Monday 16 January 2012

Neither Brussels nor Washington but national independence!

If Mickey is about to stick his head up his arse it must be through shame of his country
It is an oft-repeated line that, following the Second World War, Britain had 'lost an Empire and has not yet found a role.' That was Dean Acheson, a key player in the Truman administration.

Acheson died in 1971 but I think it's fair to say his assertion still stands. That said, I don't believe Enoch Powell was wrong when he said in 1983 that 'Britain's fondness for America has turned this country into something horribly resembling a satellite of the United States.'

I have remarked before on the way in which the myth of the 'special relationship' serves only two purposes; namely to delude Britons into believing they still hold any relevance on the world stage and to serve American strategic interests. Only one benefits from this arrangement.

Insofar as any 'special relationship' has ever existed, it has done so only personally, between presidents and prime ministers such as Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan.

America's open agression towards the British Empire, its betrayal over Suez, its funding of the IRA, its invasion of Grenada and its support for Britain's deeper integration into the European Union all overshadow these all too brief partnerships and emphasise how little love we can really share with a nation in which we were violently separated over 200 years ago.

Readers of this blog will know that, despite all this, I nurture a deep affection for the Great Republic, its Revolution and its Constitution. Indeed, were I alive at the time, I would most certainly have supported the Patriots over the redcoats of  George III.

And, despite the United States' disastrous foray into imperialism since the war, it is a country built on the principle of anti-imperialism - and any powerful country will attempt to use other nations for its own strategic interest. My beef rests with the vain, deluded and spineless politicians of this country who allow this exploitation with no resistance.

In their unquestioning loyalty as vassels of Washington and their treasonous treachery in Brussels, they have destroyed the independence of this nation. In the pursuit of foreign adventures, the memory of Empire, phoney prestige and the empty promise of lucrative markets, they have made this country the puppet of alien powers.

Nothing can be more exemplary of this than the grotesquely one-sided extradition treaty which exists between Britain and the United States. On Friday, Richard O'Dwyer became but the latest victim of this most unjust arrangement.

Richard, who in running the TVShack website provided links to pirated US films and TV shows in much the same way as Google does, now faces extradition to a country in which he has not set foot in since he was five years old and for actions which are not even considered a crime in the UK.

It is an infantilising arrangement eerily reminiscent of the extraterritoriality western powers imposed on China and Japan in the Unequal Treaties - in which western nationals were forbidden from being tried by oriental courts in favour of western consular authorities.

And, while much is made of the (very real) threat the European Arrest Warrant poses to the liberties of British nationals, Richard's mother Julia made the very good point when I spoke to her today that, at least those extradited under the EAW are accused of committing crimes in the extraditing country. Richard is being extradited for breaking US law while in the UK.

This is a moral, legal and sovereign travesty as well as the most compelling vindication of Enoch Powell's view of Britain as a US satellite. Though even he may not have foreseen the very literal unfolding of this observation.

During the Cold War, Trotskyites summed up their opposition to Stalinism and capitalism with the slogan 'Neither Moscow nor Washington but International Socialism!'

Despite recent articles arguing a choice for one or the other (here and here), I suggest a new clarion call, for true patriots of this country; 'Neither Brussels nor Washington but National Independence!'

1 comment:

  1. I disagree with your assertion that the US was 'a country built on the principle of anti-imperialism'. Though they might claim otherwise, what Americans opposed was Old World or European imperialism rather than imperialism itself. Throughout the nineteenth century the belief that the US had a ‘Manifest Destiny’ to spread across the entire American continent was prevalent in the US. It was used to justify war with Mexico in the 1840s which saw America seize California and New Mexico and later war with Spain in the 1890s which resulted in America’s seizure of Puerto Rico, the Philippines and effectively Cuba. The belief that America was founded on an ideology somehow above the imperialist principles of the time is not only wrong but one which ironically has been used to justify America’s imperialist policies in the second half of the twentieth century.

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