For now, I have been focussing on just two words – politicalbetting.com

System · July 31

For now, I have been focussing on just two words – politicalbetting.com

BREAKING: Former Vice President Kamala Harris has announced that she will not run for governor of California. https://t.co/sq5tbkFkqw pic.twitter.com/lw0lbt72lD

Read the full story here

IanB2 · July 31

First!

Fishing · July 31

FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.

IanB2 · July 31

The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.

eek · July 31

Utterly off-topic but having upgraded to IOS 26 - I can no longer login to post on the none vf site - just an early warning thst there may be problems when it becomes generally available

IanB2 · July 31

eek said:
Utterly off-topic but having upgraded to IOS 26 - I can no longer login to post on the non vf site

I haven’t been able to on an iPad there for ages, so don’t bother with it

eek · July 31

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.

I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.

TheScreamingEagles · July 31

Just a reminder PB has excellent form for tipping a 50/1 winner years out from a presidential election.

scampi25 · July 31

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.

No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.

Taz · July 31

‘For Now’

She’s a two time loser. Picking her again would be insane.

Still it would make Kinabalu happy 😉

The Democrats need to look to the future.

Casino_Royale · July 31

If she wants to lose again, yes.

Why would the Dems touch her?

Luckyguy1983 · July 31

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.

Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.

ydoethur · July 31

I don't see how she gets past the primaries. It's not normal for election losers to do so.

I know Trump did but a lot of dubious practices including pretty open bribery were involved.

Andy Beshear, Josh Stein, Tim Buttigieg, or possibly Jon Ossoff if he holds his senate seat look like better bets.

Gallowgate · July 31

The right on here is absolutely obsessed with a fictional battle between the courts and Parliament when in fact no such dispute even exists. Parliament remains absolutely sovereign and the courts have not questioned this. In fact, the Miller case again reiterated Parliamentary sovereignty.

Parliament isn’t using its power, but it’s there.

TheScreamingEagles · July 31

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.

One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir

ydoethur · July 31

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.

The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Well, it's a view.

AnneJGP · July 31

Apologies for commenting on betting when I don't bet, but it seems to me there are several preliminary hurdles you'd need to 'win' before the 50/1 chance is even a chance.

TheScreamingEagles · July 31

AnneJGP said:
Apologies for commenting on betting when I don't bet, but it seems to me there are several preliminary hurdles you'd need to 'win' before the 50/1 chance is even a chance.

All she has to do is announce she's running and that 50/1 will tumble so it becomes a good trading bet.

IanB2 · July 31

Breaking: Two Labour MPs are being investigated by parliamentary authorities after failing to declare an all-expenses-paid trip to Israel on time. Peter Prinsley and Cat Eccles joined a “solidarity” visit funded by Labour Friends of Israel in May.

The group is funded by anonymous donors and was described as a “lobbying organisation” by one of its former directors.
Now, an official probe has been announced by parliament’s standards commissioner, after Declassified revealed the MPs had not mentioned the trip in their register of interests.

moonshine · July 31

From the previous thread, I suffered a 4 day power cut after Storm Eunice I think it was called, around three years ago. On Day 2 we drove to my MiL’s house an hour away. We’re halfway through a roast dinner and then bam, hers was out for the night too. This was on top of 4 (?) outages during the last World Cup. After that I bought a Tesla battery. I’ve had it less than 2 years but it’s backed me up 11 times, for cuts longer than 3 mins. Most recently a 2hr unscheduled outage in June.

stodge · July 31

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Well, it's a view.

In politics, unfortunately, you can never tell the voters they got it wrong even when they demonstrably have.

It's one of those unwritten rules.

JosiasJessop · July 31

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.

Wasn't there another issue that benefited Germany in terms of ratio? Germany could concentrate most of their main battle fleet in the North Sea, whereas Britain, with its empire, had to split their fleet around the world to protect their empire?

A bit like how Russia needed three fleets: the Baltic, Pacific and Northern?

MattW · July 31

Thanks for the header, @TSE and good morning everyone.

I don't think Kamala will be up for it, so 50:1 maybe as a trading bet, but I don't see here coming in to say 10:1 so perhaps not.

PB successful 50:1s tend afaics to be around unlikely & obscure future winners rather than retreads, though I could have a faulty memory. The obvious one is perhaps Gavin Newsom.

Perhaps Kamala needs to do something which will also allow her to make some money.

Mexicanpete · July 31

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.

Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.

Mexicanpete · July 31

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Those trifles aside, what have you actually got against Trump?

MattW · July 31

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir

In the end when push came to shove, and Germany took over Vichy in 1942, the French *did* scuttle their fleet that was there. But there was no way to know that in 1940, and other elements fought for Vichy against the allies in West Africa.

What a contrast to the non-battle at Alexandria, where both Brits and French had good leadership.

They should have sailed to the West Indies as offered.

stodge · July 31

Morning all

The sad passing of Councillor Neil Wilson means there will be a by election in Plaistow South in Newham which could be a fascinating test of opinion in the run up to the 2026 locals.

In November 2023, the Newham Independents won a by election in Plaistow North by over 500 votes. The former is a strongly Muslim Ward and the latter, from memory, less so but I expect the Newham Independents to go strongly on this contest. It will be interesting to see if groups like the TUSC and the new Corbyn/Sultana party stand aside to give them a clear run.

There's also a less interesting subtext in the battle between Greens and Conservatives for what I suspect will be a distant third place. Reform will no doubt stand but seem unlikely to make much impression.

Casino_Royale · July 31

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir

Also, in 1942, they did try to seize the ships at Toulon. And the whole time they occupied the northern and Atlantic coasts of France causing grave difficulty to supplies through the Channel through E-boats.

There were times when British naval supremacy was lost in the Mediterranean in 1941 and 1942 as we had to protect the Atlantic supply lines, supply routes to Russia, and defend the Channel and sea routes to India all at once.

It explains why Japan had such a free ride in SE Asia over the same timeframe. Once Germany had been defeated, we deployed the British Pacific Fleet to Japan - the largest ever.

MattW · July 31

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.

One detail point - I don't think the "sorted" shells were out until after WW1 (the Greenboy Shells). It's interesting how it is always about excellent people - Admiral Jellicoe fed back the information, but it did not aiui get implemented until he became First Sea Lord and forced it through himself.

And another on Jutland: the RN failed to take advantage of the extra range of their guns. They could have had 15-20 minutes of free fire, but cocked up the range estimates so the Germans opened fire first on the first engagement.

ydoethur · July 31

Mexicanpete said:

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?
Those trifles aside, what have you actually got against Trump?

Nothing at all. Who do you think I am, Stormy Daniels?

eek · July 31

IanB2 said:

eek said:
Utterly off-topic but having upgraded to IOS 26 - I can no longer login to post on the non vf site
I haven’t been able to on an iPad there for ages, so don’t bother with it

I was able to before I upgraded to the beta - which is why I wanted to post the notice now.

MattW · July 31

Casino_Royale said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir
There were times when British naval supremacy was lost in the Mediterranean in 1941 and 1942 as we had to protect the Atlantic supply lines, supply routes to Russia, and defend the Channel and sea routes to India all at once.

There's another one there that bears notice today - RN vs RAF infighting.

They were short of aeroplanes, and especially quality aeoplanes, on the Malta Convoys because the RAF had nobbled earlier Fleet Air Arm attempts to develop a suitable naval fighter.

So even later they ended up with the Seafire, a bodged Spitfire which broke its legs like Bambi.

F35A vs F35B .... as DA goes on about.

Casino_Royale · July 31

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.

I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.

Casino_Royale · July 31

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.

I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.

Casino_Royale · July 31

MattW said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir
In the end when push came to shove, and Germany took over Vichy in 1942, the French *did* scuttle their fleet that was there. But there was no way to know that in 1940, and other elements fought for Vichy against the allies in West Africa.

What a contrast to the non-battle at Alexandria, where both Brits and French had good leadership.

They should have sailed to the West Indies as offered.

France suffered a form of national Stockholm Syndrome during WWII.

They lost all self confidence between the wars,
feared the Germand but thought they almost deserved to be beaten, then wanted to join them, and then resented Britain for not doing the same.

It was all very weird.

Casino_Royale · July 31

MattW said:

Casino_Royale said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir
There were times when British naval supremacy was lost in the Mediterranean in 1941 and 1942 as we had to protect the Atlantic supply lines, supply routes to Russia, and defend the Channel and sea routes to India all at once.
There's another one there that bears notice today - RN vs RAF infighting.

They were short of aeroplanes, and especially quality aeoplanes, on the Malta Convoys because the RAF had nobbled earlier Fleet Air Arm attempts to develop a suitable naval fighter.

So even later they ended up with the Seafire, a bodged Spitfire which broke its legs like Bambi.

F35A vs F35B .... as DA goes on about.

I see fierce interorganisational rivalry in both military and civil organisations even today, and have done throughout my career.

Ego means that someone always thinks their plan is better and wants to be the one on top.

Nigelb · July 31

TheScreamingEagles said:
Just a reminder PB has excellent form for tipping a 50/1 winner years out from a presidential election.

It's a decent trading bet, but she should anyway be pretty long odds as the nominee.

There's a whole group of possibles - and I'd even rate the new model Newsom's chances over hers. And we've yet to have the midterms, which might bring new faces into contention.

moonshine · July 31

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.

Always amuses me how parochial some brits are that the only two countries they can point to that are not members of the ECHR are Russia and Belarus. There’s 150 odd others.

Casino_Royale · July 31

MattW said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
One detail point - I don't think the "sorted" shells were out until after WW1 (the Greenboy Shells). It's interesting how it is always about excellent people - Admiral Jellicoe fed back the information, but it did not aiui get implemented until he became First Sea Lord and forced it through himself.

And another on Jutland: the RN failed to take advantage of the extra range of their guns. They could have had 15-20 minutes of free fire, but cocked up the range estimates so the Germans opened fire first on the first engagement.

The Royal Navy hadn't really mastered modern battleship handling by WW1. They got complacent during the Victorian era and only had a few years to learn on Dreadnoughts before war broke out.

By WW2, Royal Navy gunnery was actually very good but, by that time, aerial attack had shifted the dial for what drove dominance at sea.

ydoethur · July 31

moonshine said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Always amuses me how parochial some brits are that the only two countries they can point to that are not members of the ECHR are Russia and Belarus. There’s 150 odd others.

How many of them are in Europe?

ydoethur · July 31

Casino_Royale said:

MattW said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
One detail point - I don't think the "sorted" shells were out until after WW1 (the Greenboy Shells). It's interesting how it is always about excellent people - Admiral Jellicoe fed back the information, but it did not aiui get implemented until he became First Sea Lord and forced it through himself.

And another on Jutland: the RN failed to take advantage of the extra range of their guns. They could have had 15-20 minutes of free fire, but cocked up the range estimates so the Germans opened fire first on the first engagement.
The Royal Navy hadn't really mastered modern battleship handling by WW1. They got complacent during the Victorian era and only had a few years to learn on Dreadnoughts before war broke out.

By WW2, Royal Navy gunnery was actually very good but, by that time, aerial attack had shifted the dial for what drove dominance at sea.

They shouldn't really have got complacent about battleship handling given that they were quite good at steering them into each other:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_HMS_Victoria

(There are some astounding videos of the wreck on YouTube, which would be more astounding but for the stupid backing music.)

Nigelb · July 31

MattW said:

Casino_Royale said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir
There were times when British naval supremacy was lost in the Mediterranean in 1941 and 1942 as we had to protect the Atlantic supply lines, supply routes to Russia, and defend the Channel and sea routes to India all at once.
There's another one there that bears notice today - RN vs RAF infighting.

They were short of aeroplanes, and especially quality aeoplanes, on the Malta Convoys because the RAF had nobbled earlier Fleet Air Arm attempts to develop a suitable naval fighter.

So even later they ended up with the Seafire, a bodged Spitfire which broke its legs like Bambi.

F35A vs F35B .... as DA goes on about.

The dynamic is now the other way round. We've spent tens of billions on a highly compromised airframe and its marginally capable carriers.
Which deliver very little in the mainland European theatre.

The navy has nobbled the RAF by persuading governments to go for prestige over defence capacity.

Malmesbury · July 31

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.

Firstly, the French (at least) would have scuttled.

The problem wasn’t the ships in existence.

A Germany supreme on the continent would have had the resources to build a One Ocean navy more powerful than the Home Fleet.

The secondary problem is this - Imperial Germany had a war cult. War is Good. War is God. Literally taught in the schools and universities.

It was already metastasising in fuckwit fanaticism - see the incident with the cobbler in Alsace pre WWI.

If Germany won WWI, it would have doubled and redoubled. The Cult of War would rule.

Which made WWII inevitable. Hell, the planned peace terms (occupation of Belgium, a big chunk of France) were about crippling France - for the next war. They were planning it.

So on the new timeline, in about 1928, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics in Berlin makes a breakthrough in nuclear physics. Just as the drum beats for war are heating up, again…

Fun, n’est pas?

MattW · July 31

stodge said:
Morning all

The sad passing of Councillor Neil Wilson means there will be a by election in Plaistow South in Newham which could be a fascinating test of opinion in the run up to the 2026 locals.

In November 2023, the Newham Independents won a by election in Plaistow North by over 500 votes. The former is a strongly Muslim Ward and the latter, from memory, less so but I expect the Newham Independents to go strongly on this contest. It will be interesting to see if groups like the TUSC and the new Corbyn/Sultana party stand aside to give them a clear run.

There's also a less interesting subtext in the battle between Greens and Conservatives for what I suspect will be a distant third place. Reform will no doubt stand but seem unlikely to make much impression.

I'll be interested to see what kind of candidate Reform go for in a Labour stronghold like Newham (Stephen Timms started out as a Councillor there).

What are the local Reform politics?

Will it be a "stepping forward for my community" political naif type, will it be one of their black / brown candidates of whom there are a few, will it be a (probably Tory / Independent?) defector, or will it be one of the inheritors of the further right (being polite) type politics from their hard-right wing which exists in parts of East London?

Nigelb · July 31

TheScreamingEagles said:
Just a reminder PB has excellent form for tipping a 50/1 winner years out from a presidential election.

You're also assuming she'll actually run.

That's not a certainty.

JohnLilburne · July 31

Nigelb said:

TheScreamingEagles said:
Just a reminder PB has excellent form for tipping a 50/1 winner years out from a presidential election.
You're also assuming she'll actually run.

That's not a certainty.

Surely that's included it the odds

Malmesbury · July 31

MattW said:

Casino_Royale said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir
There were times when British naval supremacy was lost in the Mediterranean in 1941 and 1942 as we had to protect the Atlantic supply lines, supply routes to Russia, and defend the Channel and sea routes to India all at once.
There's another one there that bears notice today - RN vs RAF infighting.

They were short of aeroplanes, and especially quality aeoplanes, on the Malta Convoys because the RAF had nobbled earlier Fleet Air Arm attempts to develop a suitable naval fighter.

So even later they ended up with the Seafire, a bodged Spitfire which broke its legs like Bambi.

F35A vs F35B .... as DA goes on about.

That was more about the RN not recognising that things had changed. Aircraft without observers etc were required for performance.

And performance requirements meant that aircraft had to be much less friendly to land and take off, from carriers.

The 2+ man crews were predicated on navigation requirements. In WWII, it became clear that the risks of pilots doing their own navigation had to be accepted.

So you got designs like the Firefly.

Note that they went back to 2 man crews in the early jet age.

stodge · July 31

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.

Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.

Scott_xP · July 31

@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963

StillWaters · July 31

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Well, it's a view.

The voters never make a mistake. They make a choice. You may disagree, as is your right, but it wasn’t a mistake.

Harris is a terrible politician and a terrible candidate. She should quietly fade out, stage left.

But she won’t.

ydoethur · July 31

StillWaters said:

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Well, it's a view.
The voters never make a mistake. They make a choice. You may disagree, as is your right, but it wasn’t a mistake.

Harris is a terrible politician and a terrible candidate. She should quietly fade out, stage left.

But she won’t.

A choice can still be a mistake.

Nigelb · July 31

Scott_xP said:
@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963

i think you need to quote what he was remarking on:
"This is why @Nigel_Farage has said most of Reform’s Cabinet will not be MPs."

Farage seems to be dreaming of a US model with a de facto President (him) and a cabinet of appointees with no political base or legitimacy of their own.

The US has more checks and balances for their model. We have a parliament which has untrammelled power.

kinabalu · July 31

I'm expecting Harris to at least want to run. She came up short last time but it was clear she relished the experience and grew into it. She did well with a hospital pass at short notice. She was, on a personal level, a good candidate. It would have been intoxicating for her, result notwithstanding, and if there's the tiniest chance of another go I think she'll be up for it. I certainly would if I was her.

Theuniondivvie · July 31

ydoethur said:

StillWaters said:

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Well, it's a view.
The voters never make a mistake. They make a choice. You may disagree, as is your right, but it wasn’t a mistake.

Harris is a terrible politician and a terrible candidate. She should quietly fade out, stage left.

But she won’t.
A choice can still be a mistake.

As the Con membership have demonstrated time after time.

ydoethur · July 31

Nigelb said:

MattW said:

Casino_Royale said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
One war later, the French were reluctant to scuttle their ships and Churchill worried that Germans would seize the ships so we intervened to ensure they were no bother.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-Kébir
There were times when British naval supremacy was lost in the Mediterranean in 1941 and 1942 as we had to protect the Atlantic supply lines, supply routes to Russia, and defend the Channel and sea routes to India all at once.
There's another one there that bears notice today - RN vs RAF infighting.

They were short of aeroplanes, and especially quality aeoplanes, on the Malta Convoys because the RAF had nobbled earlier Fleet Air Arm attempts to develop a suitable naval fighter.

So even later they ended up with the Seafire, a bodged Spitfire which broke its legs like Bambi.

F35A vs F35B .... as DA goes on about.
The dynamic is now the other way round. We've spent tens of billions on a highly compromised airframe and its marginally capable carriers.
Which deliver very little in the mainland European theatre.

The navy has nobbled the RAF by persuading governments to go for prestige over defence capacity.

There is a story that once upon a time an admiral was agitating at a conference for the Navy to be the premier service of the three, because 2/3 of the world is covered by water.

Up pipes an Air Force cadet: 'And how much of the world is covered by air?'

ydoethur · July 31

Theuniondivvie said:

ydoethur said:

StillWaters said:

ydoethur said:

scampi25 said:

eek said:

IanB2 said:
The Dems have yet to find new leadership, so it isn’t impossible she might give it another try. It will give voters a chance to make amends for last year’s mistake.
I just feel that she can’t win - the Dems will need to find someone else but the upside is they know they will be either up against Vance or a Trump Jr.
No mistake on the part of voters - the democrats have only themselves to blame for the debacle - and if they think like you they'll keep on losing.
The voters did not make a mistake in voting for a 78 year old in rapid decline with a string of disasters in politics, business and his personal life behind him, a list of criminal convictions as long as your arm, who had promised to destroy their economy, and was pledged to act as a dictator?

Well, it's a view.
The voters never make a mistake. They make a choice. You may disagree, as is your right, but it wasn’t a mistake.

Harris is a terrible politician and a terrible candidate. She should quietly fade out, stage left.

But she won’t.
A choice can still be a mistake.
As the Con membership have demonstrated time after time.

There has been an increasing credibility gap in that system. It's become a Truss issue.

JohnLilburne · July 31

Malmesbury said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
Firstly, the French (at least) would have scuttled.

The problem wasn’t the ships in existence.

A Germany supreme on the continent would have had the resources to build a One Ocean navy more powerful than the Home Fleet.

The secondary problem is this - Imperial Germany had a war cult. War is Good. War is God. Literally taught in the schools and universities.

It was already metastasising in fuckwit fanaticism - see the incident with the cobbler in Alsace pre WWI.

If Germany won WWI, it would have doubled and redoubled. The Cult of War would rule.

Which made WWII inevitable. Hell, the planned peace terms (occupation of Belgium, a big chunk of France) were about crippling France - for the next war. They were planning it.

So on the new timeline, in about 1928, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics in Berlin makes a breakthrough in nuclear physics. Just as the drum beats for war are heating up, again…

Fun, n’est pas?

It's fascinating to look at the attitudes towards war. Italy was a new country, but joined in enthusiastically on the Isonzo. The pretext was of course irredentism - the idea that Italian-speaking Austrians should be Italian - but there was certainly a party that believed that the Italian nation needed to be blooded in a war. War was what nation-states did.

WW1 fuelled the rise of ethno-nationalism, but I am not sure what the alternative would have been, as the war destroyed Austria-Hungary's economy and administrative structures and the Poles certainly would have wanted their own country, although the 2nd Republic was of course multi-ethnic

AnneJGP · July 31

moonshine said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Always amuses me how parochial some brits are that the only two countries they can point to that are not members of the ECHR are Russia and Belarus. There’s 150 odd others.

The others, presumably, wouldn't make the point and might even refute it.

malcolmg · July 31

moonshine said:
From the previous thread, I suffered a 4 day power cut after Storm Eunice I think it was called, around three years ago. On Day 2 we drove to my MiL’s house an hour away. We’re halfway through a roast dinner and then bam, hers was out for the night too. This was on top of 4 (?) outages during the last World Cup. After that I bought a Tesla battery. I’ve had it less than 2 years but it’s backed me up 11 times, for cuts longer than 3 mins. Most recently a 2hr unscheduled outage in June.

assume you live in the boondocks with overhead cables

rottenborough · July 31

kinabalu said:
I'm expecting Harris to at least want to run. She came up short last time but it was clear she relished the experience and grew into it. She did well with a hospital pass at short notice. She was, on a personal level, a good candidate. It would have been intoxicating for her, result notwithstanding, and if there's the tiniest chance of another go I think she'll be up for it. I certainly would if I was her.

Dems would be utterly mad to let her through the primary process and actually run.

50/1 seems about right.

rottenborough · July 31

"He contrasted the way the UK Government has doggedly stuck to process and refused to throw its weight behind investment with the enthusiastic support Newcleo had received in France..."

Nuclear power start-up pulls out of Britain as Miliband drags feet

Newcleo plans to build new facility in France after frustration with Labour’s indecision
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/07/30/nuclear-power-start-up-pulls-out-uk-miliband-drags-feet

malcolmg · July 31

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.

After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.

Theuniondivvie · July 31

Piers is now Hamas.
He should come to PB to see how people can defend what this Israeli govt is now doing. They're pretty crap at at it, but still..

Piers Morgan
@piersmorgan
10h
FFS. This is so disgusting. How can anyone defend what this Israeli govt is now doing???

https://x.com/piersmorgan/status/1950663160232624628

Battlebus · July 31

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.

What about the Scots diaspora? You can't go anywhere without some reference to an ancestor that has gone before. Is economic migration only for some?

eek · July 31

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.

Sadly that's not what International conventions (as shown by the ECHR) say. But it has to be the future approach because the stream of boat migrants is never ending.

Personally I would be finding a way in which we are shipping 20,000 a year back to France in return for 20,000 (or even slightly more) legal migrants who would prefer to be in the UK rather than France.

Leon · July 31

Fascinating insight into “travelling with Trump” - from a hack who just spent five days on Air Force One

I know this will bitterly disappoint many PBers, but on this basis Trump is clearly not gaga. He takes five press conferences (unlike Biden), does hours of interviews, seems entirely lucid, and comes across as “in complete control”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/politics/2025/07/30/inside-donald-trump-scotland-trip/

FrancisUrquhart · July 31

Nigelb said:

Scott_xP said:
@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963
i think you need to quote what he was remarking on:
"This is why @Nigel_Farage has said most of Reform’s Cabinet will not be MPs."

Farage seems to be dreaming of a US model with a de facto President (him) and a cabinet of appointees with no political base or legitimacy of their own.

The US has more checks and balances for their model. We have a parliament which has untrammelled power.

This is Big Dom's latest idea for fixing the "blob".

Theuniondivvie · July 31

Leon said:
Fascinating insight into “travelling with Trump” - from a hack who just spent five days on Air Force One

I know this will bitterly disappoint many PBers, but on this basis Trump is clearly not gaga. He takes five press conferences (unlike Biden), does hours of interviews, seems entirely lucid, and comes across as “in complete control”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/politics/2025/07/30/inside-donald-trump-scotland-trip/

Totally unexpected take from a Tele hack, though at least he wasn't overheard in an airport saying this.

Some Trump controlled lucidity:

'Windmills send the whales loco'

Nigelb · July 31

What is going on here ?

It is remarkable that the Building Safety Regulator is rejecting 70% of applications. For comparison, the planning system rejects around 10% of applications, including on large sites. This is because delays are very costly for developers, so they try extremely hard to be compliant.

A 70% rejection rate suggests that developers *don't know how* to meet the standards the BSR is enforcing, presumably because they are unclear or unmeetable. This is very concerning.
https://x.com/SCP_Hughes/status/1950564519111016667

Andy_JS · July 31

Highlights of Zimbabwe v New Zealand, 1st test, day 1.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ta3hzIEDlhE

FrancisUrquhart · July 31

I envision Todd Boehly as Andy out Little Britain...I want that one....are you sure...yes I want that.....ok well its going to be expensive...I want it...ok Todd, we have signed them for £100m, I don't like it.

Chelsea have agreed a deal for Ajax defender Jorrel Hato for an initial fee of £37m, subject to the Dutch club's supervisory board approval.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cgjy77w0e41o

Dura_Ace · July 31

Nigelb said:

The dynamic is now the other way round. We've spent tens of billions on a highly compromised airframe and its marginally capable carriers.
Which deliver very little in the mainland European theatre.

The navy has nobbled the RAF by persuading governments to go for prestige over defence capacity.

That wasn't how we got here.

In the late 90s the government decided it wanted to replace the Invincibles. After much faffing an order was placed for the QE class ten years later. We couldn't remotely afford CATOBAR so STOVL it was. This resulted in having a choice of exactly one aircraft - F-35B. This aircraft was eventually rolled into the FOAS program to replace Tornado resulting in a joint RAF/RN enterprise that the RAF runs just like JFH and with similar results.

The RN would have rather stayed out of the fixed wing business altogether and had helicopter carriers that the RAF couldn't fuck around with but they have to pretend that the QE/F-35B combo is a brilliant idea. The F-35A acquisition is partially running out of money and partially discovering that if you send F-35B to sea without sufficient engineering support they come back completely fucked so the solution is to buy more aircraft that can never go to sea.

So now we've got JFL running at about 50% of the required humanpower because the RAF (and civvies) don't want to be drafted on to it because they don't want to go to sea. It takes a year to prepare for a cruise, most of the surface fleet a year to execute one and a year to recuperate. The government chooses to counter the apparently deadly serious emergent threat of the Russians by sending the CSG to the Timor Sea rather than the Baltic or the High Arctic. Bloody well done to all involved.

IanB2 · July 31

JohnLilburne said:

Malmesbury said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
Firstly, the French (at least) would have scuttled.

The problem wasn’t the ships in existence.

A Germany supreme on the continent would have had the resources to build a One Ocean navy more powerful than the Home Fleet.

The secondary problem is this - Imperial Germany had a war cult. War is Good. War is God. Literally taught in the schools and universities.

It was already metastasising in fuckwit fanaticism - see the incident with the cobbler in Alsace pre WWI.

If Germany won WWI, it would have doubled and redoubled. The Cult of War would rule.

Which made WWII inevitable. Hell, the planned peace terms (occupation of Belgium, a big chunk of France) were about crippling France - for the next war. They were planning it.

So on the new timeline, in about 1928, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics in Berlin makes a breakthrough in nuclear physics. Just as the drum beats for war are heating up, again…

Fun, n’est pas?
It's fascinating to look at the attitudes towards war. Italy was a new country, but joined in enthusiastically on the Isonzo. The pretext was of course irredentism - the idea that Italian-speaking Austrians should be Italian - but there was certainly a party that believed that the Italian nation needed to be blooded in a war. War was what nation-states did.

WW1 fuelled the rise of ethno-nationalism, but I am not sure what the alternative would have been, as the war destroyed Austria-Hungary's economy and administrative structures and the Poles certainly would have wanted their own country, although the 2nd Republic was of course multi-ethnic

Italy wanted secure borders, along the high mountain watershed in the north and with Trieste to the north east. The British were canny enough to promise them that, if they joined the allies. That the South Tyrol was then almost entirely German (with a few Ladino) and Trieste Austrian and slav didn't trouble either party.

Malmesbury · July 31

JohnLilburne said:

Malmesbury said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
Firstly, the French (at least) would have scuttled.

The problem wasn’t the ships in existence.

A Germany supreme on the continent would have had the resources to build a One Ocean navy more powerful than the Home Fleet.

The secondary problem is this - Imperial Germany had a war cult. War is Good. War is God. Literally taught in the schools and universities.

It was already metastasising in fuckwit fanaticism - see the incident with the cobbler in Alsace pre WWI.

If Germany won WWI, it would have doubled and redoubled. The Cult of War would rule.

Which made WWII inevitable. Hell, the planned peace terms (occupation of Belgium, a big chunk of France) were about crippling France - for the next war. They were planning it.

So on the new timeline, in about 1928, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics in Berlin makes a breakthrough in nuclear physics. Just as the drum beats for war are heating up, again…

Fun, n’est pas?
It's fascinating to look at the attitudes towards war. Italy was a new country, but joined in enthusiastically on the Isonzo. The pretext was of course irredentism - the idea that Italian-speaking Austrians should be Italian - but there was certainly a party that believed that the Italian nation needed to be blooded in a war. War was what nation-states did.

WW1 fuelled the rise of ethno-nationalism, but I am not sure what the alternative would have been, as the war destroyed Austria-Hungary's economy and administrative structures and the Poles certainly would have wanted their own country, although the 2nd Republic was of course multi-ethnic

Contrary to the WarMadContinent thesis, most nations in the run up to WWI didn’t want war. Germany was split between the WarIsGod types and the sensible. France, under the Revanche doctrine was determined to be attacked, not attack. Russia didn’t want it. The UK didn’t want it.

The AH empire wanted war. Maybe Serbia?

nunu2 · July 31

Battlebus said:

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.
What about the Scots diaspora? You can't go anywhere without some reference to an ancestor that has gone before. Is economic migration only for some?

It's for those who do it legally.

Dura_Ace · July 31

Nigelb said:

Scott_xP said:
@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963
i think you need to quote what he was remarking on:
"This is why @Nigel_Farage has said most of Reform’s Cabinet will not be MPs."

Farage seems to be dreaming of a US model with a de facto President (him) and a cabinet of appointees with no political base or legitimacy of their own.

The US has more checks and balances for their model. We have a parliament which has untrammelled power.

He'll just auction off peerages/cabinet posts to his scabrous donors. There will be plenty of takers.

IanB2 · July 31

Leon said:
Fascinating insight into “travelling with Trump” - from a hack who just spent five days on Air Force One

I know this will bitterly disappoint many PBers, but on this basis Trump is clearly not gaga. He takes five press conferences (unlike Biden), does hours of interviews, seems entirely lucid, and comes across as “in complete control”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/politics/2025/07/30/inside-donald-trump-scotland-trip/

Are we playing the Albanian game again, already?

SandyRentool · July 31

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.

I saw a copper on the news last night stating that the folk being housed in one of these hotels had not committed any crime. So entering the country illegally does not constitute a crime?

Stuartinromford · July 31

Nigelb said:

Scott_xP said:
@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963
i think you need to quote what he was remarking on:
"This is why @Nigel_Farage has said most of Reform’s Cabinet will not be MPs."

Farage seems to be dreaming of a US model with a de facto President (him) and a cabinet of appointees with no political base or legitimacy of their own.

The US has more checks and balances for their model. We have a parliament which has untrammelled power.

I'm sure those keen on Sovereignty Of Parliament and Not Having Unelected Rulers will be hopping mad about that.

Alphabet_Soup · July 31

SandyRentool said:

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.
I saw a copper on the news last night stating that the folk being housed in one of these hotels had not committed any crime. So entering the country illegally does not constitute a crime?

Not if they've been 'rescued' by Coast Guard or RNLI, apparently.

OnlyLivingBoy · July 31

nunu2 said:

Battlebus said:

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.
What about the Scots diaspora? You can't go anywhere without some reference to an ancestor that has gone before. Is economic migration only for some?
It's for those who do it legally.

I'm sure the indigenous people of Australia and the Americas might have views on the legality or otherwise of that migration.

FrancisUrquhart · July 31

SandyRentool said:

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.
I saw a copper on the news last night stating that the folk being housed in one of these hotels had not committed any crime. So entering the country illegally does not constitute a crime?

Not a single one is working illegally on UberEats etc?

MattW · July 31

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.

As I see it, Rwanda was about a washed-up headless chicken Government desperately trying to save its own skin, no matter what the cost to the country. Rwanda saw us coming, and Rishi walked straight into it.

There were plenty of examples - two of the most cynical being a culture war transport policy, where the official policy embraced what was later identified officially by the (Conservative) Leader of the Commons as conspiracy theory, and deliberate delays in providing the Opposition with normal pre-Election access to the Civil Service.

boulay · July 31

Dura_Ace said:

Nigelb said:

The dynamic is now the other way round. We've spent tens of billions on a highly compromised airframe and its marginally capable carriers.
Which deliver very little in the mainland European theatre.

The navy has nobbled the RAF by persuading governments to go for prestige over defence capacity.
That wasn't how we got here.

In the late 90s the government decided it wanted to replace the Invincibles. After much faffing an order was placed for the QE class ten years later. We couldn't remotely afford CATOBAR so STOVL it was. This resulted in having a choice of exactly one aircraft - F-35B. This aircraft was eventually rolled into the FOAS program to replace Tornado resulting in a joint RAF/RN enterprise that the RAF runs just like JFH and with similar results.

The RN would have rather stayed out of the fixed wing business altogether and had helicopter carriers that the RAF couldn't fuck around with but they have to pretend that the QE/F-35B combo is a brilliant idea. The F-35A acquisition is partially running out of money and partially discovering that if you send F-35B to sea without sufficient engineering support they come back completely fucked so the solution is to buy more aircraft that can never go to sea.

So now we've got JFL running at about 50% of the required humanpower because the RAF (and civvies) don't want to be drafted on to it because they don't want to go to sea. It takes a year to prepare for a cruise, most of the surface fleet a year to execute one and a year to recuperate. The government chooses to counter the apparently deadly serious emergent threat of the Russians by sending the CSG to the Timor Sea rather than the Baltic or the High Arctic. Bloody well done to all involved.

Yes, you would have hoped that someone might have pointed out that the area we might find most use/need for the aircraft carrier is in the cold north so let’s test it, the crew, the planes etc under cold wet conditions. Does everything work when it’s caked in ice? Does the onboard heating work? Can planes land safely on a potentially icy deck.

No point sending it to any war with China as it won’t last long, won’t add much to the US fleet.

nunu2 · July 31

I don't think Democrats are in a forgiving mood. They will not vote for anyone who lost to trump now.

Daveyboy1961 · July 31

Alphabet_Soup said:

SandyRentool said:

malcolmg said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
After illegal entry NONE should qualify, they are economic parasites bleeding the country dry due to ineffectual effete woke politician's and liberal do gooders.
I saw a copper on the news last night stating that the folk being housed in one of these hotels had not committed any crime. So entering the country illegally does not constitute a crime?
Not if they've been 'rescued' by Coast Guard or RNLI, apparently.

Why have you put rescued in commas? Surely if the boat was sinking or about to sink it was a rescue?

Taz · July 31

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.

My only grip with it was successful applicants could not come to the U.K.

Much of the outrage was, and still is, performative. ‘Oh look at me, I’m being worthy’

JohnLilburne · July 31

Casino_Royale said:

MattW said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
One detail point - I don't think the "sorted" shells were out until after WW1 (the Greenboy Shells). It's interesting how it is always about excellent people - Admiral Jellicoe fed back the information, but it did not aiui get implemented until he became First Sea Lord and forced it through himself.

And another on Jutland: the RN failed to take advantage of the extra range of their guns. They could have had 15-20 minutes of free fire, but cocked up the range estimates so the Germans opened fire first on the first engagement.
The Royal Navy hadn't really mastered modern battleship handling by WW1. They got complacent during the Victorian era and only had a few years to learn on Dreadnoughts before war broke out.

By WW2, Royal Navy gunnery was actually very good but, by that time, aerial attack had shifted the dial for what drove dominance at sea.

The Royal Navy was so dominant after Waterloo that we didn't fight a naval war until WW1. There had then been several generations of new tech that could only be learned theoretically.

Amazing to think that a ship of the line in 1815 sailed and fought pretty much like one of 1715, whereas by 19 15 we had superdreadnoughts and torpedo-firing submarines

OnlyLivingBoy · July 31

Nigelb said:

Scott_xP said:
@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963
i think you need to quote what he was remarking on:
"This is why @Nigel_Farage has said most of Reform’s Cabinet will not be MPs."

Farage seems to be dreaming of a US model with a de facto President (him) and a cabinet of appointees with no political base or legitimacy of their own.

The US has more checks and balances for their model. We have a parliament which has untrammelled power.

How can MPs hold Cabinet Ministers to account if they can't ask them questions in the Commons? Does Farage even know how this parliamentary democracy game works? Also speaks volumes about the calibre of parliamentary candidate he is expecting to attract if he's already ruling them out for Cabinet positions.

JohnLilburne · July 31

Taz said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
My only grip with it was successful applicants could not come to the U.K.

Much of the outrage was, and still is, performative. ‘Oh look at me, I’m being worthy’

Indeed, it should have been an offshore processing centre. I am surprised Starmer didn't try to convert it to one, although it is possible the agreement with Rwanda would have allowed them to refuse the change

Taz · July 31

Andy_JS said:
Highlights of Zimbabwe v New Zealand, 1st test, day 1.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ta3hzIEDlhE

Zim needs more exposure for sure. They have 11 tests this year. They’ll,lose every one I think. But the players will gain experience.

JohnLilburne · July 31

OnlyLivingBoy said:

Nigelb said:

Scott_xP said:
@RhonddaBryant

So we’d be governed by an unelected elite if Reform ever formed a government? We’d have to take back control.

https://x.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1950813297722191963
i think you need to quote what he was remarking on:
"This is why @Nigel_Farage has said most of Reform’s Cabinet will not be MPs."

Farage seems to be dreaming of a US model with a de facto President (him) and a cabinet of appointees with no political base or legitimacy of their own.

The US has more checks and balances for their model. We have a parliament which has untrammelled power.
How can MPs hold Cabinet Ministers to account if they can't ask them questions in the Commons? Does Farage even know how this parliamentary democracy game works? Also speaks volumes about the calibre of parliamentary candidate he is expecting to attract if he's already ruling them out for Cabinet positions.

MPs can ask them questions, they just need to change their standing orders.

Scott_xP · July 31

Yeah, this guy is totally on it...

@acyn.bsky.social‬

Reporter: Kash Patel reportedly found burn bags of Russiagate materials.

Trump: What?

Reporter: Burn bags

Trump: I don’t know what you mean

Reporter: Bags full of—

Trump: Oh, I thought you said appointed a man named Burn Bag

https://bsky.app/profile/acyn.bsky.social/post/3lv774c6q752l

‪@atrupar.com‬

Trump is fighting for his life to stay awake during this roundtable event

https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3lv7jqv75tb2a

Top of his game...

FrancisUrquhart · July 31

JohnLilburne said:

Taz said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
My only grip with it was successful applicants could not come to the U.K.

Much of the outrage was, and still is, performative. ‘Oh look at me, I’m being worthy’
Indeed, it should have been an offshore processing centre. I am surprised Starmer didn't try to convert it to one, although it is possible the agreement with Rwanda would have allowed them to refuse the change

Have you seen the deals Starmer has tried to do so far....

boulay · July 31

JohnLilburne said:

Taz said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
My only grip with it was successful applicants could not come to the U.K.

Much of the outrage was, and still is, performative. ‘Oh look at me, I’m being worthy’
Indeed, it should have been an offshore processing centre. I am surprised Starmer didn't try to convert it to one, although it is possible the agreement with Rwanda would have allowed them to refuse the change

Starmer could have had the greatest academics in the world show him proof that Rwanda would work but he still wouldn’t have done it with a required tweak because it was a Tory policy and the Left had spent years blindly attacking it as a solution for multiple reasons.

bondegezou · July 31

Malmesbury said:

JohnLilburne said:

Malmesbury said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Fishing said:
FPT -

Casino_Royale said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Casino_Royale said:

rcs1000 said:

Andy_JS said:

Fishing said:
Personally I'd say our decision to go to war with France and Russia against Germany in 1914 was where it all started to go wrong.

It killed almost a million men over some inconsequential tracts of Flanders, beggared the Empire, strengthened the United States, led to the Russian Revolution and Labour Governments and eventually to the Second World War.

Honourable mentions to Lloyd George's 1909 Budget that set us on the disastrous road to the current welfare junkie tax and spend doom loop, and the Attlee government that pushed us further in that direction and passed the current disastrous planning system.
This is Peter Hitchens' view IIRC.
It is - of course - worth remembering that British foreign policy for the last 500 years has been to avoid a European continental hegemon emerging. It led to us fighting in the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701–1714; the Napoleonic Wars from 1803 to 1815, and then both the World Wars in the 20th Century.

The view - rightly or wrongly - was that Britain was strongest when Europe was fractured. (And I would argue that the fracturing of the European continent was -mostly- good for citizens too. It meant countries were competing and innovating.)

So... you can argue that Britain should have avoided the First World War, but you do have to remember that would have had consequences too.
We had no choice.

France and Russia would have both been defeated (Russia was as it is, and France came close in 1917) and we'd have faced a totally German dominated Europe. They could have united the fleets of up to 4 navies against us, and would have occupied the low countries and the Channel coast, which would have meant the UK's safety and its links to the Empire would have been utterly at its mercy. The Royal Navy wouldn't have been able to protect our independence.

We want to believe it was avoidable due to the terrible cost. But, whilst a catastrophe, the alternative for this country would have been worse.

We had to fight.
No, I don't really think that holds water. Even with whatever survived of France and Russia's Navies that had not been scuttled or come to us, Germany would not have been a serious naval threat. And where is the solid evidence that the Kaiser would have been more successful in conquering Russia than Napoleon before him?

A Germany that had only recently united itself acting as the overlord of an annoyed Europe would have had far more pressing problems than attacking Britain at sea.

It was just a catastrophical error. We have to accept it, forgive, and move on.
I suppose the evidence is that in 1918 Germany had successfully conquered Russia.
Yes, one only needs to read the Treaty of Brest-Litovskt. For France, look at the annexed territory in Alsace-Lorraine in 1871.

The Royal Navy had about 36 dreadnoughts to 21 German, roughly a 60% advantage, but nothing like an insurmountable one.

That is a bigger advantage than it seems, because not only do you have 60% more guns, but there's also 60% more of you to destroy. So in fact the advantage is not 1.6:1, it's 1.6^2:1 or 2.56:1. That IS close to insurmountable, especially given the generally much larger calibre of the Royal Navy's guns, and once the Royal Navy had addressed the poor quality of its heavy calibre shells and its disastrous ammunition handling practices.

Which is why the Germans, despite the better quality of their ships overall, never seriously contemplated a full fleet action during WW1, and, when they got trapped in one, at Jutland, their only thought was to flee as quickly as possible.

Interestingly there were a few months in late 1914 and early 1915 when the Germans did have rough equality in numbers in Dreadnoughts with the Royal Navy. But that changed once the 15-inch gun Queen Elizabeths and then the Royal Sovereigns started arriving, and once the Americans sent their 6th Battle Squadron.
Also, why would France and Russia have simply signed their fleets over to Germany, rather than to an ally like Britain, or scuttled them?

I would not have chosen for Britain to remain neutral in WW1, I would have had us help our allies with our Navy. My issue lies with our disastrous involvement in the land war.
Firstly, the French (at least) would have scuttled.

The problem wasn’t the ships in existence.

A Germany supreme on the continent would have had the resources to build a One Ocean navy more powerful than the Home Fleet.

The secondary problem is this - Imperial Germany had a war cult. War is Good. War is God. Literally taught in the schools and universities.

It was already metastasising in fuckwit fanaticism - see the incident with the cobbler in Alsace pre WWI.

If Germany won WWI, it would have doubled and redoubled. The Cult of War would rule.

Which made WWII inevitable. Hell, the planned peace terms (occupation of Belgium, a big chunk of France) were about crippling France - for the next war. They were planning it.

So on the new timeline, in about 1928, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics in Berlin makes a breakthrough in nuclear physics. Just as the drum beats for war are heating up, again…

Fun, n’est pas?
It's fascinating to look at the attitudes towards war. Italy was a new country, but joined in enthusiastically on the Isonzo. The pretext was of course irredentism - the idea that Italian-speaking Austrians should be Italian - but there was certainly a party that believed that the Italian nation needed to be blooded in a war. War was what nation-states did.

WW1 fuelled the rise of ethno-nationalism, but I am not sure what the alternative would have been, as the war destroyed Austria-Hungary's economy and administrative structures and the Poles certainly would have wanted their own country, although the 2nd Republic was of course multi-ethnic
Contrary to the WarMadContinent thesis, most nations in the run up to WWI didn’t want war. Germany was split between the WarIsGod types and the sensible. France, under the Revanche doctrine was determined to be attacked, not attack. Russia didn’t want it. The UK didn’t want it.

The AH empire wanted war. Maybe Serbia?

"N'est-ce pas", not "n'est pas".

#pbpedantry

Fairliered · July 31

Good morning everyone. A choice between Vance/Trump jnr and Harris would be like a choice between eating shit and drinking piss.
Ok, I’ll let all you old men get back to your military discussion.

Stuartinromford · July 31

Taz said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
My only grip with it was successful applicants could not come to the U.K.

Much of the outrage was, and still is, performative. ‘Oh look at me, I’m being worthy’

But successful applicants go to Rwanda (well, 1% of them, anyway) was the heart of the policy.

Dura_Ace · July 31

MattW said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:

Mexicanpete said:

boulay said:

Mexicanpete said:

Casino_Royale said:

stodge said:

Casino_Royale said:
Starmer is adept at U-Turns so he should just admit cancelling Rwanda was a bad idea, sent totally the wrong message, and bring it make with a tweak and call it the Labour version.
Simply because Labour knows it wouldn't work just as the Conservatives probably did.

In truth, no one has come up with a coherent, legal, practical, workable and above all inexpensive solution to the problem of "the boats". If such a solution existed, it would have been implemented by either this Government or the last Government.

If withdrawing from the ECHR is the panacea some seem to think it would have been done by this Government or the last Government.

You could try the Greek response and immediately arrest and deport all those who come over illegally but that wouldn't stop them coming.
And, small boat crossings have increased 50% since it was cancellled.
Nice weather.

I doubt your average Afghan boat person has any idea of the Rwanda deterrent, or now, lack thereof.
Before the election Today had regular interviews with charity people in the Calais region and former border officials working with organisations who were very clear that the Rwanda plan was well known by asylum seekers and the threat of it was real to potential boaters.

I know that’s not ideal, something you really don’t like actually working, but the evidence was clearly there and with tweaks such as allowing successful applicants to come to the UK and non successful to stay in Rwanda or confirm and return to their county of origin, it might have worked very well but too many people were blinded to Rwanda because it was the Tories’ plan or frankly, they just don’t want to do anything about the problem.
Rwanda was appalling on so many fronts. It was a Johnsonian stunt which was amoral, Rwanda was not and is not a stable, safe and reliable destination and the project was absurdly expensive. Rwanda was a jolly jape concocted by Johnson and as I mentioned above, serious Tories in Cabinet hated the idea. That is not to say a more workable third party country arrangement is not viable, it is just on any measure, Rwanda wasn't the answer.

Rwanda does however serve a political function, it allows more enthusiastic right wingers to argue we should join Russia and Belarus and jettison the ECHR.
I had no problem with Rwanda.

Neither did Matthew Parris or Ken Clarke.
Ignoring the legalities for a moment (which you can't), the hope in the last Government was, pace Trident, Rwanda would act as a deterrent to those seeking to cross the Channel and enter the country illegally.

It was the biggest stick (well, not quite) the Government had to deter those who were trying to come over and there was some evidence it was acting as such a deterrent.

There was a big cost issue but the current situation has a big cost issue as well. Presumably we'd have assembled a plane load of illegals and then flown them out to Kigali - how many flights a week would we have seen? The idea we'd have flown three or four people on a plane to Kigali was ridiculous but the desperate desire of the last Government to show their plan was "working" led us to that point.

The other side of the issue was whether we would transport those already here from their (allegedly) four star hotel accommodation to something somewhat more rudimentary on the outskirts of Kigali and I'm sure that was under consideration before the Conservatives were swept away in July 2024.

It's not just about flying illegal migrants TO Rwanda - there's the small matter of returning those whose applications were successful (about half perhaps?) and sending the unsuccessful to some other country so in the end it was much more symbolic than serious, more propaganda than practical.
As I see it, Rwanda was about a washed-up headless chicken Government desperately trying to save its own skin, no matter what the cost to the country. Rwanda saw us coming, and Rishi walked straight into it.

Big Rish and the Gang preferred to campaign on the notion of Rwanda rather than the actuality. Their fucking idiotic legislation that said Rwanda was safe and Rishi wore size 13 shoes passed at the end of April 2024. They had two months where they could have launched Rwanda flights but chose not to. Why was that? It wasn't because they thought it was a fucking brilliant idea that was definitely actionable and effective.

FrancisUrquhart · July 31

Fairliered said:
Good morning everyone. A choice between Vance/Trump jnr and Harris would be like a choice between eating shit and drinking piss.
Ok, I’ll let all you old men get back to your military discussion.

Looks down at my breakfast....not feeling quite so hungry now.

Sunil_Prasannan · July 31

Scott_xP said:
Yeah, this guy is totally on it...

@acyn.bsky.social‬

Reporter: Kash Patel reportedly found burn bags of Russiagate materials.

Trump: What?

Reporter: Burn bags

Trump: I don’t know what you mean

Reporter: Bags full of—

Trump: Oh, I thought you said appointed a man named Burn Bag

https://bsky.app/profile/acyn.bsky.social/post/3lv774c6q752l

‪@atrupar.com‬

Trump is fighting for his life to stay awake during this roundtable event

https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3lv7jqv75tb2a

Top of his game...

Droopy Don!

For now, I have been focussing on just two words – politicalbetting.com

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