanya, Tovarisch!"



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Day 2786: Georgia – the Balloon Goes Up

Sunday:


Mr Balloon flies into Tbilisi, the besieged capital of Georgia, to stage a lightning press opportunity.

Well at least he went!

Since making a GESTURE is about all that we seem capable of, then this was a pretty grand gesture to make.

On the other fluffy foot, Mr Balloon is in a better position to make BELLICOSE pronouncements since he ISN'T in a position to put anybody's life on the line to back up his JINGOISM.

I just can't recommend his Neo-Con rush to have Georgia join a NATO that can afford neither people nor arms to defend it. Nor am I sold on his desire to replace Lord Blairimort as the yipping poodle beside America's sabre-rattling.

Far more PRACTICAL were the efforts of President Sarcastic of France, demonstrating that DIPLOMACY not threats could bring the Russian aggression to an end.

Good for him.

"Strong European cooperation must be the way forward," said Liberal Democrat Shadow Foreign Secretary Mr Ed Davey, urging greater British support for Monsieur Sarcastic's efforts.


Unfortunately, it seems that, like Mr Balloon, the Russians are capable of a GRAND OLD GESTURE of their own, and their "withdrawal" appears to be more a case of driving in circles and GLOWERING.

Meanwhile the "independence" movements in the Georgian provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia are appealing to the Russians to annex them recognise their sovereignty.

The way I see it, though, by being BELLIGERENT we are actually making things WORSE for the Georgians.

The Russians KNOW that we do not want to get into a REAL conflict over the Caucuses, not least because any confrontation with Russia runs the risk of going NUCLEAR. But if American and Britain are STRUTTING their STUFF, then the Russians can claim pseudo-legitimacy when they roll their armour about the place too; if we are HUFFING and PUFFING then the Kremlin thinks it's fine to BLOW THE HOUSE DOWN.

Day 2777: War Games

Friday:


And the Olympic Gold Medal for Throwing Their Weight About by a Superpower goes to… well, actually it's America again, but not without a fierce late challenge from the Empire of Vladland (formerly the Peoples' Plutocracy of Yeltsin).

"This is not a war," the Russian ambassador told the world straight-faced. "This is Peace Enforcement."

Yeaaaaaaas…

It's funny (funny-peculiar that is) to see such an OLD-FASHIONED war peace-enforcement: a simple grab for land and resources, with none of your new-fangled asymmetric war-on-terra-fare.

But then Vladland is an old-fashioned sort of a place, with old-fashioned tanks and old-fashioned massive numerical superiority.

It's not that Georgia is ENTIRELY innocent in all this – they went barrelling into their dissident province of South Ossetia intent on using force to crush the local partisans. (Just like Vladland went barrelling into THEIR dissident province of Chechnya to crush THEIR local partisans… but we'll not mention that.)

But then the Russian army responds with 200 tanks that they JUST HAPPEN to have parked across the border. Crossing the border to possibly topple a rogue state (just like WE did in Iraq… but we'll not mention that either) to prevent crimes against humanity and protect their own ethnic group (just like the GERMANS did in the… and at that point Godwin's Law is satisfied).



The key question that troubles the West is this: if we HAD moved to admit Georgia into NATO (which IRONICALLY we didn't do because it might have been "provocative"), would that have contained the Russian threat or would we now be facing World War Part Three as our treaty obligations forced us to respond to an attack on one member as an attack on all members?

Because, let's face it, none of us WANT to see Georgia being crushed under a Russian invasion… but I think many of us want to see a full scale war with Russia EVEN LESS. So all the Monkey-in-Chief's brave talk about defending Georgia is… just talk. The Georgians, and indeed the rest of the states in the Russian "sphere of influence", can expect Western support all the way up to just short of actually committing any real assistance.

And of course the Russian leaders, Prince Vlad and President Mediocre, know this. Indeed they are counting on it.

The lessons from history are clear: after the Cold War we smashed Russia to pieces, plundered her reserves of natural resources and – at least from their perspective – humiliated them and left them with a drunk in charge. Prince Vlad seized that opportunity (and a lot of his old KGB files) and used it to forge a new powerful image for Russia built on ethnic image and a cult of his personality. Does ANY of this sound familiar?

Yes, after confronting the Soviet Union for eighty years of Cold War, when it turned out that their MASTER STRATEGY for World Domination was, er, to huddle in their defensive position and wait for the inevitable revolution, it seems that we have managed to turn Russia into an aggressive neo-feudal dictatorship that really DOES want to conquer her neighbours.


And we are going to have to face the fact that there's not a whole lot we can do about it in the short term.

The Monkey-in-Chief's adventure in Middle Eastern politics – with Lord Blairimort's support – and our ongoing commitments to rebuilding Afghanistan and continuing to smash up Iraq leave us with neither the ability nor the moral standing to do anything about it when Russia gets pushy with any of her neighbours.

But what we CAN do is commit to spreading prosperity and democracy to the Eastern European states who HAVE joined the European Union. By making the Union a success throughout the expanded area and by being clear that this is an opportunity (not a threat) to all the former Soviet Republics AND RUSSIA HERSELF, then we can show that our interests are peaceful AND that it works! This isn't a quick solution; it is the challenge of a generation – but it is doable. We have seen it done. Just as the first generation of the Union saw that peace between France and Germany was possible, just as the second generation brought in former military dictatorships like Spain and Greece, so our generation can erase the division of the Iron Curtain.

And maybe in time we can persuade the Russians to join us too.