Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
The Donald Trump Asylum for the Criminally Insane!
Newsagents yesterday reporting on the dark flights disappearing people detained by ICE, including people with legal migration status. Kudos to the plane-spotters uncovering the hidden flights and documenting what is happening. Democracy to a 1970's South American dictatorship in a year...
It gets a barnacle off the underside of the boat and the actual people themselves don't want the transfer iirc.
The views of the Chagossians are mixed. Some support the transfer.
Is there some value in sticking to international law at this time? Can we see any examples where ignoring international law has led a country to poor decisions?
I am happy to return the Chagos to Mauritius and aid resettlement of the Chaggossians who wish to return there.
I don't see why we should pay to rent the US base their. Let the Yanks pay Mauritius.
When were the Chagos owned by Mauritius?
Until we illegally detached them in 1968 according to the UN and International Court of Justice:
The fact that we deported the Chaggossians to Mauritius and Seychelles indicates that we recognised that they were Mauritians. We denied them UK passports until 2002.
We did this purely in order to furnish the USA with a military base.
That would be the ICJ ruling that is explicitly non-binding?
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
Foxy's wrong anyway, the Chagos were separated in 1965, BEFORE Mauritius became independent.
By Foxy's logic, Pakistan (and by extension Bangladesh) were "illegally" separated from India!
You have more of a cultural affinity with Lee Anderson, he's your man.
In the same way Mellors had with Lady Chatterley? I'm struggling to think of a single cultural affinity I have with Lee Anderson other than that we both hate Nottingham Forrest.....................
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
From the government's perspective, and not one I particularly share... If the UK, a traditional champion of the rules based international order, decided just to wipe its arse on an already signed agreement then the consequences would be the destruction of the credibility of the ICJ (it may as well not exist at that point), reputational damage to the UK (post Brexit everybody hates us and we don't care anywhere) and creates legal, if not actual, uncertainty over the status of NSF Diego Garcia.
Trump banging on about it possibly helps SKS domestically because just about everybody in the UK fucking hates him and will gravitate to an opposing position.
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
This already happens. I am now at the age where some of my old comrades are very senior and I occasionally get a glimpse behind the tattered curtain at the MoD. The Navy and RAF are in throes of ecstasy over Ajax, the Army and Navy very sincerely hope that GCAP is a colossal, expensive and very visible failure, etc. They all know they have to fight each other much harder than they'll ever have to fight the Russians or fuck knows who for a bigger portion of the same pile of taxpayers' money.
The solution would be a much more unified UK Defence Force with lots of 'purple' roles at the top but the Daily Mail wouldn't stand for it.
It's hard not to listen to Carney's speech as a direct rebuke to Starmer's foreign policy strategy - "the capacity to stop pretending, to name reality"
Starmer is not willing to do this with respect to the special relationship that used to exist between the US and the UK.
Canada is an interesting example, since they are, if anything even more dependent on US ties than are we.
..The powerful have their power. But we have something too: the capacity to stop pretending, to name realities, to build our strength at home, and to act together.
Carney's speech yesterday. Watch from 11 minutes in. Extraordinarily powerful stuff, a must watch.
I just watched the whole thing and would recommend it.
It's the most clear sighted account of the changing world we are facing and how countries like the UK should be responding.
Would recommend watching it all.
Agree. Fabulous and let's await Starmer following the lead.
However the speech resolves in outline every middle ranking nation's strategy except for one question: What precisely does Canada do if, having annexed Greenland in 2026, the USA armed forces enter Canada in 2027 and seek to take over?
It was delusional to ask, but now it isn't. We know why Carney didn't touch on it, but it is still a question. Is he in fact accidentally saying to Trump: If you want to take over Canada you had better do it quickly because we are getting ready?
Canadian defence spending is growing very quickly, albeit from a low base. It was up by 39% above inflation last year. (UK defence spending rose by 4.4% above inflation last year)
I guess it's the sort of thing that you would want to do in private as much as possible, but Britain really ought to be working hard to make sure that the nuclear deterrent can be sustained with US obstructionism. One of the benefits of an Anglo-Canadian Union would be extending Britain's nuclear deterrent to cover Canada, but that's no good if the US can put it out of action.
The latest figures from NATO on defence spending (pdf) are interesting to look at. There are obviously some countries that are responding with an appropriate level of seriousness in terms of rapidly increasing their spending on defence, particularly if you look at countries that are already above the old 2% target that are still increasing their spending rapidly:
Denmark +45% Finland +17% Latvia +13% Lithuania +34% Netherlands +26% Norway +50% Poland +22% Sweden +11% Turkiye +12%
The UK sticks out as a country already above the 2% target that is doing very little to increase spending further. Britain has a self-image of being stronger on defence then the continental Europeans, but we're starting to become a laggard now.
How do we know they're not doing what the UK did a while back, and redefining what constitutes 'defence' spending to embrace previously excluded categories? There's an accepted NATO definition, but the UK now adds in a proportion of security services spending, cybersecurity activity, various non-MoD R&D.
Other countries already do such things - Italy, for example, credits its entire spend on the Carabinieri as defence spending, despite their day to day activities mostly being humdrum stuff like roadside checks on drivers. Indeed the US is the biggest spender, but also uses the broadest definition of all, including its entire intelligence community (all 18 agencies), all of its space expenditure, all of its nuclear expenditure, the myriad veterans' benefits such as their medical scheme (which alone, in cash terms, exceeds what many NATO members spend on defence in total!), coastguard, homeland security, multi-agency R&D - such that comparing defence spending between nations can be a pretty meaningless exercise, unless you are willing to go do a lot of work breaking the spending down into categories.
And even where there's an accepted definition - for example armed forces' pensions count as defence spending, and comprise almost a tenth of UK's declared total - that money's not going to help us fend off the Russkies, is it?
The UK should strip out the nuclear deterrent from the defence budget as it’s not likely to be used so doesn’t help anyone with planning etc - if it’s ever used then budgets mean nothing anymore anyway.
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
So for example the RAF have to go to the treasury and explain what they need and why they need it and agree their own budget, the Navy and Army the same. It might focus politicians minds on which areas are more important and what our role actually should/can be.
I'd like to see the US compared to other countries once they strip out all the padding and crap from their declared total - for example their including the huge cost of veterans' healthcare makes no sense when almost all other NATO members have state-funded or state-subsidised healthcare for everyone. I wonder whether anyone's ever done such an exercise?
We can do the comparison with the US in the only way that matters - deployable military power.
Look at what they were able to do in Venezuela, at the Furness they are assembling to attack Iran now, while maintaining their forces in the Caribbean.
It is obvious that their defence spending on paper is not all an accounting exercise.
For sure, but that's signifcantly a factor of their size and scale. Whereas the 'moral' judgement of spending commitment always looks at spend as a % of GDP
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
This already happens. I am now at the age where some of my old comrades are very senior and I occasionally get a glimpse behind the tattered curtain at the MoD. The Navy and RAF are in throes of ecstasy over Ajax, the Army and Navy very sincerely hope that GCAP is a colossal, expensive and very visible failure, etc. They all know they have to fight each other much harder than they'll ever have to fight the Russians or fuck knows who for a bigger portion of the same pile of taxpayers' money.
The solution would be a much more unified UK Defence Force with lots of 'purple' roles at the top but the Daily Mail wouldn't stand for it.
What's a "purple" role?
One that combines oversight of all armed services. Purple being the notional shade of all of the uniform colours mixed.
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
Maldivians, not Sri Lankans. The closest land to the Chagos is actually in the Maldives.
The Maldives won't be there much longer though, will they.
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
From the government's perspective, and not one I particularly share... If the UK, a traditional champion of the rules based international order, decided just to wipe its arse on an already signed agreement then the consequences would be the destruction of the credibility of the ICJ (it may as well not exist at that point), reputational damage to the UK (post Brexit everybody hates us and we don't care anywhere) and creates legal, if not actual, uncertainty over the status of NSF Diego Garcia.
Trump banging on about it possibly helps SKS domestically because just about everybody in the UK fucking hates him and will gravitate to an opposing position.
So, I repeat, what do we have to lose?
Who gives a damn if the ICJ loses credibility? It has none anyway, and is disregarded anyway, and is non-binding anyway.
Who gives a damn about reputation? Other countries act based on realpolitik, not reputation.
The legality is irrelevant, since law is non-consequential. There is no court that can order us to hand over the base and we have a base there with the backing of both our military and the US military - and if the US turns on us and the base, which isn't going to happen as far as the latter is concerned, this is all moot anyway.
So we have nothing to lose other than the bruised egos of people who like to pretend that the ICJ matters.
It's hard not to listen to Carney's speech as a direct rebuke to Starmer's foreign policy strategy - "the capacity to stop pretending, to name reality"
Starmer is not willing to do this with respect to the special relationship that used to exist between the US and the UK.
Canada is an interesting example, since they are, if anything even more dependent on US ties than are we.
..The powerful have their power. But we have something too: the capacity to stop pretending, to name realities, to build our strength at home, and to act together.
Starmers in denial . It’s now becoming extremely embarrassing. A once great nation having to beg for scraps from Trump .
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
It isn't someone else's territory though, its ours. We should keep it, then we don't need to pay anyone anything.
If Mauritius want to claim it, they can either fight us and America for it, or they can bugger off.
Don't be such an old-fashioed colonialist! The Chagos Islands are no more part of the UK that Greenland is of the US.
You hit the mark as you so often do. When anyone demands a return or even mentions the Chagos Islands I picture the poster being the most fuddy duddy of all fuddy duddies. A Disgusted of Cheam.........
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
The Donald Trump Asylum for the Criminally Insane!
Carney's speech yesterday. Watch from 11 minutes in. Extraordinarily powerful stuff, a must watch.
I just watched the whole thing and would recommend it.
It's the most clear sighted account of the changing world we are facing and how countries like the UK should be responding.
Would recommend watching it all.
Agree. Fabulous and let's await Starmer following the lead.
However the speech resolves in outline every middle ranking nation's strategy except for one question: What precisely does Canada do if, having annexed Greenland in 2026, the USA armed forces enter Canada in 2027 and seek to take over?
It was delusional to ask, but now it isn't. We know why Carney didn't touch on it, but it is still a question. Is he in fact accidentally saying to Trump: If you want to take over Canada you had better do it quickly because we are getting ready?
Canadian defence spending is growing very quickly, albeit from a low base. It was up by 39% above inflation last year. (UK defence spending rose by 4.4% above inflation last year)
I guess it's the sort of thing that you would want to do in private as much as possible, but Britain really ought to be working hard to make sure that the nuclear deterrent can be sustained with US obstructionism. One of the benefits of an Anglo-Canadian Union would be extending Britain's nuclear deterrent to cover Canada, but that's no good if the US can put it out of action.
The latest figures from NATO on defence spending is interesting to look at. There are obviously some countries that are responding with an appropriate level of seriousness in terms of rapidly increasing their spending on defence, particularly if you look at countries that are already above the old 2% target that are still increasing their spending rapidly: Denmark +45% Finland +17% Latvia +13% Lithuania +34% Netherlands +26% Norway +50% Poland +22% Sweden +11% Turkiye +12%
The UK sticks out as a country already above the 2% target that is doing very little to increase spending further. Britain has a self-image of being stronger on defence then the continental Europeans, but we're starting to become a laggard now.
Britain's defence spending has some problems, like all economic statistics. First, Cameron/Osborne boosted the figures but not the spending by adding in pensions and other costs that don't go bang. Second, it includes the nuclear deterrent which we can't actually fire at an enemy. Third, Labour actually used the army which is more expensive and runs down stocks faster than sitting around in Catterick. Fourth, decades of Tory cuts. Fifth, Labour spent the lot on two new carriers with not enough planes to fill one.
Meanwhile, it’s clear that the next major territorial battle will be fought with mostly small autonomous vehicles on land, sea, and air.
The best defence spending possible right now, is buying shares in the Ukranian startups currently powering their war that lets them expand their investment.
Most likely. The risk appears to be spending a large amount of money on large, highly visible bits of military kit, whether on land or sea, that some kid in a basement can take out with a £1000 drone?
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
This already happens. I am now at the age where some of my old comrades are very senior and I occasionally get a glimpse behind the tattered curtain at the MoD. The Navy and RAF are in throes of ecstasy over Ajax, the Army and Navy very sincerely hope that GCAP is a colossal, expensive and very visible failure, etc. They all know they have to fight each other much harder than they'll ever have to fight the Russians or fuck knows who for a bigger portion of the same pile of taxpayers' money.
The solution would be a much more unified UK Defence Force with lots of 'purple' roles at the top but the Daily Mail wouldn't stand for it.
What's a "purple" role?
One that combines oversight of all armed services. Purple being the notional shade of all of the uniform colours mixed.
Having some training in colour theory and use of a palette, I think that would end up a sludgy shade of excrement.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
Maldivians, not Sri Lankans. The closest land to the Chagos is actually in the Maldives.
The Maldives won't be there much longer though, will they.
Newsagents yesterday reporting on the dark flights disappearing people detained by ICE, including people with legal migration status. Kudos to the plane-spotters uncovering the hidden flights and documenting what is happening. Democracy to a 1970's South American dictatorship in a year...
"Newsagents"?
The Resistance is being run through a network of corner shops....
Yeah, not even Trump’s stupid enough to understand why you’d want to give away land and pay for the privilege.
The answer, that’s what India wanted, and turned pressure up on us till we caved in.
Asking questions of ourselves, why should we continue to be US and India bitch on this one? as Lord Dannat suggested as ideal solution, just hand Chagos, Garcia and the base over to US and India and walk away.
Dannat is right, that would have been best option for UK right now, unfortunately that was never an option for us because of how closely UK has interwoven its security and military equipment with the US, means we have to keep taking these instructions from US - and their buddies, the actual diplomatic power now in that region, India.
Carney's speech yesterday. Watch from 11 minutes in. Extraordinarily powerful stuff, a must watch.
I just watched the whole thing and would recommend it.
It's the most clear sighted account of the changing world we are facing and how countries like the UK should be responding.
Would recommend watching it all.
Agree. Fabulous and let's await Starmer following the lead.
However the speech resolves in outline every middle ranking nation's strategy except for one question: What precisely does Canada do if, having annexed Greenland in 2026, the USA armed forces enter Canada in 2027 and seek to take over?
It was delusional to ask, but now it isn't. We know why Carney didn't touch on it, but it is still a question. Is he in fact accidentally saying to Trump: If you want to take over Canada you had better do it quickly because we are getting ready?
Canadian defence spending is growing very quickly, albeit from a low base. It was up by 39% above inflation last year. (UK defence spending rose by 4.4% above inflation last year)
I guess it's the sort of thing that you would want to do in private as much as possible, but Britain really ought to be working hard to make sure that the nuclear deterrent can be sustained with US obstructionism. One of the benefits of an Anglo-Canadian Union would be extending Britain's nuclear deterrent to cover Canada, but that's no good if the US can put it out of action.
The latest figures from NATO on defence spending (pdf) are interesting to look at. There are obviously some countries that are responding with an appropriate level of seriousness in terms of rapidly increasing their spending on defence, particularly if you look at countries that are already above the old 2% target that are still increasing their spending rapidly:
Denmark +45% Finland +17% Latvia +13% Lithuania +34% Netherlands +26% Norway +50% Poland +22% Sweden +11% Turkiye +12%
The UK sticks out as a country already above the 2% target that is doing very little to increase spending further. Britain has a self-image of being stronger on defence then the continental Europeans, but we're starting to become a laggard now.
Never mind under the UK Labour government we are pouring welfare into those with anxiety and 5 children on universal credit and giving train drivers and GPs big payrises instead
I think we should be trying to work out why some welfare paymnets are going up so much. It's more complicated than HYUFD's off-the-cuff comment. One issue appears to be long COVID. Lots of working-age people got COVID and they didn't die, but they do have long-term health problems, which in some cases have led to the need for welfare.
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I believe a feature of some authoritarian countries is to label dissidents as insane and to imprison them in mental institutions, drugged up to the eyeballs.
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
This already happens. I am now at the age where some of my old comrades are very senior and I occasionally get a glimpse behind the tattered curtain at the MoD. The Navy and RAF are in throes of ecstasy over Ajax, the Army and Navy very sincerely hope that GCAP is a colossal, expensive and very visible failure, etc. They all know they have to fight each other much harder than they'll ever have to fight the Russians or fuck knows who for a bigger portion of the same pile of taxpayers' money.
The solution would be a much more unified UK Defence Force with lots of 'purple' roles at the top but the Daily Mail wouldn't stand for it.
What's a "purple" role?
One that combines oversight of all armed services. Purple being the notional shade of all of the uniform colours mixed.
There's also the ‘Purple Zone’ - the intersection of responsibilities/powers of elected parliamentarians (‘Blue Zone’) and those of the civil service (‘Red Zone’).
I don't think we do that particularly well, either.
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I believe a feature of some authoritarian countries is to label dissidents as insane and to imprison them in mental institutions, drugged up to the eyeballs.
Yeah, but most don't also let them play at being President.
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I hate to say it, but that's a good idea.
Or it's part of the new US gulag.
(And there's obviously the possibility that Trump just has "asylum seekers" and "insane asylums" inextricably confused.)
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
Maldivians, not Sri Lankans. The closest land to the Chagos is actually in the Maldives.
The Maldives won't be there much longer though, will they.
Carney's speech yesterday. Watch from 11 minutes in. Extraordinarily powerful stuff, a must watch.
I just watched the whole thing and would recommend it.
It's the most clear sighted account of the changing world we are facing and how countries like the UK should be responding.
Would recommend watching it all.
Agree. Fabulous and let's await Starmer following the lead.
However the speech resolves in outline every middle ranking nation's strategy except for one question: What precisely does Canada do if, having annexed Greenland in 2026, the USA armed forces enter Canada in 2027 and seek to take over?
It was delusional to ask, but now it isn't. We know why Carney didn't touch on it, but it is still a question. Is he in fact accidentally saying to Trump: If you want to take over Canada you had better do it quickly because we are getting ready?
Canadian defence spending is growing very quickly, albeit from a low base. It was up by 39% above inflation last year. (UK defence spending rose by 4.4% above inflation last year)
I guess it's the sort of thing that you would want to do in private as much as possible, but Britain really ought to be working hard to make sure that the nuclear deterrent can be sustained with US obstructionism. One of the benefits of an Anglo-Canadian Union would be extending Britain's nuclear deterrent to cover Canada, but that's no good if the US can put it out of action.
The latest figures from NATO on defence spending (pdf) are interesting to look at. There are obviously some countries that are responding with an appropriate level of seriousness in terms of rapidly increasing their spending on defence, particularly if you look at countries that are already above the old 2% target that are still increasing their spending rapidly:
Denmark +45% Finland +17% Latvia +13% Lithuania +34% Netherlands +26% Norway +50% Poland +22% Sweden +11% Turkiye +12%
The UK sticks out as a country already above the 2% target that is doing very little to increase spending further. Britain has a self-image of being stronger on defence then the continental Europeans, but we're starting to become a laggard now.
I really don’t believe there is any real desire to increase defence spending in the majority of the Labour Party. To many the military is something they know nothing about and care little, to others it’s something they actively resent. There are a group of ex military and sensible MPs who hopefully can push but if it’s at the cost to welfare etc there will be endless promises and cans kicked down road (I seem to recall they set the target to increase spending as 2035?).
The Tories have been no better in their stints in charge however they might get a tiny bit of leeway for it not having been so dangerous for most of their rule as it is right now requiring actively immediate spending.
But….. there is no point in spending more if it’s the same people doing the spending who have been doing it so far with constant delays and overspends. Maybe convene an emergency committee to oversee spending of emergency top up money that has to be spent only on kit that is available now, is not altered for British requirements.
There's a whole bunch of ex-miltary LibDem MPs: Mike Martin, Helen Maguire, Richard Foord, Angus MacDonald, Ian Roome, Jamie Stone, Cameron Thomas.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
Maldivians, not Sri Lankans. The closest land to the Chagos is actually in the Maldives.
The Maldives won't be there much longer though, will they.
Chagos has the same challenge. However, both are in the central-western part of the tropical Indian Ocean and this helps them in 2 ways:
1. The ocean temperature and health of the reefs is (for now) reasonable to allow for rapid growth. They get fewer bleaching and die off episodes than areas further East. Coral islands can keep up with sea level rise below a certain speed, in a way non-coral islands can’t. 2. They’re not in the usual path of tropical cyclones, which are the biggest threats to low lying islands affected by sea level rise. So less risk of catastrophic flood events that accelerate the problem.
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
We don’t realistically have the capability to defend our own home island never mind the Chagos islands. The level of self delusion is off the charts from a defence perspective. I agree that it should be the Chagossians who decide what they want to do but that’s a moral reason not a defence reason.
Air defence of the UK and army numbers should be the priority.
We're the 5th strongest economy/military on the planet and have our allies (like it or not) the USA stationed on the island.
Of course we do have the ability to defend it, from Mauritius.
It is delusional to say we don't.
It's not clear to me whether any UK military personnel have been there for decades. British military forces certainly wouldn't be playing any role in defending the US military base there from attack.
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I have the name of an early candidate for admission.
....building, big building with bars on the window... I said mom what's that ...I played little league you know, I could have gone pro...
Await in anticipation WGs update on whether he's taken a dump and what he had for breakfast
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
This already happens. I am now at the age where some of my old comrades are very senior and I occasionally get a glimpse behind the tattered curtain at the MoD. The Navy and RAF are in throes of ecstasy over Ajax, the Army and Navy very sincerely hope that GCAP is a colossal, expensive and very visible failure, etc. They all know they have to fight each other much harder than they'll ever have to fight the Russians or fuck knows who for a bigger portion of the same pile of taxpayers' money.
The solution would be a much more unified UK Defence Force with lots of 'purple' roles at the top but the Daily Mail wouldn't stand for it.
What's a "purple" role?
One that combines oversight of all armed services. Purple being the notional shade of all of the uniform colours mixed.
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
This already happens. I am now at the age where some of my old comrades are very senior and I occasionally get a glimpse behind the tattered curtain at the MoD. The Navy and RAF are in throes of ecstasy over Ajax, the Army and Navy very sincerely hope that GCAP is a colossal, expensive and very visible failure, etc. They all know they have to fight each other much harder than they'll ever have to fight the Russians or fuck knows who for a bigger portion of the same pile of taxpayers' money.
The solution would be a much more unified UK Defence Force with lots of 'purple' roles at the top but the Daily Mail wouldn't stand for it.
What's a "purple" role?
One that combines oversight of all armed services. Purple being the notional shade of all of the uniform colours mixed.
Having some training in colour theory and use of a palette, I think that would end up a sludgy shade of excrement.
You have more of a cultural affinity with Lee Anderson, he's your man.
In the same way Mellors had with Lady Chatterley? I'm struggling to think of a single cultural affinity I have with Lee Anderson other than that we both hate Nottingham Forrest.....................
"hate Nottingham Forest...."
Pistols at dawn, Sir....
Its the only thing keeping the country together......Every football fan hates Nottingham Forrest (though I have no idea why).
And even where there's an accepted definition - for example armed forces' pensions count as defence spending, and comprise almost a tenth of UK's declared total - that money's not going to help us fend off the Russkies, is it?
People aren't going to join the armed forces without a decent pension scheme, so I think pensions should count as defence spending.
Think of this the other way around: if armed forces' pensions aren't defence spending, what are they? They're not education spending!
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
From the government's perspective, and not one I particularly share... If the UK, a traditional champion of the rules based international order, decided just to wipe its arse on an already signed agreement then the consequences would be the destruction of the credibility of the ICJ (it may as well not exist at that point), reputational damage to the UK (post Brexit everybody hates us and we don't care anywhere) and creates legal, if not actual, uncertainty over the status of NSF Diego Garcia.
Trump banging on about it possibly helps SKS domestically because just about everybody in the UK fucking hates him and will gravitate to an opposing position.
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I believe a feature of some authoritarian countries is to label dissidents as insane and to imprison them in mental institutions, drugged up to the eyeballs.
That was my instinctive reaction to this too. ICE lifting "libtards" off the street and into the gulag. Marginally better than being dropped into the sea out of a helicopter I guess.
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Mark Carney answered that question in his speech yesterday
He wants the trans pacific trading block to merge with the EU to extend free trade to 1.5 billion people
Canada and UK are in the trans pacific block but US and China are not
It resolves any arguments over UK rejoining the EU
At the time of Carney's speech I did praise it on here and say how lucky Canada is to have him
I note several posters have also praised him and recommended his speech
"If great powers abandon even the pretense of rules & values for the unhindered pursuit of their power & interest, the gains from transactionalism will become harder to replicate" -- Carney's speech at Davos is an extended criticism of the damage Trump is doing (though he's not mentioning his name)
It is, albeit unintentionally, also a critique of the international-law-doesn't-exist stance of @BartholomewRoberts and others here.
Acknowledging the pretence of rules is an acknowledgement that international law is, as I've always said, more guidelines than actual rules.
Trump, I think we can both agree, is unusual by not even respecting guidelines whatsoever and showing utter contempt for them.
However that does not mean we should treat international law as actual rules, rather than mere guidelines we pretend to follow when it suits us - which is precisely what America and others have always done pre-Trump.
Trump's behaviour is what happens when you ignore international law. The shock at Trump's behaviour shows how most countries were mostly respecting the guidelines (not 100% all the time, sure, but mostly). The claim that we were always just pretending to follow them is disproved: we weren't all acting like Trump. The guidelines were moderating behaviour.
Carney's speech yesterday. Watch from 11 minutes in. Extraordinarily powerful stuff, a must watch.
I just watched the whole thing and would recommend it.
It's the most clear sighted account of the changing world we are facing and how countries like the UK should be responding.
Would recommend watching it all.
Agree. Fabulous and let's await Starmer following the lead.
However the speech resolves in outline every middle ranking nation's strategy except for one question: What precisely does Canada do if, having annexed Greenland in 2026, the USA armed forces enter Canada in 2027 and seek to take over?
It was delusional to ask, but now it isn't. We know why Carney didn't touch on it, but it is still a question. Is he in fact accidentally saying to Trump: If you want to take over Canada you had better do it quickly because we are getting ready?
Canadian defence spending is growing very quickly, albeit from a low base. It was up by 39% above inflation last year. (UK defence spending rose by 4.4% above inflation last year)
I guess it's the sort of thing that you would want to do in private as much as possible, but Britain really ought to be working hard to make sure that the nuclear deterrent can be sustained with US obstructionism. One of the benefits of an Anglo-Canadian Union would be extending Britain's nuclear deterrent to cover Canada, but that's no good if the US can put it out of action.
The latest figures from NATO on defence spending (pdf) are interesting to look at. There are obviously some countries that are responding with an appropriate level of seriousness in terms of rapidly increasing their spending on defence, particularly if you look at countries that are already above the old 2% target that are still increasing their spending rapidly:
Denmark +45% Finland +17% Latvia +13% Lithuania +34% Netherlands +26% Norway +50% Poland +22% Sweden +11% Turkiye +12%
The UK sticks out as a country already above the 2% target that is doing very little to increase spending further. Britain has a self-image of being stronger on defence then the continental Europeans, but we're starting to become a laggard now.
How do we know they're not doing what the UK did a while back, and redefining what constitutes 'defence' spending to embrace previously excluded categories? There's an accepted NATO definition, but the UK now adds in a proportion of security services spending, cybersecurity activity, various non-MoD R&D.
Other countries already do such things - Italy, for example, credits its entire spend on the Carabinieri as defence spending, despite their day to day activities mostly being humdrum stuff like roadside checks on drivers. Indeed the US is the biggest spender, but also uses the broadest definition of all, including its entire intelligence community (all 18 agencies), all of its space expenditure, all of its nuclear expenditure, the myriad veterans' benefits such as their medical scheme (which alone, in cash terms, exceeds what many NATO members spend on defence in total!), coastguard, homeland security, multi-agency R&D - such that comparing defence spending between nations can be a pretty meaningless exercise, unless you are willing to go do a lot of work breaking the spending down into categories.
And even where there's an accepted definition - for example armed forces' pensions count as defence spending, and comprise almost a tenth of UK's declared total - that money's not going to help us fend off the Russkies, is it?
The UK should strip out the nuclear deterrent from the defence budget as it’s not likely to be used so doesn’t help anyone with planning etc - if it’s ever used then budgets mean nothing anymore anyway.
I wonder if there is any merit for breaking up the Defence Budget as one block and break it down into its constituent parts to be considered very separately on the basis of need rather than having internal bunfights between the services.
So for example the RAF have to go to the treasury and explain what they need and why they need it and agree their own budget, the Navy and Army the same. It might focus politicians minds on which areas are more important and what our role actually should/can be.
I'd like to see the US compared to other countries once they strip out all the padding and crap from their declared total - for example their including the huge cost of veterans' healthcare makes no sense when almost all other NATO members have state-funded or state-subsidised healthcare for everyone. I wonder whether anyone's ever done such an exercise?
Yeah, not even Trump’s stupid enough to understand why you’d want to give away land and pay for the privilege.
He was stupid enough last spring when he approved he deal.
He wasn’t the one spending the money, deals are always good when someone else pays the bill.
Yes. You poking the very nub of it Sandpit - UK being US bitch on Chagos today, and ever since this adventure together began in the 1960s.
It's obvious that there is some sort of quid pro quo going on around Trident or something, hence all the dithering from UK politicians of all stripes on this. Given recent events I do see the logic of just walking away from it, rather than paying all this cash to house a US military that isn't guaranteed to be friendly anymore.
Being a bunch of awkward pricks on this and Mildenhall, Fylingdales etc etc might be the kind of thing that stirs the US establishment into action. It's a big "might" though.
It gets a barnacle off the underside of the boat and the actual people themselves don't want the transfer iirc.
The views of the Chagossians are mixed. Some support the transfer.
Is there some value in sticking to international law at this time? Can we see any examples where ignoring international law has led a country to poor decisions?
I am happy to return the Chagos to Mauritius and aid resettlement of the Chaggossians who wish to return there.
I don't see why we should pay to rent the US base their. Let the Yanks pay Mauritius.
When were the Chagos owned by Mauritius?
Until we illegally detached them in 1968 according to the UN and International Court of Justice:
The fact that we deported the Chaggossians to Mauritius and Seychelles indicates that we recognised that they were Mauritians. We denied them UK passports until 2002.
We did this purely in order to furnish the USA with a military base.
That would be the ICJ ruling that is explicitly non-binding?
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
Then everyone else ignore ICJ rulings, and the bottom of that slippery slope is Trump and Miller saying the US should own Greenland by right of force.
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
From the government's perspective, and not one I particularly share... If the UK, a traditional champion of the rules based international order, decided just to wipe its arse on an already signed agreement then the consequences would be the destruction of the credibility of the ICJ (it may as well not exist at that point), reputational damage to the UK (post Brexit everybody hates us and we don't care anywhere) and creates legal, if not actual, uncertainty over the status of NSF Diego Garcia.
Trump banging on about it possibly helps SKS domestically because just about everybody in the UK fucking hates him and will gravitate to an opposing position.
So, I repeat, what do we have to lose?
Who gives a damn if the ICJ loses credibility? It has none anyway, and is disregarded anyway, and is non-binding anyway.
Who gives a damn about reputation? Other countries act based on realpolitik, not reputation.
The legality is irrelevant, since law is non-consequential. There is no court that can order us to hand over the base and we have a base there with the backing of both our military and the US military - and if the US turns on us and the base, which isn't going to happen as far as the latter is concerned, this is all moot anyway.
So we have nothing to lose other than the bruised egos of people who like to pretend that the ICJ matters.
As per Carney's speech, it's to the benefit of middle-ranking powers that there are an agreed set of international rules that everyone chooses to abide by voluntarily. Britain has benefited from the rule-based order that has existed, imperfectly, since WWII.
That doesn't mean we should follow it slavishly, or gold-plate it. It doesn't mean there isn't wiggle room on this issue. But it does mean we shouldn't do damage to it needlessly or recklessly. I would prioritise the Chagossian's right to self-determination over the ICJ ruling.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
We don’t realistically have the capability to defend our own home island never mind the Chagos islands. The level of self delusion is off the charts from a defence perspective. I agree that it should be the Chagossians who decide what they want to do but that’s a moral reason not a defence reason.
Air defence of the UK and army numbers should be the priority.
We're the 5th strongest economy/military on the planet and have our allies (like it or not) the USA stationed on the island.
Of course we do have the ability to defend it, from Mauritius.
It is delusional to say we don't.
It's not clear to me whether any UK military personnel have been there for decades. British military forces certainly wouldn't be playing any role in defending the US military base there from attack.
The civil administration of Diego Garcia (ie locking up drunk American civvie contractors) is done by the RN in the form of NP1002. Like all such obscure drafts, it's a dumping ground for the incompetent and superannuated to keep them away from anything of genuine import.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
It isn't someone else's territory though, its ours. We should keep it, then we don't need to pay anyone anything.
If Mauritius want to claim it, they can either fight us and America for it, or they can bugger off.
"If Denmark want to claim Greenland, they can either fight America for it, or they can bugger off"... is not a path I think we should be going down.
I don't know whether any on here know of Jeffrey Sachs but he really is worth listening to. I've just come to the end of the piece i posted earlier and he not only predicted exactly what the problems for Europe would be when Trump took over but what Europeans shold do about it. Basically ditch them permanently and understand Russia. Exactly the opposite of what Starmer has done.
You have more of a cultural affinity with Lee Anderson, he's your man.
In the same way Mellors had with Lady Chatterley? I'm struggling to think of a single cultural affinity I have with Lee Anderson other than that we both hate Nottingham Forrest.....................
"hate Nottingham Forest...."
Pistols at dawn, Sir....
Its the only thing keeping the country together......Every football fan hates Nottingham Forrest (though I have no idea why).
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
I think the bold thing, and the way to move this beyond the Brexit debate, is to move the geographic focus away from Europe alone - the EU, yes, but also Canada, Japan, South Korea, Australia. All the countries that once relied on the US.
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Mark Carney answered that question in his speech yesterday
He wants the trans pacific trading block to merge with the EU to extend free trade to 1.5 billion people
Canada and UK are in the trans pacific block but US and China are not
It resolves any arguments over UK rejoining the EU
At the time of Carney's speech I did praise it on here and say how lucky Canada is to have him
I note several posters have also praised him and recommended his speech
We need more people articulating ideas like this. Our government is too cautious, too incremental. It talks in terms of vague aspirations, not ideas. The biggest problem Labour have isn’t the impact of their policies (we can all have a debate about those, and yes some aren’t ideal) it’s the inertia and inaction, the fact they have too little to bring to the table despite having correctly diagnosed some of the problems we face, domestically and internationally. They need to get a grip. Maybe we do need to see the back of Starmer to allow that a chance to happen.
"If great powers abandon even the pretense of rules & values for the unhindered pursuit of their power & interest, the gains from transactionalism will become harder to replicate" -- Carney's speech at Davos is an extended criticism of the damage Trump is doing (though he's not mentioning his name)
It is, albeit unintentionally, also a critique of the international-law-doesn't-exist stance of @BartholomewRoberts and others here.
Acknowledging the pretence of rules is an acknowledgement that international law is, as I've always said, more guidelines than actual rules.
Trump, I think we can both agree, is unusual by not even respecting guidelines whatsoever and showing utter contempt for them.
However that does not mean we should treat international law as actual rules, rather than mere guidelines we pretend to follow when it suits us - which is precisely what America and others have always done pre-Trump.
Trump's behaviour is what happens when you ignore international law. The shock at Trump's behaviour shows how most countries were mostly respecting the guidelines (not 100% all the time, sure, but mostly). The claim that we were always just pretending to follow them is disproved: we weren't all acting like Trump. The guidelines were moderating behaviour.
Mostly following them, mostly proving them, proves the point they were guidelines and are pretend.
Actual rules are there to get followed all the time, not just when realpolitik suits.
We don't need to throw away guidelines, but nor do we need to elevate them to actual rule status.
@Steven_Swinford Rachel Reeves confirms that Britain will not be imposing retaliatory tariffs on the US
'Britain is not here to be buffeted around. We’ve got an economic plan and it’s the right one for our country.
'If other countries want to increase trade barriers, that is their choice. But we are determined to bring trade barriers down, which is why this week I’m meeting with European, Gulf partners, Canadians to talk about how we can free up trade and make it easier for businesses to trade around the world'
@faisalislam Just spoken to the Chancellor Rachel Reeves here in Davos, also trying to be diplomatic but clearly very frustrated at the trade war talk now re-emerging … asserting that the UK will not be buffeted around by anyone… and saying that “she would never rule anything out” in terms of joining in European retaliation, and talked to me about assuring with Trump’s Commerce Secretary that there should be no increase in US tariffs against the UK …
Trump: Signed an executive order to bring back mental institutions and insane asylums. We are going to have to bring them back. Hate to build those suckers but you've got to get the people off the streets
I believe a feature of some authoritarian countries is to label dissidents as insane and to imprison them in mental institutions, drugged up to the eyeballs.
That was my instinctive reaction to this too. ICE lifting "libtards" off the street and into the gulag. Marginally better than being dropped into the sea out of a helicopter I guess.
The powers in the UK to detain people under the Mental Health Act (1983) are quite broad. It's not hard to see how these could be abused in the sort of situation that the US now finds itself in.
Once Capitalism Christmas at Davos is over, Denmark will start to come under pressure from its putative allies to find an "off ramp". ie give Greenland to Trump.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
Your are absolutely right. That was Lord Dannat’s suggestion as well. Just hand it over to US and India.
Several problems we have to concede, that makes it impossible to do that.
To bear in mind before the next paragraphs, US and India never friends of UK colonialism, in fact hostile and willing dismantlers of it.
Neither US or India want or will accept ownership. India insisted on Mauritius ownership, and UK to pay the money for the lease. What power do India have over this to get away with that? A lot actually. Times have changed and India are the power countries listen to and influenced by in that region, and the knock for UK there is commercial and security related.
We got into Garcia Deal in first place back in 1960s when US said do this favour for us and we will give you mates rates on security arrangements and help you with cutting edge military equipment and nuclear weaponry. Before UK accepted this offer from US, it was offered to France, who said no. Part of the deal was for UK to ethnically cleanse the islands.
So we initially volunteered to be entangled with US on security, equipment and nuclear weapon, and we find ourselves so entangled up today that we are their bitch, we just cannot walk away as simply as you put it.
The status quo became impossible to UK due to what India was doing to us.
These are the facts of the political and military history surrounding Garcia Base. With the true facts known, your post, like Dannat’s suggestion, is so glib and stupid. Yet, at the same time, the perfect answer for UK if only it was possible.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
It isn't someone else's territory though, its ours. We should keep it, then we don't need to pay anyone anything.
If Mauritius want to claim it, they can either fight us and America for it, or they can bugger off.
"If Denmark want to claim Greenland, they can either fight America for it, or they can bugger off"... is not a path I think we should be going down.
It's a path that we have been walking the other direction on since the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.
"..many of the fly-tipped items could have been taken to one of its recycling centres or collected from the kerbside at no extra cost."
Many does not equal all.
I doubt the fly tippers care about that distinction either.
Keep doing what we’re doing we will keep getting what we’re getting 👍
FWIW I actually agree that we should make it easier for people to dispose of waste in the way we want it disposed of. It would be more effective to target policies at reducing the creation of waste, rather than penalising the disposal of it.
But I do think we shouldn't excuse those who are fly-tipping, by suggesting that they are simply victims of a tyrannical waste disposal regime.
I don't know whether any on here know of Jeffrey Sachs but he really is worth listening to. I've just come to the end of the piece i posted earlier and he not only predicted exactly what the problems for Europe would be when Trump took over but what Europeans shold do about it. Basically ditch them permanently and understand Russia. Exactly the opposite of what Starmer has done.
As I said earlier Mark Carney has the answer with the merging of the trans pacfic and EU into one trading block without the US or China who are not members of the trans pacific block
No need for rejoining the EU debate either
The question is are the EU leaders upto the challenge ?
Once Capitalism Christmas at Davos is over, Denmark will start to come under pressure from its putative allies to find an "off ramp". ie give Greenland to Trump.
Nobody has the stomach for the alternative.
I think I don't see that.
A concession on Greenland is a permission to do whatever else he wants to do.
I think we will see pushback - how far and how strong, I am not sure.
I think he'll TACO on the tariffs for one, as ever when his target punches him on the nose.
You have more of a cultural affinity with Lee Anderson, he's your man.
In the same way Mellors had with Lady Chatterley? I'm struggling to think of a single cultural affinity I have with Lee Anderson other than that we both hate Nottingham Forrest.....................
"hate Nottingham Forest...."
Pistols at dawn, Sir....
Its the only thing keeping the country together......Every football fan hates Nottingham Forrest (though I have no idea why).
Once Capitalism Christmas at Davos is over, Denmark will start to come under pressure from its putative allies to find an "off ramp". ie give Greenland to Trump.
I don't know whether any on here know of Jeffrey Sachs but he really is worth listening to. I've just come to the end of the piece i posted earlier and he not only predicted exactly what the problems for Europe would be when Trump took over but what Europeans shold do about it. Basically ditch them permanently and understand Russia. Exactly the opposite of what Starmer has done.
As I said earlier Mark Carney has the answer with the merging of the trans pacfic and EU into one trading block without the US or China who are not members of the trans pacific block
No need for rejoining the EU debate either
The question is are the EU leaders upto the challenge ?
Sort of but Carney has included China who he has just signed a major trading agreement with
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Yes. Relitigating the Brexit thing is no use, but understanding it matters. Most wanted to be part of a genuine free trade friction free single market for goods (and still do) but not in an ever closer political union.
What was then the great hole in the political union is now glaringly obvious: it was a growing political union without a common defence policy. Astonishingly it still is. (RoI and Austria have a different military policy from the rest. In 2016 Sweden and Finland did as well).
Now none of us have a military policy, (and BTW I suspect few really want indiscriminate FoM) the UK has, to its own grave disadvantage, been vindicated.
The other country with whom we have common cause in every possible sense is Canada. Europe extends within 16 miles of Canada in the form of Greenland. The new Europe, one that has a proper defence policy, should include our wonderful 'moral realism' friends before it is too late.
Ergo, the elites abandoned renewables and climate change justice overnight.
AI gives them a possible offramp from the demographic crisis that reduces the need for mass migration and the subsequent rise of the Farage/Le Pen-types.
You have more of a cultural affinity with Lee Anderson, he's your man.
In the same way Mellors had with Lady Chatterley? I'm struggling to think of a single cultural affinity I have with Lee Anderson other than that we both hate Nottingham Forrest.....................
"hate Nottingham Forest...."
Pistols at dawn, Sir....
Its the only thing keeping the country together......Every football fan hates Nottingham Forrest (though I have no idea why).
Once Capitalism Christmas at Davos is over, Denmark will start to come under pressure from its putative allies to find an "off ramp". ie give Greenland to Trump.
Nobody has the stomach for the alternative.
I don't think we have reached that point yet. Implied in Trump's tariff threat was quite a long timescale - the 25% tariff rate would not be imposed until June 1st. So there's a clear signal that any direct military threat doesn't exist until the second half of the year at the earliest.
That leaves plenty of time to wait it out and see whether Trump will be distracted, or if internal opposition can mobilise itself.
I don't know whether any on here know of Jeffrey Sachs but he really is worth listening to. I've just come to the end of the piece i posted earlier and he not only predicted exactly what the problems for Europe would be when Trump took over but what Europeans shold do about it. Basically ditch them permanently and understand Russia. Exactly the opposite of what Starmer has done.
As I said earlier Mark Carney has the answer with the merging of the trans pacfic and EU into one trading block without the US or China who are not members of the trans pacific block
No need for rejoining the EU debate either
The question is are the EU leaders upto the challenge ?
Sort of but Carney has included China who he has just signed a major trading agreement with
China is not in the trans pacific partnership, and in the meantime the new deal with China after their very real fallout is in Canada's interest and closer to home, my daughter in law, who heads up BC tourism, can restart her visits to China to encourage tourism to BC and Vancouver
Once Capitalism Christmas at Davos is over, Denmark will start to come under pressure from its putative allies to find an "off ramp". ie give Greenland to Trump.
Nobody has the stomach for the alternative.
I think I don't see that.
A concession on Greenland is a permission to do whatever else he wants to do.
I think we will see pushback - how far and how strong, I am not sure.
I think he'll TACO on the tariffs for one, as ever when his target punches him on the nose.
We need to hold out until the Supreme Court rules on tariffs. That will now not be before mid-February. Trump is going to push their use - or the threat of their use - whilst he still has a window to do so.
It is probably why the timeline on Greenland has been concertinaed. Stall, stall, stall...
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Yes. Relitigating the Brexit thing is no use, but understanding it matters. Most wanted to be part of a genuine free trade friction free single market for goods (and still do) but not in an ever closer political union.
What was then the great hole in the political union is now glaringly obvious: it was a growing political union without a common defence policy. Astonishingly it still is. (RoI and Austria have a different military policy from the rest. In 2016 Sweden and Finland did as well).
Now none of us have a military policy, (and BTW I suspect few really want indiscriminate FoM) the UK has, to its own grave disadvantage, been vindicated.
The other country with whom we have common cause in every possible sense is Canada. Europe extends within 16 miles of Canada in the form of Greenland. The new Europe, one that has a proper defence policy, should include our wonderful 'moral realism' friends before it is too late.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
Cleverly knew it was not politically deliverable.
Starmer delivered it. The politics? Not so much.
It’s very hard though, or impossible, for a Foreign Secretary Cleverly or Truss, or PM Starmer, to stand up in House of Commons and tell the world “our friends India have been screwing us over to make this Chagos deal with Mauritius” and “Our great Buddies US have effectively turned us into their bitch - we cannot just walk away from our commitments to buying off their defence catalogue.”
For excellent example, Cleverley could be LOTO right now, his involvement with Chagos deal was used to undermine his campaign. Fair play to the Conservatives though, for maintaining the civil service negotiating this deal right up to they left office.
Boo to Badenoch and Patel, for obviously knowing the truth, but playing politics with this to such an extent that they really wouldn’t like it done to them if roles reversed?
It gets a barnacle off the underside of the boat and the actual people themselves don't want the transfer iirc.
The views of the Chagossians are mixed. Some support the transfer.
Is there some value in sticking to international law at this time? Can we see any examples where ignoring international law has led a country to poor decisions?
I am happy to return the Chagos to Mauritius and aid resettlement of the Chaggossians who wish to return there.
I don't see why we should pay to rent the US base their. Let the Yanks pay Mauritius.
When were the Chagos owned by Mauritius?
Until we illegally detached them in 1968 according to the UN and International Court of Justice:
The fact that we deported the Chaggossians to Mauritius and Seychelles indicates that we recognised that they were Mauritians. We denied them UK passports until 2002.
We did this purely in order to furnish the USA with a military base.
That would be the ICJ ruling that is explicitly non-binding?
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
Then everyone else ignore ICJ rulings, and the bottom of that slippery slope is Trump and Miller saying the US should own Greenland by right of force.
I don't know whether any on here know of Jeffrey Sachs but he really is worth listening to. I've just come to the end of the piece i posted earlier and he not only predicted exactly what the problems for Europe would be when Trump took over but what Europeans shold do about it. Basically ditch them permanently and understand Russia. Exactly the opposite of what Starmer has done.
As I said earlier Mark Carney has the answer with the merging of the trans pacfic and EU into one trading block without the US or China who are not members of the trans pacific block
No need for rejoining the EU debate either
The question is are the EU leaders upto the challenge ?
Sort of but Carney has included China who he has just signed a major trading agreement with
That was one aspect of his speech which was strangely off.
He quoted "Trans Pacific Partnership", which does not exists because the USA withdrew and killed it, which gave us CPTPP instead - of which China is not a member.
I hope that the UK is engaged with Canada in building CPTPP-EU links, as we have a veto over it from the CPTPP side. That is a bargaining chip in our relationship with Brussels.
I think carney is after "links", not a merger. Institutionally and philosophically the EU and the CPTPP are very different.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
It isn't someone else's territory though, its ours. We should keep it, then we don't need to pay anyone anything.
If Mauritius want to claim it, they can either fight us and America for it, or they can bugger off.
"If Denmark want to claim Greenland, they can either fight America for it, or they can bugger off"... is not a path I think we should be going down.
Its the real world path that exists, whether you think it or not.
Its why we fought off Argentina w.r.t. the Falklands.
Once Capitalism Christmas at Davos is over, Denmark will start to come under pressure from its putative allies to find an "off ramp". ie give Greenland to Trump.
Nobody has the stomach for the alternative.
I think you may well be right
I disagree with you both. (And what a peculiar alliance you two are)
The US had lots of Cold War bases on Greenland, and decommissioned them all down to 1 for a reason. What Trump is pushing here, in US - from strategists to voters - they all might not buy into it.
What’s good for Trumps ego and family coffers may not be good for America - so why should Denmark need the down ramp, not Trump family and hangers on?
Trump really does not have this amount of power. Supreme Court and congress could put their foot down - obviously not whenever they want to because politics doesn’t work like that, but at the right moment to put foot down, when you have the show of hands in your favour, so foot goes down and stays down. That’s how politics works. Which is why it’s all about patience sometimes.
Carney's speech yesterday. Watch from 11 minutes in. Extraordinarily powerful stuff, a must watch.
I just watched the whole thing and would recommend it.
It's the most clear sighted account of the changing world we are facing and how countries like the UK should be responding.
Would recommend watching it all.
Agree. Fabulous and let's await Starmer following the lead.
However the speech resolves in outline every middle ranking nation's strategy except for one question: What precisely does Canada do if, having annexed Greenland in 2026, the USA armed forces enter Canada in 2027 and seek to take over?
It was delusional to ask, but now it isn't. We know why Carney didn't touch on it, but it is still a question. Is he in fact accidentally saying to Trump: If you want to take over Canada you had better do it quickly because we are getting ready?
Canadian defence spending is growing very quickly, albeit from a low base. It was up by 39% above inflation last year. (UK defence spending rose by 4.4% above inflation last year)
I guess it's the sort of thing that you would want to do in private as much as possible, but Britain really ought to be working hard to make sure that the nuclear deterrent can be sustained with US obstructionism. One of the benefits of an Anglo-Canadian Union would be extending Britain's nuclear deterrent to cover Canada, but that's no good if the US can put it out of action.
The latest figures from NATO on defence spending (pdf) are interesting to look at. There are obviously some countries that are responding with an appropriate level of seriousness in terms of rapidly increasing their spending on defence, particularly if you look at countries that are already above the old 2% target that are still increasing their spending rapidly:
Denmark +45% Finland +17% Latvia +13% Lithuania +34% Netherlands +26% Norway +50% Poland +22% Sweden +11% Turkiye +12%
The UK sticks out as a country already above the 2% target that is doing very little to increase spending further. Britain has a self-image of being stronger on defence then the continental Europeans, but we're starting to become a laggard now.
I really don’t believe there is any real desire to increase defence spending in the majority of the Labour Party. To many the military is something they know nothing about and care little, to others it’s something they actively resent. There are a group of ex military and sensible MPs who hopefully can push but if it’s at the cost to welfare etc there will be endless promises and cans kicked down road (I seem to recall they set the target to increase spending as 2035?).
The Tories have been no better in their stints in charge however they might get a tiny bit of leeway for it not having been so dangerous for most of their rule as it is right now requiring actively immediate spending.
But….. there is no point in spending more if it’s the same people doing the spending who have been doing it so far with constant delays and overspends. Maybe convene an emergency committee to oversee spending of emergency top up money that has to be spent only on kit that is available now, is not altered for British requirements.
There's a whole bunch of ex-miltary LibDem MPs: Mike Martin, Helen Maguire, Richard Foord, Angus MacDonald, Ian Roome, Jamie Stone, Cameron Thomas.
Only two of those look to have much in the way of relevant smarts...
Martin looks quite intelligent and sceptical enough to take seriously; Maguire is ex military police; Foord looks fairly "purple', since he's ex-army but a member of the naval focused Council on Geostrategy; MacDonald is a Falklands vet with no other obvious interest in defence; Roome a solid type, ex RAF, with no particular expertise; Stone ex Army Reserves ditto; Thomas a former Flight Lt. and drill instructor.
Martin is on the Defence Select Committee and Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy.
I don't know whether any on here know of Jeffrey Sachs but he really is worth listening to. I've just come to the end of the piece i posted earlier and he not only predicted exactly what the problems for Europe would be when Trump took over but what Europeans shold do about it. Basically ditch them permanently and understand Russia. Exactly the opposite of what Starmer has done.
As I said earlier Mark Carney has the answer with the merging of the trans pacfic and EU into one trading block without the US or China who are not members of the trans pacific block
No need for rejoining the EU debate either
The question is are the EU leaders upto the challenge ?
Sort of but Carney has included China who he has just signed a major trading agreement with
That was one aspect of his speech which was strangely off.
He quoted "Trans Pacific Partnership", which does not exists because the USA withdrew and killed it, which gave us CPTPP instead - of which China is not a member.
I hope that the UK is engaged with Canada in building CPTPP-EU links, as we have a veto over it from the CPTPP side. That is a bargaining chip in our relationship with Brussels.
I think Carney is after "links", not a merger. Institutionally and philosophically the EU and the CPTPP are very different.
Big_G's idea that it's an alternative to the EU is a bit misguided.
It gets a barnacle off the underside of the boat and the actual people themselves don't want the transfer iirc.
The views of the Chagossians are mixed. Some support the transfer.
Is there some value in sticking to international law at this time? Can we see any examples where ignoring international law has led a country to poor decisions?
I am happy to return the Chagos to Mauritius and aid resettlement of the Chaggossians who wish to return there.
I don't see why we should pay to rent the US base their. Let the Yanks pay Mauritius.
When were the Chagos owned by Mauritius?
Until we illegally detached them in 1968 according to the UN and International Court of Justice:
The fact that we deported the Chaggossians to Mauritius and Seychelles indicates that we recognised that they were Mauritians. We denied them UK passports until 2002.
We did this purely in order to furnish the USA with a military base.
That would be the ICJ ruling that is explicitly non-binding?
Tell them to go f*** themselves and move on, what have we got to lose?
Then everyone else ignore ICJ rulings, and the bottom of that slippery slope is Trump and Miller saying the US should own Greenland by right of force.
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Yes. Relitigating the Brexit thing is no use, but understanding it matters. Most wanted to be part of a genuine free trade friction free single market for goods (and still do) but not in an ever closer political union.
What was then the great hole in the political union is now glaringly obvious: it was a growing political union without a common defence policy. Astonishingly it still is. (RoI and Austria have a different military policy from the rest. In 2016 Sweden and Finland did as well).
Now none of us have a military policy, (and BTW I suspect few really want indiscriminate FoM) the UK has, to its own grave disadvantage, been vindicated.
The other country with whom we have common cause in every possible sense is Canada. Europe extends within 16 miles of Canada in the form of Greenland. The new Europe, one that has a proper defence policy, should include our wonderful 'moral realism' friends before it is too late.
Pre Brexit how well I remember on here and other places the endless calls for a common EU defence policy.
This is an interesting review of the "First year of Trump" from the National Conservative Squad podcast.
It's quite an example of how early middle-aged unalloyed Trump supporters working in politics/media try to justify whatever the latest Trump or Trump Administration action has been.
The people are Will Chamberlain, Ben Weingarten, Amber Duke, and Inez Stepman, who are from various parts of US media, including the Spectator USA.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
It isn't someone else's territory though, its ours. We should keep it, then we don't need to pay anyone anything.
If Mauritius want to claim it, they can either fight us and America for it, or they can bugger off.
"If Denmark want to claim Greenland, they can either fight America for it, or they can bugger off"... is not a path I think we should be going down.
Its the real world path that exists, whether you think it or not.
Its why we fought off Argentina w.r.t. the Falklands.
Argentina broke international law then. We didn't.
Trump launching Spectre (with Tony Blair as Number Two) is just as fascinating as his Greenland push. He literally wants to rewrite the global order in his own image.
Carney's speech was top drawer. Take the sign out of the window, the old order is gone. Even if Trump drops dead later we aren't going to see MAGA pull back from this.
This is not "lets rejoin the EU" because I am certain we are now to see that evolve significantly with its relationships globally. A trade block that doesn't have Canada and the UK and Japan and South Korea in it is pointless. So yes, lets glue together the relevant pieces. Defence is no longer just military, its economic and electronic.
Surely the time has come for a radical debate about the future of Europe. The times call for a bold discussion, like those we had post-war rather than incrementalism and caution.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Yes. Relitigating the Brexit thing is no use, but understanding it matters. Most wanted to be part of a genuine free trade friction free single market for goods (and still do) but not in an ever closer political union.
What was then the great hole in the political union is now glaringly obvious: it was a growing political union without a common defence policy. Astonishingly it still is. (RoI and Austria have a different military policy from the rest. In 2016 Sweden and Finland did as well).
Now none of us have a military policy, (and BTW I suspect few really want indiscriminate FoM) the UK has, to its own grave disadvantage, been vindicated.
The other country with whom we have common cause in every possible sense is Canada. Europe extends within 16 miles of Canada in the form of Greenland. The new Europe, one that has a proper defence policy, should include our wonderful 'moral realism' friends before it is too late.
I hope Trump vetoes the Mauritius deal its a real dog.
If Starmer cant face up to owning some real estate in the Indian Ocean, he shpuld hand it over to the US
US gets permanence for a key base US can offer citizenship to Chagossians whereas UK treats them like shit UK taxpayer saves £100million a year rent.
Starmer really is a dimwit.
I thought it was a Tory scheme..... in particular, Cleverly's ....... originally.
And there will be one major objection, in Trump's 'mind' to offering the Chagossiams citizenship.
This is the standard drivel coming from the Left.
You spend 14 years saying everything the Tories did was wrong and then you accelerate the fk ups they have made instead of killing them dead and saying they were wrong.
Cleverly was wrong and so is Starmer.
I didn't say that the scheme, was "right". However it does seem to me that if we, or anyone else, have military bases on someone else's territory, there should a quid pro quo of some kind. I do think that the Chagossians should have the choice of whether they become citizens of Mauritius or independent. Or, perchance, Sri Lankans.
The moral approach could have been to
1) identify the Chagossians 2) implement a digital id for them (since they are scattered). It could be a test of creating digital id without vast databases and stupid over reach. See the systems that are used in Estonia, for example. 3) using the digital id, they get to elect some representatives 4) negotiate a deal with those representatives 5) have a referendum among the Chagossians to seal the deal. 6) implement the deal
I’m sure someone will claim that this wouldn’t be cricket.
Cricket, based on the recent Ashes, involves poor planning by England leadership and then capitulation in short order. More like the current deal.
Comments
Democracy to a 1970's South American dictatorship in a year...
By Foxy's logic, Pakistan (and by extension Bangladesh) were "illegally" separated from India!
Pistols at dawn, Sir....
Trump banging on about it possibly helps SKS domestically because just about everybody in the UK fucking hates him and will gravitate to an opposing position.
..The powerful have their power. But we have something too: the capacity to stop pretending, to name realities, to build our strength at home, and to act together.
Make the cost of waste disposal prohibitive ‘to discourage it and encourage recycling’ and this is the consequence.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c931ng11x4ro
I'm sure ICE would love to have them available.
Who gives a damn if the ICJ loses credibility? It has none anyway, and is disregarded anyway, and is non-binding anyway.
Who gives a damn about reputation? Other countries act based on realpolitik, not reputation.
The legality is irrelevant, since law is non-consequential. There is no court that can order us to hand over the base and we have a base there with the backing of both our military and the US military - and if the US turns on us and the base, which isn't going to happen as far as the latter is concerned, this is all moot anyway.
So we have nothing to lose other than the bruised egos of people who like to pretend that the ICJ matters.
The Resistance is being run through a network of corner shops....
Asking questions of ourselves, why should we continue to be US and India bitch on this one? as Lord Dannat suggested as ideal solution, just hand Chagos, Garcia and the base over to US and India and walk away.
Dannat is right, that would have been best option for UK right now, unfortunately that was never an option for us because of how closely UK has interwoven its security and military equipment with the US, means we have to keep taking these instructions from US - and their buddies, the actual diplomatic power now in that region, India.
I don't think we do that particularly well, either.
(And there's obviously the possibility that Trump just has "asylum seekers" and "insane asylums" inextricably confused.)
Perhaps, and perhaps not.
1. The ocean temperature and health of the reefs is (for now) reasonable to allow for rapid growth. They get fewer bleaching and die off episodes than areas further East. Coral islands can keep up with sea level rise below a certain speed, in a way non-coral islands can’t.
2. They’re not in the usual path of tropical cyclones, which are the biggest threats to low lying islands affected by sea level rise. So less risk of catastrophic flood events that accelerate the problem.
Without seeking to re litigate the Brexit debate the world has moved on so quickly since 2016. The EU remains its bureaucratic, inflexible self. The UK is adrift but is being pulled ever closer to the continent, by necessity.
I don’t know what that new Europe needs to look like constitutionally. It could be 2 speed or 4 speed or 16 speed, frankly. But surely matters of security (including border security) and defence must be dealt with at a pan-European level now. Is it time to finally acknowledge that our interests are aligned?
Await in anticipation WGs update on whether he's taken a dump and what he had for breakfast
Think of this the other way around: if armed forces' pensions aren't defence spending, what are they? They're not education spending!
He wants the trans pacific trading block to merge with the EU to extend free trade to 1.5 billion people
Canada and UK are in the trans pacific block but US and China are not
It resolves any arguments over UK rejoining the EU
At the time of Carney's speech I did praise it on here and say how lucky Canada is to have him
I note several posters have also praised him and recommended his speech
Being a bunch of awkward pricks on this and Mildenhall, Fylingdales etc etc might be the kind of thing that stirs the US establishment into action. It's a big "might" though.
That doesn't mean we should follow it slavishly, or gold-plate it. It doesn't mean there isn't wiggle room on this issue. But it does mean we shouldn't do damage to it needlessly or recklessly. I would prioritise the Chagossian's right to self-determination over the ICJ ruling.
Denmark is "irrelevant," US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent tells reporters at Davos, as tensions over Greenland keep mounting
@faisalislam
This is the sort of rhetoric not going down too well among Europeans here at Davos especially as Bessent is respected here as a “grown up” 👀
I doubt the fly tippers care about that distinction either.
Keep doing what we’re doing we will keep getting what we’re getting 👍
Actual rules are there to get followed all the time, not just when realpolitik suits.
We don't need to throw away guidelines, but nor do we need to elevate them to actual rule status.
Rachel Reeves confirms that Britain will not be imposing retaliatory tariffs on the US
'Britain is not here to be buffeted around. We’ve got an economic plan and it’s the right one for our country.
'If other countries want to increase trade barriers, that is their choice. But we are determined to bring trade barriers down, which is why this week I’m meeting with European, Gulf partners, Canadians to talk about how we can free up trade and make it easier for businesses to trade around the world'
@faisalislam
Just spoken to the Chancellor Rachel Reeves here in Davos, also trying to be diplomatic but clearly very frustrated at the trade war talk now re-emerging … asserting that the UK will not be buffeted around by anyone… and saying that “she would never rule anything out” in terms of joining in European retaliation, and talked to me about assuring with Trump’s Commerce Secretary that there should be no increase in US tariffs against the UK …
https://x.com/datarepublican/status/2013336327584956565
AI requires massive amounts of energy.
The elites find AI useful.
Ergo, the elites abandoned renewables and climate change justice overnight.
Nobody has the stomach for the alternative.
Several problems we have to concede, that makes it impossible to do that.
To bear in mind before the next paragraphs, US and India never friends of UK colonialism, in fact hostile and willing dismantlers of it.
Neither US or India want or will accept ownership.
India insisted on Mauritius ownership, and UK to pay the money for the lease. What power do India have over this to get away with that? A lot actually. Times have changed and India are the power countries listen to and influenced by in that region, and the knock for UK there is commercial and security related.
We got into Garcia Deal in first place back in 1960s when US said do this favour for us and we will give you mates rates on security arrangements and help you with cutting edge military equipment and nuclear weaponry. Before UK accepted this offer from US, it was offered to France, who said no. Part of the deal was for UK to ethnically cleanse the islands.
So we initially volunteered to be entangled with US on security, equipment and nuclear weapon, and we find ourselves so entangled up today that we are their bitch, we just cannot walk away as simply as you put it.
The status quo became impossible to UK due to what India was doing to us.
These are the facts of the political and military history surrounding Garcia Base. With the true facts known, your post, like Dannat’s suggestion, is so glib and stupid. Yet, at the same time, the perfect answer for UK if only it was possible.
But I do think we shouldn't excuse those who are fly-tipping, by suggesting that they are simply victims of a tyrannical waste disposal regime.
No need for rejoining the EU debate either
The question is are the EU leaders upto the challenge ?
A concession on Greenland is a permission to do whatever else he wants to do.
I think we will see pushback - how far and how strong, I am not sure.
I think he'll TACO on the tariffs for one, as ever when his target punches him on the nose.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecyba-kUByM
What was then the great hole in the political union is now glaringly obvious: it was a growing political union without a common defence policy. Astonishingly it still is. (RoI and Austria have a different military policy from the rest. In 2016 Sweden and Finland did as well).
Now none of us have a military policy, (and BTW I suspect few really want indiscriminate FoM) the UK has, to its own grave disadvantage, been vindicated.
The other country with whom we have common cause in every possible sense is Canada. Europe extends within 16 miles of Canada in the form of Greenland. The new Europe, one that has a proper defence policy, should include our wonderful 'moral realism' friends before it is too late.
That leaves plenty of time to wait it out and see whether Trump will be distracted, or if internal opposition can mobilise itself.
It is probably why the timeline on Greenland has been concertinaed. Stall, stall, stall...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Island
For excellent example, Cleverley could be LOTO right now, his involvement with Chagos deal was used to undermine his campaign. Fair play to the Conservatives though, for maintaining the civil service negotiating this deal right up to they left office.
Boo to Badenoch and Patel, for obviously knowing the truth, but playing politics with this to such an extent that they really wouldn’t like it done to them if roles reversed?
He quoted "Trans Pacific Partnership", which does not exists because the USA withdrew and killed it, which gave us CPTPP instead - of which China is not a member.
I hope that the UK is engaged with Canada in building CPTPP-EU links, as we have a veto over it from the CPTPP side. That is a bargaining chip in our relationship with Brussels.
I think carney is after "links", not a merger. Institutionally and philosophically the EU and the CPTPP are very different.
Its why we fought off Argentina w.r.t. the Falklands.
That would be fun.
"Why didn't the chicken cross the pond?"
The US had lots of Cold War bases on Greenland, and decommissioned them all down to 1 for a reason. What Trump is pushing here, in US - from strategists to voters - they all might not buy into it.
What’s good for Trumps ego and family coffers may not be good for America - so why should Denmark need the down ramp, not Trump family and hangers on?
Trump really does not have this amount of power. Supreme Court and congress could put their foot down - obviously not whenever they want to because politics doesn’t work like that, but at the right moment to put foot down, when you have the show of hands in your favour, so foot goes down and stays down. That’s how politics works. Which is why it’s all about patience sometimes.
Martin looks quite intelligent and sceptical enough to take seriously; Maguire is ex military police; Foord looks fairly "purple', since he's ex-army but a member of the naval focused Council on Geostrategy; MacDonald is a Falklands vet with no other obvious interest in defence; Roome a solid type, ex RAF, with no particular expertise; Stone ex Army Reserves ditto; Thomas a former Flight Lt. and drill instructor.
Martin is on the Defence Select Committee and Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy.
It's quite an example of how early middle-aged unalloyed Trump supporters working in politics/media try to justify whatever the latest Trump or Trump Administration action has been.
The people are Will Chamberlain, Ben Weingarten, Amber Duke, and Inez Stepman, who are from various parts of US media, including the Spectator USA.
This is the take on Greenland:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDCTO5niDYI&t=2122s
And this is the start of the podcast.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDCTO5niDYI
Carney's speech was top drawer. Take the sign out of the window, the old order is gone. Even if Trump drops dead later we aren't going to see MAGA pull back from this.
This is not "lets rejoin the EU" because I am certain we are now to see that evolve significantly with its relationships globally. A trade block that doesn't have Canada and the UK and Japan and South Korea in it is pointless. So yes, lets glue together the relevant pieces. Defence is no longer just military, its economic and electronic.