I am quite pleased that the Russians and Chinese have vetoed the West's resolution at the United Nations condemning the actions of the Syrian government in its clampdown against protesters seeking to overthrow the Assad regime.
It's not that I have any sympathy for President Assad in the way that he is handling the protests. It is just that I feel the West needs to reminded again and again of the consequences of gaining a reputation as a dishonest broker.
Russia and China saw the resolution as a first step towards Western military intervention in Syria. Western governments say it was no such thing, of course, but they also claimed their military action against Libya was about protecting civilians and nothing to do with regime change. Six months later French aircraft, under NATO jurisdiction, set up a legitimate head of state for a grotesque summary execution by a mob of Western-backed insurgents - all in the name of "democracy".
The UN resolution on Libya imposed the condition that there would be no NATO "boots on the ground". Last month British authorities admitted that the SAS were involved in the thick of the insurgency. In all likelihood they were there before the UN resolution as agents provocateurs, stirring up the protests that provoked the conflict in the first place.
Western politicians seem uniquely incapable of comprehending the very simple truism that those who lie the first time are very much less likely to be believed the second time. I have found this in local politics every bit as much as it is evident on the national and international stage. They seem to expect to be trusted even when they have demonstrated in the past that they clearly cannot be, and assume a veneer of injured innocence when they are not. The moral of the fable The Boy Who Cried Wolf seems completely lost on the entire political class in the UK, as well as in other Western "democracies".
In Syria, as in Iran, the rest of the world distrusts the motives of the Western powers whether or not they happen to have honourable intentions this time around. We are told Iran is developing a nuclear military capability, but the same people told us Iraq had Weapons of Mass Destruction that could be unleashed upon our forces within forty minutes. It turn out to be a lie, but the war ostensibly fought to relieve Iraq of the weapons it didn't have continued as though nothing had happened, with barely a murmur from the British media or from the then government's so-called "opposition".
Even if Iran is developing a nuclear bomb it can hardly be blamed for so doing. North Korea has an atomic capability and has been left well alone. Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya didn't have and look what became of them.
The Iranian authorities will have figured, not without good reason, that the West has imperialistic intentions in the region and that having a nuclear arsenal will deter it from attacking them. Protestations that the West has no intention of attacking Iran will be meaningless, because the Western "democracies" have already demonstrated quite clearly that they lie with absolute impunity and cannot therefore be trusted.
All the apprehension and uncertainty over Iran's nuclear intentions is entirely the fault of Western leaders and their OCD-like compulsion to speak in forked tongues every time they open their mouths.
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Sunday, 5 February 2012
Monday, 2 May 2011
Osama bin Laden is Dead
Of that I am in little doubt.
Inevitably the killing of the al-Qaeda leader by US Navy Seals and his almost instantaneous burial at sea has given rise to speculation that he is not really dead, that the media announcement of his demise was in fact a hoax and that he is really still alive and living in the Afghan mountains.
Personally I do not buy this.
According to Muslim burial requirements bin Laden's body needed to be laid to rest as quickly as possible. To have failed to have done this would not just have shown disrespect to bin Laden's memory but, far more importantly, to the entire Islamic faith.
A burial at sea is only permitted either when death has taken place at sea or when there would have been a significant danger that if buried under land the body would be exhumed or stolen. In bin Laden's case the latter obviously applies.
To announce his death when he was still alive would be an unacceptably high-risk strategy for Western leaders. He would only need to reappear at some later stage and their credibility, and that upon which the whole foundation of the New World Order is built, would be forever in tatters.
If any conspiracy theory has to be considered the only one with any legs is that that has it that bin Laden was already dead. Keeping him "alive" for several years in order to justify an relentlessly aggressive foreign policy does make some sense. As does "killing" him at a time when a war crime, already shielded from the world's news media to some extent by the Royal Wedding, has been committed in Libya by forces of the NWO bent on regime change for political, economic and strategic reasons.
The removal of bin Laden would in such an event serve the twin purpose of deflecting media attention from the Tripoli incident and of enabling the West, as soon as is practical and decent, to begin to close the book on the war with al-Qaeda at a time when Western foreign policy has shifted to the point where our "leaders" are to all intents and purposes making common cause with them in their war against Libya.
On balance I still tend to the view that bin Laden was killed last night, as per the official story. But what a shame it is that our leaders are so deceitful and untrustworthy then whenever something of this import occurs those of us who actually take the time and trouble to think for ourselves instinctively look for the "real" story before accepting the official one?
Inevitably the killing of the al-Qaeda leader by US Navy Seals and his almost instantaneous burial at sea has given rise to speculation that he is not really dead, that the media announcement of his demise was in fact a hoax and that he is really still alive and living in the Afghan mountains.
Personally I do not buy this.
According to Muslim burial requirements bin Laden's body needed to be laid to rest as quickly as possible. To have failed to have done this would not just have shown disrespect to bin Laden's memory but, far more importantly, to the entire Islamic faith.
A burial at sea is only permitted either when death has taken place at sea or when there would have been a significant danger that if buried under land the body would be exhumed or stolen. In bin Laden's case the latter obviously applies.
To announce his death when he was still alive would be an unacceptably high-risk strategy for Western leaders. He would only need to reappear at some later stage and their credibility, and that upon which the whole foundation of the New World Order is built, would be forever in tatters.
If any conspiracy theory has to be considered the only one with any legs is that that has it that bin Laden was already dead. Keeping him "alive" for several years in order to justify an relentlessly aggressive foreign policy does make some sense. As does "killing" him at a time when a war crime, already shielded from the world's news media to some extent by the Royal Wedding, has been committed in Libya by forces of the NWO bent on regime change for political, economic and strategic reasons.
The removal of bin Laden would in such an event serve the twin purpose of deflecting media attention from the Tripoli incident and of enabling the West, as soon as is practical and decent, to begin to close the book on the war with al-Qaeda at a time when Western foreign policy has shifted to the point where our "leaders" are to all intents and purposes making common cause with them in their war against Libya.
On balance I still tend to the view that bin Laden was killed last night, as per the official story. But what a shame it is that our leaders are so deceitful and untrustworthy then whenever something of this import occurs those of us who actually take the time and trouble to think for ourselves instinctively look for the "real" story before accepting the official one?
Wednesday, 15 September 2010
How should we define "the people"?
I have to admit that I probably don't know as much as I should about the way that politics works in the USA. It would appear that there, even more so than here, everything revolves around the big two parties, but that unlike in the UK there are opportunities for factions and parties within parties to gatecrash the show by taking part in primaries and publicly seeking nomination for positions of influence within the two party system.
My attention today was drawn to a BBC News item headed "Tea Party surges in US primaries". When I clicked the link I noticed that the article carried the slightly longer title "Tea Party surges in US Republican primaries".
The Tea Party, it would appear, is a fringe group on the conservative wing of the already conservative Republican Party and has won several Senate nominations including in Delaware, where the successful candidate Christine O'Donnell was endorsed by Sarah Palin. In her victory speech Ms. O'Donnell warned her opponents: "Don't ever underestimate the power of we, the people".
I found myself wondering just what it was about the Tea Party that qualified it to presume to speak for "the people". My guess was that, as an organ of the conservative right, its agenda would have something to do with small government, minimal intervention and lower taxes. But not wishing to jump automatically to conclusions, I decided to investigate. Sure enough, it would appear that the Tea Party is driven by a desire for "limited government" and "opposes high government spending". It is also opposed to President Barack Obama's healthcare proposals, his economic stimulus ideas and other aspects of his political agenda.
In spite of the fact that my dislike of political manipulation, control freakery and unnecessary interference in people's lives was what led me to join and work for the ICG, I have to admit that I nonetheless instinctively baulk at conservative "small government" rhetoric. The reason for this, I believe, is that the conservative dislike of government intervention at both local and national levels has less to do with a desire to allow communities to flourish organically and more to do with creating an environment in which everybody strives for Number One and in which, as the heroine of the cult once infamously put it, "there is no such thing as society".
In the world of big party politics this outlook represents one side of a dichotomy which conspires with the other side to try to strike the communitarian ideals heralded by the likes of the ICG out of the discussion and into the wilderness. Whilst conservatives (and I use the term generically rather than as a party label) preach the gospel of Every Man For Himself, their so-called "socialist" critics hold that society should by organised (by them), regulated by The Party as the only agency that has the wit and sophistication to recognise where the interests of that society truly lie, and that any attempt by that society to self-manage should be viewed with the utmost suspicion and crumpled ruthlessly underfoot by the full weight of the bureaucratic machine under its control.
In my view it is essential that ICG members recognise this two-headed ideological assault upon our community ideal for what it is, and do not make the mistake of adopting one twin as an ally in the struggle against the other. Temporary alliances are one thing entirely, but the wider object of the exercise is to use any situation to the community's ultimate advantage, not to succumb to the allure of ideologies which are fundamentally at odds with our own outlook.
It was a government of the right in the USA that wreaked havoc in the Middle East, supported meekly and without challenge by a government supposedly of the left in the UK. A good many of those protesters who marched against the illegal Iraq war shuffled out without conscience or embarrassment a few years later to implore voters to back those who had taken us into it.
The strength of our cause lies in the fact that we are different to, and better than, the whole stinking lot of them.
My attention today was drawn to a BBC News item headed "Tea Party surges in US primaries". When I clicked the link I noticed that the article carried the slightly longer title "Tea Party surges in US Republican primaries".
The Tea Party, it would appear, is a fringe group on the conservative wing of the already conservative Republican Party and has won several Senate nominations including in Delaware, where the successful candidate Christine O'Donnell was endorsed by Sarah Palin. In her victory speech Ms. O'Donnell warned her opponents: "Don't ever underestimate the power of we, the people".
I found myself wondering just what it was about the Tea Party that qualified it to presume to speak for "the people". My guess was that, as an organ of the conservative right, its agenda would have something to do with small government, minimal intervention and lower taxes. But not wishing to jump automatically to conclusions, I decided to investigate. Sure enough, it would appear that the Tea Party is driven by a desire for "limited government" and "opposes high government spending". It is also opposed to President Barack Obama's healthcare proposals, his economic stimulus ideas and other aspects of his political agenda.
In spite of the fact that my dislike of political manipulation, control freakery and unnecessary interference in people's lives was what led me to join and work for the ICG, I have to admit that I nonetheless instinctively baulk at conservative "small government" rhetoric. The reason for this, I believe, is that the conservative dislike of government intervention at both local and national levels has less to do with a desire to allow communities to flourish organically and more to do with creating an environment in which everybody strives for Number One and in which, as the heroine of the cult once infamously put it, "there is no such thing as society".
In the world of big party politics this outlook represents one side of a dichotomy which conspires with the other side to try to strike the communitarian ideals heralded by the likes of the ICG out of the discussion and into the wilderness. Whilst conservatives (and I use the term generically rather than as a party label) preach the gospel of Every Man For Himself, their so-called "socialist" critics hold that society should by organised (by them), regulated by The Party as the only agency that has the wit and sophistication to recognise where the interests of that society truly lie, and that any attempt by that society to self-manage should be viewed with the utmost suspicion and crumpled ruthlessly underfoot by the full weight of the bureaucratic machine under its control.
In my view it is essential that ICG members recognise this two-headed ideological assault upon our community ideal for what it is, and do not make the mistake of adopting one twin as an ally in the struggle against the other. Temporary alliances are one thing entirely, but the wider object of the exercise is to use any situation to the community's ultimate advantage, not to succumb to the allure of ideologies which are fundamentally at odds with our own outlook.
It was a government of the right in the USA that wreaked havoc in the Middle East, supported meekly and without challenge by a government supposedly of the left in the UK. A good many of those protesters who marched against the illegal Iraq war shuffled out without conscience or embarrassment a few years later to implore voters to back those who had taken us into it.
The strength of our cause lies in the fact that we are different to, and better than, the whole stinking lot of them.
Tuesday, 9 March 2010
New movement gives Independence real meaning
Nearly twelve years ago, shortly after having been elected to the London Borough of Hounslow for the first time as its first ever independent councillor, I attended a meeting of the Local Government Association Independent Group of councillors at the Connaught Hotel in Bournemouth.
To be truthful the reason for my attendance at the meeting was a combination of natural curiosity with an opportunity to take my family away to the seaside for a couple of days. Bournemouth in my view is one of the better resorts on the South Coast - conspicuously clean, much to do but not too populous as Brighton can be at its worst. We couldn't afford to stay at the Connaught but we found an adequate little guest house a few minutes' walk away and were happy enough with that.
At the meeting were a hundred or so independent councillors from around the country. One thing I noticed straight away was that they were mostly older (at 36 I figured I was probably the youngest person in the room), mostly male and almost exclusively white. As they began to speak I also picked up fairly quickly that a disproportionate number of them were from the West Country or thereabouts, representing farming communities.
They didn't have a great deal in common with me or the ICG, whether politically or socially. The majority, but not all, seemed conspicuously right of centre and probably did not know very much about community life in a place like Isleworth. Nevertheless I found them to be a likable bunch and, well, friendly. Some seemed possessed of a sense of humour which I had found lacking amongst many of my fellow councillors back home. I gave out a few of my LBH "business" cards and resolved to keep in occasional touch with this group, although overall I did not consider they could do a great deal to help shape the development of the ICG.
Fast forward nearly twelve years and we are facing a general election, at which the likelihood is that the era of New Labour will draw to a close and will be replaced either by a Conservative government with a clean majority, or a messy and unclear situation รก la February 1974.
I have long argued, to the obvious disappointment of some of my good friends in the local Conservative Group, that the scenario we have before us is not 1997 in reverse. Then an excited and excitable tide of New Labour fervour overwhelmed with embarrassing ease a Conservative establishment that had long been in decline to the point at which it could no longer do anything at all right. At that election half the parliamentary Conservative Party had been wiped out and a new age was well and truly upon us. Things, we were told, could only get better.
Whether things did in fact get better depends of course upon whom one speaks to. What is not in dispute, other than amongst the most absurdly blinkered few who remain loyal to the class of '97 (and they still appear on local community forums from time to time, emerging in fighting mode out of the blue like Japanese nonagenarians from the jungle thinking the war is still on), is that the New Labour project is in its death throes as we approach May 2010 and, for some, the political equivalent of an appointment with a firing squad.
But the situation is not the same as in 1997 because there is no real sense of excitement about the opposition, at least not anything remotely like on the same scale as had been the case when Blair first assumed power. Public disquiet and disgust over expenses has tainted all the major political parties, and the Conservatives nationally only find themselves ahead by virtue of the fact that Labour are behind them. There is a general disillusionment with party politics which could truly herald a new age in national government, as it has in local government in Hounslow.
A couple of months ago I wrote a light-hearted piece for this blog entitled Rise of the Indies, in which I pointed out how betting giants Ladbrokes were shy of offering too generous odds on some of the more high-profile independent candidates who will be standing at the general election for fear that they may cause an upset. Leading Irish bookie Paddy Power has since taken a similarly cautious approach. Although the concept of the independent MP is still in its infancy and will not be making any major breakthroughs this May, the tide is clearly going out on the old politics and looks poised to wash something new and exciting up on the shore when it eventually returns.
This new force is binding together in the form of an organisation called the Independent Network. Rather than being a political party, the Network offers support to independent parliamentary candidates provided they adhere to a few basic, common-sense principles which unite them all. They are then free to fight their different campaigns, on their different issues, from wherever on the so-called political spectrum they happen to reside.
One of the many independent candidates associated with the Network is Tony Clarke, former Labour MP for Northampton South and now an independent member on Northampton Borough Council. As well as being a truly welcome supporter of this blog (!), Tony is also a full-time Director of Northampton Football Club. He has consistently opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and has his own distinct political programme with a distinctly "people first" flavour. He also publishes a superb blog of his own entitled The Northampton Independent, which I highly recommend. At the next general election Tony will be seeking to recapture his old seat, and according to the bookies he is not without a chance.
Like I said I am not anticipating a flood of independent MPs being elected to office in May. But the Independent Network and its quality candidates such as Tony and Khizar Iqbal show us clearly that the writing is on the wall for old-style politics in this country.
To be truthful the reason for my attendance at the meeting was a combination of natural curiosity with an opportunity to take my family away to the seaside for a couple of days. Bournemouth in my view is one of the better resorts on the South Coast - conspicuously clean, much to do but not too populous as Brighton can be at its worst. We couldn't afford to stay at the Connaught but we found an adequate little guest house a few minutes' walk away and were happy enough with that.
At the meeting were a hundred or so independent councillors from around the country. One thing I noticed straight away was that they were mostly older (at 36 I figured I was probably the youngest person in the room), mostly male and almost exclusively white. As they began to speak I also picked up fairly quickly that a disproportionate number of them were from the West Country or thereabouts, representing farming communities.
They didn't have a great deal in common with me or the ICG, whether politically or socially. The majority, but not all, seemed conspicuously right of centre and probably did not know very much about community life in a place like Isleworth. Nevertheless I found them to be a likable bunch and, well, friendly. Some seemed possessed of a sense of humour which I had found lacking amongst many of my fellow councillors back home. I gave out a few of my LBH "business" cards and resolved to keep in occasional touch with this group, although overall I did not consider they could do a great deal to help shape the development of the ICG.
Fast forward nearly twelve years and we are facing a general election, at which the likelihood is that the era of New Labour will draw to a close and will be replaced either by a Conservative government with a clean majority, or a messy and unclear situation รก la February 1974.
I have long argued, to the obvious disappointment of some of my good friends in the local Conservative Group, that the scenario we have before us is not 1997 in reverse. Then an excited and excitable tide of New Labour fervour overwhelmed with embarrassing ease a Conservative establishment that had long been in decline to the point at which it could no longer do anything at all right. At that election half the parliamentary Conservative Party had been wiped out and a new age was well and truly upon us. Things, we were told, could only get better.
Whether things did in fact get better depends of course upon whom one speaks to. What is not in dispute, other than amongst the most absurdly blinkered few who remain loyal to the class of '97 (and they still appear on local community forums from time to time, emerging in fighting mode out of the blue like Japanese nonagenarians from the jungle thinking the war is still on), is that the New Labour project is in its death throes as we approach May 2010 and, for some, the political equivalent of an appointment with a firing squad.
But the situation is not the same as in 1997 because there is no real sense of excitement about the opposition, at least not anything remotely like on the same scale as had been the case when Blair first assumed power. Public disquiet and disgust over expenses has tainted all the major political parties, and the Conservatives nationally only find themselves ahead by virtue of the fact that Labour are behind them. There is a general disillusionment with party politics which could truly herald a new age in national government, as it has in local government in Hounslow.
A couple of months ago I wrote a light-hearted piece for this blog entitled Rise of the Indies, in which I pointed out how betting giants Ladbrokes were shy of offering too generous odds on some of the more high-profile independent candidates who will be standing at the general election for fear that they may cause an upset. Leading Irish bookie Paddy Power has since taken a similarly cautious approach. Although the concept of the independent MP is still in its infancy and will not be making any major breakthroughs this May, the tide is clearly going out on the old politics and looks poised to wash something new and exciting up on the shore when it eventually returns.
This new force is binding together in the form of an organisation called the Independent Network. Rather than being a political party, the Network offers support to independent parliamentary candidates provided they adhere to a few basic, common-sense principles which unite them all. They are then free to fight their different campaigns, on their different issues, from wherever on the so-called political spectrum they happen to reside.
One of the many independent candidates associated with the Network is Tony Clarke, former Labour MP for Northampton South and now an independent member on Northampton Borough Council. As well as being a truly welcome supporter of this blog (!), Tony is also a full-time Director of Northampton Football Club. He has consistently opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and has his own distinct political programme with a distinctly "people first" flavour. He also publishes a superb blog of his own entitled The Northampton Independent, which I highly recommend. At the next general election Tony will be seeking to recapture his old seat, and according to the bookies he is not without a chance.
Like I said I am not anticipating a flood of independent MPs being elected to office in May. But the Independent Network and its quality candidates such as Tony and Khizar Iqbal show us clearly that the writing is on the wall for old-style politics in this country.
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