Exposing Blogger Identities: The Empire Strikes Back?

In this shriveled scrap of empire we call the United Kingdom, there is a fine tradition of the anonymous political missive – Swift, Defoe, Scott, to name but a few. What is interesting is that they all relate to the idea of a greater England. Let’s call it Britain, for argument’s sake.

Daniel Defoe, author of Robinson Crusoe (based on the Scot Alexander Selkirk), was the English spy and pamphleteer who came to Scotland to campaign for Union with England in the early 1700s, at great risk to his personal safety. Walter Scott, on the other hand, when not arguing for the continuation of that same Union, fought to save Scotland’s version of English money in the 1820s (that’s why he’s on it). As for Jonathan Swift, well, I defy any adult who knows Irish history to read Gulliver’s Travels and not see Lilliput as a scathing metaphor for English colonial rule: Ireland tied down and crawling with self-important little Englishmen, who all just happen to be six inches long. Brilliant.

All three writers used anonymity to protect themselves from retaliation for their political campaigns. When you are taking on a state, you need to be careful. States are remote, faceless powers that cannot be touched. It is only fair to extend the political pamphleteer, novelist, or blogger the same courtesy.

Once again, though, it seems as if the genre will no longer be tolerated by the powers that be.

A War on Nationalist Bloggers?
With the recent campaign to close down three Scottish nationalist blogs, some may be wondering if the days of anonymous political dissent in Scotland are numbered. The identities of two nationalist bloggers – Subrosa and Montague Burton – were revealed in the same week, while Wardog was harassed at work and home by newspapers.

So who is behind this? Is the establishment fighting back?

As far as I am concerned, for a political blogger, being told to shut up means you are annoying somebody. And if you are someone with a political axe to grind who enjoys pissing people off, this is about as close as you will get to a pat on the back.

So what would happen if my identity were exposed? After my massive ego had dealt with the flattery of it all, next there will be calls from reporters, the paparazzi at the bottom of the garden. I might have to get an agent. Not that revealing my identity would make much difference. If it happens, so be it. My blog hit rate might even soar through a dozen hits a day. The most likely reaction would be a resounding ‘Who?’

Let me be clear. Alex Salmond was right to tell nationalist bloggers to cool the four-letter insults. They convince no one. But these attacks had absolutely nothing to do with obscene language. Subrosa didn’t generally say nasty things about anyone, yet someone tried to reveal her identity. Someone didn’t like what she had to say, and tried to shut her up.

As for Wardog and Montague, these were solid blogs I enjoyed reading, and will miss. Personally, I prefer not to resort to four-letter name-calling, but others may do as they please. If you don’t like to hear it, don’t visit the site. I occasionally use bad language on my blog (So what? We’re all adults) and I feel it is my right to insult political groups I consider worthy of contempt. If challenged, I will respond with:

"Prove to me you are not oxygen thieves."

I have also made the odd poor attempt at satire, which works best when the target is not named but they decide to complain anyway, and to the reply should always be:

"What makes you think the drink-sodden moron was you?"

My blog is a vehicle for my opinions, and what I believe. I happen to believe the British state is technically bankrupt and rotten to its stinking, expenses-fueled, illegal war-waging core. I think that Scotland is in a colonial situation with England, against the wishes of the English people. I believe that most Scots and English are essentially decent people, but that we are ruled by a corrupt, self-serving political class whose continued existence depends on keeping us locked together in an artificial state called the United Kingdom.

No one can condemn me for holding these opinions. Or change them. My self-set task is to convince those of a different opinion, and to ridicule those I consider my political enemies.


Why Jim Murphy is Not a C**t
To simply call someone a c**t, though, is to lose. It convinces no one. In my opinion, it tells your enemies that they are winning, that you are powerless, and is a cry of anger and frustration.

Oh, and by the way, Jim Murphy is most definitely NOT a c**t. He is, in my humble opinion, a second rate political lightweight who has never had a proper job in his life and who is facing electoral oblivion at the next General Election. And quite frankly he is shitting himself.

C**ts, on the other hand, are pleasing on the eye, exciting to see, serve a productive purpose in society, and regularly put a smile on my face. They are, above all, useful. So, Wardog and Montague, on behalf of c**ts everywhere, I demand a retraction. How dare you sully the reputation of these truly wonderful creations!

What is at Stake
Just as for Swift, Scott and Defoe, the anonymous political writer today has much at stake. For many bloggers, exposure might mean your reputation, your career, even your life. Whether it is the university lecturer losing his job for saying things too vulgar for those poor wee precious students to hear (give me a break), the police officer revealing systemic corruption among the officers around him, or the political dissident criticizing his government, it can be a serious business.

Unless you are lucky enough to be a full time sex slave to a rich, horny widow who doesn’t know the first thing about politics and has free broadband, cable and a heated swimming pool. Then you are pretty much in the clear.

"Authority, I laugh at you! Ha!"

No, not you, Sweetie. I’ll be there in a minute.

The challenge for the government is to stop the political blogger from blogging. If you have already made your identity public voluntarily, they only have to wait for you to say something incompatible with your professional position and then hound your bosses till you are sacked. (Wardog and Monty, we await your return. You served a valuable role.)

If you are anonymous, you probably have good reason to be. They first have to reveal your identity, preferably in a way that conceals government involvement, at least in supposedly democratic states. Make it look like a mistake, or the work of a nosey newspaper. (Well done, Rosy, for getting back in the ring. I salute you.)

The question to ask is ‘cui bono?’ To whose advantage was the exposure of Subrosa, Montague Burton and the harassment of Wardog? Other bloggers, jealous of their hit-rates? Newspapers, envious of their readership? The Scotland Office, annoyed at not getting blanket coverage of the independence-bad, Union-good message?

I’m not making any accusations, but just what exactly do the sixty – count them: SIXTY – people in the Anti-Scottish Office do? That’s nearly half the total number of politicians in Holyrood. And what exactly does Jim Murphy spends his £7.2million budget a year on? When Scotland becomes independent, England will have a consular general in Edinburgh with a secretary and a cappuccino machine if they’re lucky. So what the hell do these SIXTY people do? Their total salaries can’t amount to much more than £2million. Where the hell does the rest go?

Can we see the accounts, please, Jim?

Exposure works both ways, too. When my rich widow unties me long enough to blog, I can tell exactly when my missives are read by those in Whitehall, Westminster and Holyrood.

Take this avid little reader, for instance. You can tell a lot about what’s on someone’s mind by the path they take through the site. Any guesses? And a whole hour on my site, too. I’m flattered. They obviously have a lot of time on their hands.


(Green – where they came from, black – what they read, blue – how they left)


Make no mistake, I am under no illusions that the minions of the British government don’t know exactly who I am. To be perfectly honest, though, I don’t really care.

Speak the truth and let the heavens fall, to twist the words of Thoreau. Let them do their damnedest.

As long as I keep my cute little widow happy, I’m not going anywhere.

Oops, spoke too soon. Gotta go.

Duty calls. Ahem.



UPDATE: WATCHING THE WATCHERS

Is Scottish Unionism Treachery?

Treachery has been a reviled and despised quality as long as history and literature have been recorded. In his Inferno, Dante went so far as to reserve the ninth and lowest circle of Hell for traitors.



The question is: is the language of treason entirely appropriate in a supposedly healthy debate on Scottish independence, considering that the Scots in the Labour Party are not technically betraying their own country by opposing Scottish nationalism?

Nationalists may argue that it is their own people and the nation of Scotland they are betraying, but to the paid-up Labour Unionist, his or her country is the United Kingdom.

What about ‘Vichy’ and ‘Quisling’? Are these charges too strong, considering Scotland is not yet an independent country, and not at war? In the online forums of the press, we often hear these words leveled against Labour politicians – those who would aid and abet London’s continuing colonial control of Scotland for their own personal gain. Personally, I consider Scotland’s SUKCUP press fair game.

But do these words alienate undecided voters, rather than persuade? How much does this level of invective hinder rather than help the cause of Scottish independence?

To help answer these questions, I thought it would be useful to summarize the different forms of traitorous accusation, putting them in their original historical context, to determine if indeed they are appropriate to Scotland today, or simply over the top.



1. Judas


Judas Iscariot betrayed Jesus to the Romans soldiers for thirty pieces of silver by identifying him with a kiss. He died alone, probably by hanging himself.

Not particularly relevant to Scotland, since Unionists are quite open in their allegiances. They do not see themselves as traitors to a country which they deny even exists.

Fair enough, I say.

In the same vein, Judas betrayed a friend, whereas Unionists are utterly loyal to their London masters. They may be servile colonial lickspittles in the eyes of nationalists, but they are not betraying any friendships by their actions.



2. Benedict Arnold

American Colonial War of Independence (I refuse to call it a revolution). Arnold was a successful general in Washington’s army who switched sides. Still regarded in American history as the embodiment of treachery. Even though he lived out the rest of his life in Britain, he was never entirely trusted by anyone. He had, after all, fought on the other side first. A reformed rebel is still a rebel.

And the reason he switched sides? Wait for it…he had been passed over for promotion and ordered to repay expenses.



3. Fifth Columnists

Spanish civil war. Not strictly traitors (although they were opposing the elected government in a civil war) but rather an enemy within. In 1936, as four columns of Franco’s fascists approached Madrid, Fascist radio claimed that a ‘fifth column’ of supporters inside the city would help them take it. The campaign failed, and the Spanish government forces held off Franco for three more long years.

The term gained currency during WW2 in relation to the Germans living in Britain. Fearing a ‘fifth column’ within, Churchill gave his famous ‘collar the lot’ command and they were rounded up and held on the Isle of Man until the end of the war. The term is often used in Israeli press today to describe Israeli Arabs, whose loyalties lie with the Arabs in the occupied territories.



4. Quislings

Norway’s greatest ever traitior, Vidkun Quisling, led the Norwegian Nazi Party, and was set up by Germany as Norway’s puppet leader during their occupation. His fate? To be found guilty of high treason and shot as a traitor after the war.

His greatest grammatical achievement was to be both nouned and verbed. One can be a Quisling, or one can quisle. This is a verb that should be revived.

Incidentally, ‘Quisling’ sounds a lot like usling in Norwegian – a slippery, deceitful, slimy person.



5. A Vichy Regime

Also from the Second World War. Still a sore point in French history, and one that excites much scholarly debate. After surrendering in 1940, France agreed to become a client state of Nazi Germany and the central and southern region was left to run its own affairs, unoccupied by German troops, run from the small spa town of Vichy. De Gaulle tried to rally the Resistance from London, but the indisputable fact is that many French collaborated with the Nazis.

I got an interesting take on this from one of my French amis: if France had fought tooth and nail for every centimeter of la patrie, all those pretty French villages that we love to visit on our driving holidays would have been destroyed. He believes that surrender was the best policy at the time to save France’s architecture and culture, given the overwhelming odds stacked against it.

Cheese eating surrender monkeys, or the pragmatic rationalizers of the military reality at the time?


Are these terms appropriate?
From a nationalist perspective, the fifth column idea of an enemy within seems most relevant to the role Unionists play in maintaining Scotland’s position within the Union, but since the relations between Scotland and the rest of the UK are peaceful, it is still too strong.

Indeed, none of these terms would therefore seem suitable for the debate on Scotland’s independence, considering (1) Unionists happen to believe in a different identity, and do not see themselves as traitors, and (2) there is no secessionist war between Scotland and the UK.

That is why I believe that the most appropriate historical equivalent for our Scottish Unionists friends – be they Scots in the Scottish Office, members of the UK government, or Unionists employed by the Scottish TV and print media to talk down Scotland – is that of a besieged colonial elite in its last days of colonial rule.



The Colonial Elite
No colonial power in history ever ruled without the help of a local elite in the subjugation of its own people. The key to understanding their essential bridging function is that the colonial power cannot do it without them, and that once the colonial relationship is over, they are without exception despised by all sides – by both their own people and by the ex-governing power. They are usually remembered by the ex-colonial power as failed flunkies, and by the newly independent country as former collaborators in their own people’s subjugation.

For these reasons, this is the group that always fights hardest for the colonial arrangement and their colonial privileges to continue: they know full well that once independent comes, the game is up. They will become pariahs, despised by all, with no part to play in either the new domestic political scene or in future diplomatic relations between the ex-imperial power and its newly independent former colony. In summary: useless, washed up, redundant.

If there is a violent transition to independence (as there was for the United States, Ireland, Algeria and Kenya) they tend to die either at the hands of their countrymen, or like Benedict Arnold in exile as old men in the imperial homeland, trusted by no one, hated by their countrymen from a distance, passing away in obscurity and exile as bitter, friendless, alcoholics, ‘unwept, unhonoured and unsung’.

If on the other hand the transition is peaceful (as it was for Australia, Canada and New Zealand, and as it will be for Scotland) former Unionists can quickly become absorbed into the political structure of the newly independent country and play their part. The challenge in forming new states is in incorporating all the former factions into the newly independent political spectrum. They are usually intelligent men and women who have much to offer a fledgling nation.

Whether or not they choose to depends a lot on the level of rhetoric used against them in the run up to independence.

It also depends on whether the newly independent nation can ever bring itself to trust them, based on how vehemently they opposed independence as Unionists in the colonial regime.

What the Irish Result Means for Scotland & England

With the YES vote in Ireland and European Union integration back to full steam ahead, we are quite possibly living through the last days of UK sovereignty. Interestingly enough though, during these momentous times many UK nationalists can still be heard to argue that even though the UK should be independent from the EU, that Scotland should not from the UK.

The irony of this should not be lost on Scots.

England’s Future in the EU
The UK nationalist argument is that on the one hand Scottish nationalism is narrow-minded, parochial and a recent construction of the SNP, but that UK nationalism is ancient and noble and somehow the way things ought to be, despite it being entirely a creation of the years since 1707. The key to understanding this thinking is that most anti-EU UK nationalist arguments are in fact borrowed from Tory ideas of Englishness, and that almost all the UK’s anti-EU groups are also English. Englishmen are in effect trying to intellectualise what is in reality a visceral aversion to their absorption of English national identity into the EU international soup.




What will the Lisbon Treaty mean for the UK as it stands? If you want an idea of what will happen if Project EU is completed, look no further than Scotland’s history within the UK. The parallels with the UK's coming absorption into the EU collective are striking.

For some time before Union happened for Scotland, there was a loose form of union in place (regal Union in 1603). This generated much conflict with England, and serious doubts from both nations about whether to take it further. Then Scotland suffered from a financial disaster that almost bankrupted the country - the fallout of the failed Darien Expeditions in the late 1690s.

Sound familiar?

Eventually, after much heated debate and venting of spleens, England offered to compensate Scotland in return for incorporating union. The Scottish common people were utterly against it. Then a massive English campaign of pamphlets and propaganda was launched to get it over the line.

Sound familiar?

Daniel Defoe was an English agent in Scotland at the time and a key player. England spent big to bribe Scotland's political elites and, in the end, most of those who were against it changed their minds. Scotland was sold out and the Scottish parliament voted itself out of existence.

Full incorporating Union was then finally enacted, without a referendum, and against the wishes of the Scottish people. How do we know this was the case? The result was rioting in the streets of several Scottish cities.

Scotland’s sovereignty was lost but her national identity persisted stubbornly throughout the Union, during which time her political elites and much of her population threw their weight behind the British Imperial project which, as many Englishmen will admit, was heavily influenced by the Scots. In the 300 years since, Scotland was transformed beyond recognition as hundreds of thousands of Scots scattered themselves across the Empire as soldiers, governors, settlers and merchants. She entered the Union with a fifth of England’s population, and is threatening to leave with barely a tenth.

Her people helped found and populate many of the nations that grew out of the Empire. Conversely, most of her land at home is today under foreign ownership. That is the nature of junior partnership in an empire.

What does this mean for England? Her population stands today at 51.7 million, barely more than a tenth of the population of Europe. With this in mind, the question on the lips of many Englishmen is this: once we have lost our sovereignty, will our island location be enough to preserve what’s left of England’s national identity in a teaming sea of 499 million Europeans, or is our population destined for dilution and depletion as the English are scattered throughout Europe, and European migrants pour in?


Scotland and the EU
In Scotland, many Scots may be sorely tempted to say, “see how you like your own medicine”, but for us the baton change from Westminster to Brussels would be fairly straightforward. It will be something for which 300 years of union with England has prepared us. In reality, we are already part of the EU labour market, while receiving none of the benefits of direct membership. But will full membership of the EU be the best arrangement for an ‘independent’ Scotland?

Will it be a case of ‘out of the frying pan, into the fire’?

Personally, after independence I would prefer a transition period of about twenty years to get our house in order and enter Europe on our own terms - if ever, instead of joining as an oil-rich-but-penniless escapee from the financial basket case that is Britain today. Norway’s associate membership via the EEA and EFTA has allowed it to opt into European programs on its own terms, and – through its massive oil revenues – to build a $400billion sovereign fund, giving it one of the hardest currencies in the world (as the UK Govt predicted 35 years ago would happen in Scotland after independence) instead of propping up the Euro.

This is probably the best path for Scotland.

Unfortunately, from where we stand I don’t think EEA membership is something that can be sold to a cautious Scottish public, in whose collective mind the act of breaking away from London will be difficult enough, and for whom the idea of Brussels acts as a safety net. In other words, if we want to get Scottish independence over the line, the SNP policy of independence-in-Europe is the most likely way it will succeed.

Independence-in-Europe has long been SNP policy, and although I’ve recently had my reservations, I now realise that these will only play into the hands of those who wish to keep Scotland in the UK. Make no mistake: for those Scots unsure of independence, cold feet about the EU will not lead them to choose the alternative model of EEA/EFTA-style of Norwegian nationhood.

It will keep us locked in this godforsaken Union.

Europe may have its problems but, as the expenses scandal has clearly shown, these issues are dwarfed by the systemic venality of Westminster and Whitehall. And the suggestion of Tony Blair as EU president should be seen for what it is: a distraction. Removing the corrupting influence of London’s tentacles from Scotland should remain our top priority and can only be a Good Thing.

If the last few weeks of Irish referendum coverage have taught us anything, it’s that most EU scaremongering in the UK has been by disaffected English Tories and the English Tory media, watching as the last vestiges of their national identity – dressed up as the UK – disappear.

That same UK sovereignty has allowed the British parliament to control Scotland since 1707 and, not to put too fine a point on it, the game is up.

So it’s important for Scots not to be taken in by English Tory protests at the loss of UK nationality to the EU. As part of the UK, Scots have no nationality to lose. We already lost that three hundred years ago, and now it's time to take it back.

Norway offers us the model, but even direct membership of the EU is more than what we've got now, which is nothing.

Scotland: The Last Jewel in the Crown

George Monbiot is a thinker with a global perspective I like to follow, and he recently wrote an excellent piece on the long-term reasons for the Britain’s mounting woes. In summary, his scathing theory is that empire-less Britain has run out of foreign peoples willing to be exploited.

“The current political crisis has little to do with the expenses scandal, still less to do with Gordon Brown’s leadership. It arises because our economic system can no longer extract wealth from other nations,” he says.

It’s a plausible hypothesis, both academically honest and one that is sure to make uncomfortable reading for many of those who proudly call themselves British. Many who consider themselves Scots rather than British might take issue with it too, not only with Monbiot’s assertion that the metropolis has run out of colonies, but with his conclusion that the United Kingdom is the final stage of its disintegration. They might argue that – with Scottish independence a real possibility – the UK’s demise still has further to go, and that what remains of London’s imperial structure is now squarely focused on asset-stripping Scotland of her oil revenues while it still can.

The question is, are they right? Has Scotland become little more than a colony for the Southeast of England? Surely, with her own parliament, any argument for Scotland being a colony should now be dead. So what evidence is there for this outlandish claim? As one might expect, their argument hinges on the London’s relentless extraction of Scottish oil and gas wealth and its repeated refusal to reinvest a penny of this windfall back in Scotland. (1) This is a fact whether one agrees with the policy or not, but is it enough to justify calling Scotland a colony?

Most counter-arguments to the argument that Scotland is a colony are poorly thought out and predictable. “What rubbish!” the Scottish Unionist defiantly retorts. He (it’s usually a ‘he’) will tell you how well Scotland’s economy did from the Union (eventually, anyway, after the forty years of ensuing economic stagnation), and how many Scots achieved positions of power in the imperial apparatus which, he will be at pains to point out, was most certainly NOT exclusively English.

Indeed, the Scottish Unionist’s hackles can always be relied upon to rise when an Englishman lazily cites the imperial achievements of England. If the British nationalist (giving the Scottish Unionist his proper name) knows his history, he will explain to the patriotic Englishman that Scotland was in fact on the ‘executive committee’ of the Empire, and remind him politely of imperial power-wielders such as Henry Dundas, key colonial governors like Australia’s Lachlan Macquarie, accomplished military leaders such as Colin Campbell, and great explorers like Alexander MacKenzie, James Bruce and David Livingstone. Desperate to prove his British credentials to his fellow Brit, he will no doubt remind the yawning Englishman of the Thin Red Line at Balaclava, of Colin Campbell’s relief of Lucknow, of the Highlanders who gave Wolfe his victory in Quebec, and of the Lowlanders and Highlanders facing Napoleon as one at Quatre Bras. “Sure,” the Englishman will reply, glancing at his watch. “That’s all very well, but as far as the rest of the world is concerned, they were fighting for England.” And he would be right.

Explorers, governors, missionaries, bureaucrats, merchants, soldiers: this is the glorious (if anachronistic and irrelevant) imperial history to which the Scottish Unionist clings in his denial of Scotland’s need to be a nation in her own right. Having felt some pride in this imperial history myself, it’s hard not to feel at least some sympathy for his predicament: emotionally – and logically – it must be difficult to proudly and patriotically boast to Englishmen and foreigners of Scotland's imperial record, only to deny in your next breath that this pride is in any way nationalistic. Something doesn’t add up.

It’s because it is the rhetoric of the servant.

Scottish nationalists (as opposed to British nationalists - it's a matter of identity, not legitimacy) take a different tack. If anything, they say, Scotland’s magnificent imperial history only proves how far we have fallen, and that Scotland has become a colony since the end of Empire. Some scholars go even further, arguing that – regardless of our leadership role and the personal success of individual Scots in the Empire – Scotland became a colony the day the Treaty of Union was signed. They point to the forced nature of what was an incorporating Union (2), the broad patriotic character of the 1715 Jacobite Rising – following as it did hot on the heels of the Union (3), the expendable nature of the Highland regiments (4), the brutal persecution of Scottish nationalist radicals like Thomas Muir (5), the financing of the Sutherland Clearances from English industrial profits (6), the excessive Scottish war dead throughout the imperial period – including almost a fifth of Britain’s death toll of World War One (7), and Churchill using English soldiers against Scottish strikers in Glasgow in 1919. (8)

All fair points, diehard Unionists will say, balanced by the success Scots enjoyed as equal partners in the Empire. Many Scots may have suffered – as did many of those who Scots helped subjugate (9) – but enterprising Scots did very well from the Empire too.

Perhaps. The role of Scots throughout the imperial period is a complex one, and your opinion on it is probably as much a reflection of your perceived national identity as of your politics, or your opinion of empires in general. That the Scots were enthusiastic participants in colonisation – of our own people as well as others – is undeniable. Let’s just say that there were many shameful aspects in the roles of Scots in the Empire, which may be balanced by philanthropic and benevolent roles played elsewhere. Time and healthy debate will tell.

The problem is that whereas during the imperial period there was a semblance of balance between gain and loss, benefit and detriment, coloniser and colonised, today we see only Scotland’s exploitation. In addition to:

A. The continuing grand larceny of £32billion in tax revenues every year from Scotland’s oil (10), we also see:

B. The pre-meditated, concerted and sustained campaign by the British Government to conceal the true scale of Scottish oil revenues from the Scottish people, using consolidated national tax revenues and the rendering of key government documents ‘Secret’, only recently unearthed by FOI requests. (11)

C. The continuing adversarial attempt to control Scotland via a colonial Governor-General acting as ‘Scottish Secretary’ – in spite of Scotland supposedly having her own government (12),

D. The relocation of ALL British nuclear submarines to Scottish waters near Glasgow (13) – rendering it the principal target in the event of any nuclear strike,

E. The blatant attempt at manipulation of Scottish election results (14),

F. The attempt to dump toxic waste from London’s Olympics in Scotland (15),

G. The seizure of £150 million of Scottish charity money for the 2012 London Olympics – despite Scotland needing the cash for its own 2014 Commonwealth Games (16),

H. The appropriation of Scottish sportsmen and women as British when they succeed – while Englishmen can proudly compete as Englishmen without criticism (17), and

I. The tight control of the Scotland’s print media to deliver an endless subliminal stream of confidence-sapping and contradictory lies about her being better off as part of Britain and her non-viability as an independent state. (18)


Individually, each item may not in itself be sufficient to prove the point, but together they form a strong case that Scotland’s pocket-money parliament in Edinburgh has in fact changed little. Indeed, without any real power to defend the interests of Scotland and her people, it is largely symbolic. And try as they might, it is impossible for Scottish Unionists to blame any aspect of Scotland’s current economic woes on independence: any blame must lie squarely with the status quo, and our on-going membership of the United Kingdom. One well-timed announcement of a ‘saved’ defence contract does not a case for Union make. (19)

That’s why Monbiot is right when he connects the UK’s current troubles with the end of Empire. His only error is to see the process as over, and the lingering mini-Empire of the British state as the smallest unit of post-imperial disintegration. The reality is that the Empire is still alive and kicking, and that Britain’s decline still has one more step to go – the independence of Scotland.







References

(1) Tom Gordon, ‘Alex Salmond Fuels Flames of Oil Crisis,’ TimesOnline, June 1, 2008.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article4040115.ece?token=null&offset=0

Even the Calman Commission’s recent report recognised that 90% of British oil revenues belong to Scotland.
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/News/Releases/2009/06/calman

(2)The riots that occurred in 1707 in the streets of Scotland with English forces standing by at the border are testament to the forced nature of the Union (Magnus Magnusson, Scotland: The Story of a Nation, HarperCollins, London, 2000, p548), a fact which Scottish Unionists can only dismiss with bland statements such as ‘our leaders chose it.’ This is a disingenuous argument. If Scotland signed up for a voluntary union, then surely it is equally acceptable to leave it. And if she is part of a forced union, then why the Scottish Unionist pretence of friendly federalism? Which is it? If the 1320 Declaration of Arbroath was an assertion of the sovereignty of the Scottish people, then our leaders agreeing to the 1707 Act of Union was clearly a violation of this.
See Paul Henderson Scott’s excellent summary of the background to the Act in The Union of 1707: why and how?, The Saltire Society, Edinburgh, 2006.

(3) See Michael Lynch, Scotland: A New History, Pimlico, London, 1992, p328.

(4) As (later Major-General) James Wolfe wrote in his private letter to his friend William Rickson in June 1751:

“I should imagine that that two or three independent Highland companies might be of use; they are hardy, intrepid, accustomed to a rough country, and no great mischief if they fall. How can you better employ a secret enemy than by making his end conducive to the common good?”

This statement, as expressed by their eventual commander, clearly reveals the cold, expoitative calculation that lay behind the recruitment of Scottish Highland regiments into the British army post-Culloden, even though it was the Earl of Albemarle who was to eventually suggest the idea to William Pitt.
See Stephen Brumwell, Paths of Glory: The Life and Death of General James Wolfe, McGill-Queens University Press, Montreal, 2007, p123, 125

(5) For reading out a letter of support for Scottish independence from the United Irishmen, Thomas Muir was in 1793 given transportation for fourteen years to Botany Bay. In the letter, the United Irishmen rejoiced that ‘you do not consider yourselves as merged and melted down into another country, but that in this great national question you are still Scotland – the land where Buchanan wrote, and Fletcher spoke, and Wallace fought.’
See Kenneth R. Johnstone, ‘The First and Last British Convention,’ Romanticism, Edinburgh University Press, Vol. 13, No. 2, 2007, pages 104-105 & 114

(6) Some scholars argue that the first Duke of Sutherland in fact made a loss on the enormous personal investment he made in the destruction of Sutherland's Highland society, as if the failure of his financial venture somehow made him the victim.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/immig_emig/scotland/highland/article_6.shtml

(7) Murray G.H. Pittock, Scottish Nationality, Palgrave, New York, 2001, p103

(8) Some may say ‘so what?’, but can you imagine the English reaction to Scottish troops being used to quell political demonstrations on the streets of London, Leeds or Liverpool?
http://gdl.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/redclyde/redclyeve14.htm

(9) The Chinese, for example, suffered greatly from the opium trade, to which Scottish opium barons such as Sir James Matheson contributed significantly.
See Arthur Herman, The Scottish Enlightenment: The Scots’ Invention of the Modern World, HarperCollins, London, 2001, pages 342-3

(10) This uses an oil price of $60 a barrel, the price as of July, 2009. This is quite conservative, considering that just one year ago it reached $145/bbl.

http://www.nyse.tv/crude-oil-price-history.htm

(11) The best summary of this process is the recent BBC documentary Diomhair. I’ve given a link to part 1 below, but due to the BBC’s repeated attempts to prevent its availability via legal writ, this may not work after a while, so the best way to locate it is by a simple Google search on either YouTube or GoogleVideo.




(12) Eddie Barnes, ‘Role of Scottish Secretary Will Survive Reshuffle,’ Scotsman, September 28, 2008.
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/politics/Role-of-Scottish-Secretary-will.4535883.jp

(13) On May 6, 2009, Bob Ainsworth, Armed Forced Minister, announced to the British Parliament that the entire nuclear submarine fleet would be based in Scotland by 2017.
http://www.banthebomb.org/ne/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1158&Itemid=95

(14) Angus MacLeod, ‘Election Shambles Verdict: the voters lost,’ TimesOnline, October 24, 2007.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2726440.ece

(15) http://apps.sepa.org.uk/disclosurelogs/pdf/F0130268%20released%20correspondence.pdf

(16) Eddie Barnes, ‘Olympics robs Scots of Lottery cash,’ Scotland on Sunday, November, 23, 2008.
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/londonolympics2012/Olympics-robs-Scots-of-Lottery.4722417.jp

(17) Joan MacAlpine, ‘British if you win, Scottish if you lose,’ TimesOnline, July 5, 2009.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6637179.ece

(18) This humorous YouTube video is an excellent summary of the knots British Unionists get themselves into in their quasi-religious nationalist zeal for the British State:

(19) Daily Record, ‘Defence contract guarantees Clyde work for 15 years,’ July 2, 2009.
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2009/07/02/defence-contract-guarantees-clyde-work-for-15-years-86908-21489650/

Nine Ways to Stop Scotland Breaking Free

As Scotland’s minister for the Constitution, Mike Russell’s job is to deliver a successful independence referendum in late 2010. This will not be easy. In the second part of this series, we look at what he will be up against, and what tactics PM-to-be David Cameron might use to hold together what’s left of the remnant of Empire we call the UK of GB & NI.


Over the next two years, the fate of Scotland will be decided in the following three polls:


A. The next British General Election on or before June 3rd, 2010.

B. The planned referendum on Scottish independence, planned for late 2010, and

C. The next Scottish parliamentary elections on May 5th 2011 - if indeed there is still a devolved Scottish parliament by that date: if the above referendum goes ahead and is successful, there won’t be any more elections for a devolved Scottish parliament. The electoral cycle for a newly independent free and democratic Scotland will have begun.


Getting a referendum bill through the Scottish Parliament will be no easy matter. It will be met by the full arsenal of British Unionist resistance: the combined opposition of the British Unionist parties in Edinburgh (Labour, Tory and LibDem), the relentless pro-Union bias of the foreign-owned Scottish media, the death throws of the out-going Labour administration in London, the continued surreptitious spoiling tactics of Britain’s faceless minions in Whitehall, and the full might of the next Tory government at Westminster with its massive English majority.

But now that Labour is facing annihilation at the next British election, surely the task facing Scottish nationalists becomes simpler? Won’t there be a Scottish backlash against the Tories, once they take power at Westminster?

You would think so, but we can’t write off Labour yet. Their plan is to hang on long enough to fire off their last deadly Parthian shot: proportional representation in UK elections. With the prospect of at least a dozen years in power, the Tories will oppose it, but Gordon Brown (or his unelected Labour successor) will push it through as the only thing standing between his party and utter oblivion.

How will this affect Scotland? The referendum is the key, but with an impotent Tory administration in Westminster (as a result of a new PR system), there might not be the backlash against the Union that the SNP is counting on in the coming referendum.

The signs are indeed ominous, and Scottish nationalists might be getting a strong sense of déjà vu. Haven’t we been here before? For those too young to remember, current events bear more than a passing resemblance to 1979, with the SNP calling for the dissolution of the British parliament, Scotland being dragged down by the UK’s increasingly precarious finances, the IMF breathing down the British Government's neck, the Labour Party on the ropes, the Tories waiting in the wings of Westminster, and a referendum on Scottish nationalism in the pipeline.

When the '79 referendum was finally held, Scotland voted YES in a contrived question that would have granted an almost meaningless form of devolution, only to be told the answer was NO on a trumped-up technicality.

It was Europe that eventually forced London to concede real devolution to Scotland via another referendum in 1997 after – despite Tony Blair’s claims of spontaneous generosity – a secret group of Scottish nationalists had pointed out to Council of Europe diplomats that Brussels was in no position to dictate forms of democracy to Eastern Europe when those self-same forms were being denied within Scotland. London was promptly told to get its house in order. Quickly.

It was the supreme irony of Margaret Thatcher’s legacy. Having lobbied for full EU membership for the emerging democratic states of Eastern Europe (to counter attempts by the French-German axis to create a ‘United States of Europe’) her actions led to Scottish nationalists then using her success to seek the same levels of democracy, levels she had been so instrumental in preventing in Scotland.

So what can we expect this time around? Another loaded question in a fixed-up referendum? Twenty more wasted years? What tactics will the combined might of the British establishment use this time to hang on to Scotland for the few remaining years it needs to extract the last of her oil?

To answer this question, and to anticipate the desperate Unionist rearguard action about to be unleashed on Scotland, I’ve decided to put myself in David Cameron’s shoes - assuming he wins the next election. What follows is a step-by-step battle plan, ready to roll for the newly elected Prime Minister of this morally and financially bankrupt British state:

1. Announce English votes for English laws. This should head off English demands for devolution and act as a good band-aid for the inherent unfairness of England not having her own parliament.

2. Make ‘Respect for Scotland’ the Tory mantra north of the border. Buy off the Scottish elites and nationalist-leaning Scottish entrepreneurs with knighthoods and peerages. Move some of the nuclear subs from Scotland to ports in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Re-form the Scottish regiments. Divide et impere.

3. Strict Scottish media management. Control the flow of all non-internet information. Pull the plug on award-winning Newsnight Scotland. Encourage pseudo-intellectual Scottish writers to attack the idea of Alex Salmond’s ‘arc of prosperity’ while ignoring the stunning success story of Norway (1), the closest match to Scotland, and the complete meltdown that is UK Inc. Continue to support blanket pro-Union media coverage via the BBC and the Scottish press. Spoon-feed ‘lobby journalists’ with inside stories, ostracising any journalist – English or Scots – with nationalist leanings. Increase funding to BBC Scotland for pro-Union news and current affairs programming. This could never happen in England, but with Scotland’s well-established, anti-SNP, rabidly pro-Union press and media, it would be business as usual, with a new piper calling the tune.

4. Derail economic arguments for full Scottish independence. Avoid granting full fiscal autonomy, allowing instead the Calman Commission recommendations on Scottish government borrowing. Then go further and announce a fair share of all taxes raised on oil revenues will now be paid directly to Scotland, proportional to its current ratio of the UK population: 8.5%. (2) The nationalist Scottish Government will appear greedy as it condemns the niggardliness of the windfall while spending it on hospitals, roads and schools. The Scottish people will probably settle for this as an acceptable result, allowing the British Government keep the rest for IMF repayments, more London infrastructure, the Olympics and the replacement of Trident.

5. Form an unholy alliance with Labour in Scotland to get access to its up-and-running electoral fraud machine. They too will be playing an end game for their survival as a party, just as you will be for the British state. They will hope to stage a comeback from their old Scottish heartland, and will be willing to try almost anything. Imaginary Scottish Labour supporters voting for the Union in a referendum are better than real ones.

6. Once all this is in place, announce a British-run referendum on Scottish independence to take place before the Scottish Government one, with the pretext that you want to make sure it is run fairly, being such an important issue.

7. Make the referendum question loaded, something along the lines of: ‘Should Scotland break all ties and separate from the rest of Great Britain, or remain within the United Kingdom?’ YES – break all ties; NO – remain in the United Kingdom. The psychology of this is that most referendums tend to vote ‘No’, regardless of the issue, when it is contrived as a vote for the status quo. (3)

8. Hold the referendum on a work day or, even better, a holiday weekend so that the aged and unemployed – those currently dependent on British government handouts – will be over-represented, and more independent professional people will be too busy to vote, or away on holiday. (4)

9. Once the NO vote occurs – as it surely will if all these steps are taken – declare the matter of Scottish independence closed for a generation, at least until well past peak oil, when an asset-stripped Scotland can finally be cut loose.


In this way, despite the unprecedented levels of autonomy granted to Scotland, you, David Cameron, will still be able to claim that you are Prime Minister of a UK that includes the land and seas of Scotland. The UK will then retain its relative importance within Europe, its geopolitical importance in the world, and its seats on the UN Security Council, G8, and NATO, allowing you to continue with the myth that Britain is still a world power.(5)

This will also give your government continued access to 91.5% of Scotland’s oil revenues, essential if bankrupt Britain is to have any chance at all of paying off the unprecedented levels of debt accrued on the watch of your predecessor, the unelected Scottish Unionist Prime Minister, James Gordon Brown.





UPDATE
Brown signals end to ‘first past the post’ voting at Westminster



References

(1) “On the government's estimates, the [2009 Norwegian Government] surplus will more than halve as a share of GDP from 18.9% to 7.4%. That would still be a remarkably good outcome in comparison with the budgetary problems being faced in other European countries, although it is also dependent to some extent on the revised macroeconomic assumptions underlying the forecast.”
http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_id=13709932

(2) The current proportion of the UK population living in Scotland is 8.5%, taking Scotland’s latest population as 5,144,200, and the UK as 60,943,912.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/uk.html
http://www.scotland.org/about/fact-file/population/

(3) This has been the case in Australia, where the option for change has always been tied to the YES choice in any referendum. In this way only 8 out of 44 referendums have been carried since Federation in 1901.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referendums_in_Australia

(4) Labour tried this in Glasgow East in 2008 and still lost. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/glasgow_and_west/7522153.stm

(5) Jack Straw revealed the true value of Scotland to the UK during BBC Question Time, September 28 2006: “A broken-up United Kingdom would not be in the interests of Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, but especially not England. Our voting power in the European Union would diminish. We'd slip down in the world league GDP tables. Our case for staying in the G8 would diminish and there could easily be an assault on our permanent seat in the UN Security Council.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/5388078.stm

Scotland Independent by 1950

What would Scotland be like today if the Home Rule Bill had been passed on its second reading in 1913? It was a very close thing, only prevented by the outbreak of the carnage of the Great War.(1) If Home Rule had happened then - rather than 85 years later in 1998 - it is safe to assume that independence would have followed within forty years, say by 1948, fifty years before devolution was grudgingly granted.


Comparing the history of Scotland to that of independent European states over the past sixty years, what follows is an attempt to construct what an independent Scotland's history would have been, had this happened.

1. Scotland declares independence in 1948, a year after India. The general feeling in both England and Scotland is that with the Empire winding down, the Union has served its purpose. It joins the UN the same year, the Scottish member sitting between the representatives for the 3.9 million people of Saudi Arabia and 13.3 million of South Africa.

2. The Stone of Destiny is returned to Scotland after the independence celebrations. Scottish Police hold back the jubilant crowds as the stone is welcomed at the border. A piper welcomes it home to Arbroath Abbey.

3. Queen Elizabeth's second coronation takes place over the Stone of Destiny in a refurbished Palace of Holyrood in 1953. The Scottish Government celebrates the event with new blue 'E1R' letter boxes. The English press label it a stunt.

4. Scotland re-establishes its east coast burghs’ European trade contacts from the time of the Hanseatic League. On March 30th, 1956, mayors from Flemish towns take part in an emotional ceremony in Berwick to remember the Flemish merchants killed when Edward I of England ordered his men to slaughter all 17,000 men, women and children there 660 years before.

5. Scotland a signatory to the Treaty of Rome in 1957.

6. Edinburgh rapidly expands as the population and services around Scotland’s government grows there.

7. The Scottish government invests in Glasgow to give it a facelift. It loses its grim post-imperial waterfront to be reborn in the architectural style of Charles Rennie Mackintosh (See above). The Highlands complain that too much investment is happening in the south.

8. Reverse emigration begins and children and grandchildren of Scots who emigrated in the last decades of Empire return from around the world. Gaelic speaking grandchildren of Nova Scotian émigrés, speaking English with strange Canadian accents, begin to resettle the Highlands.

9. In a 1960 referendum, Berwick-Upon-Tweed votes to return to Scotland, motivated by the better social services, healthcare and free transport for the elderly to the north. Other English Border towns also threaten to secede for the same reason, much to the annoyance of the British parliament at Westminster.

10. Oil is discovered under Scottish waters in the 1960s. Scotland leaves the oil industry in private hands and the oil begins to flow as the American oil companies apply their open water extraction skills learned in the Gulf of Mexico.

11. Glasgow’s social deprivation from the last years of Union is largely cured by 1970.

12. A cod war with Iceland is averted in the 1970s when Scotland and Iceland come to a peaceful agreement on their sea borders.

13. British PM Ted Heath follows Scotland with what is left of Britain into full membership of the Common Market in 1973.

14. The rump British state is refused an IMF loan in 1975, due to its lack of collateral. It goes cap in hand to Europe for funds.

15. In 1978, Scottish football is made a laughing stock as the team is bundled out of the World Cup in the first round, after boasting they would win it.

16. Scotland has a referendum in 1979 and votes to leave the EEC, even though 51.6% of the electorate choose to remain. Under Scotland’s 1949 Constitution, 40% of the electorate need to vote ‘Yes’ for Scotland remain within external organisations. The 'Yes' vote cries foul.

17. Margaret Thatcher is elected PM of Britain in 1979 and presides over EEC investment – mainly French and German subsidies - to reinvigorate English and Welsh industry, concentrating on mining.

18. In 1981, Scots band Rusty Nail win the Eurovision Song Contest, narrowly beating English band Bucks Fizz. Their gimmick is for the two girls to pull off the two men’s kilts, revealing women’s underwear.

19. Using her new-found oil wealth, Scotland begins building a breathtaking program of infrastructure in the 1980s. Scotland is soon covered in an integrated modern network of roads, rail and ferry links, addressing Highland concerns about excessive centralisation. The A9 becomes the backbone of the road system, a three-lane superhighway from Edinburgh to Inverness, one of the safest roads in Europe.

20. Aberdeen and Inverness hit one million people by the year 2000. Oban, a thriving West Highland student city of 500,000, becomes the twin city of Bergen in Norway.

21. In the 1980s, Scotland becomes famous for its effortless transition from heavy engineering to high tech, fuelled by low corporate taxes and government relocation subsidies. Silicon Glen becomes an R&D and export phenomenon, unlike the cheap PC manufacturing facilities in England, which take advantage of its cheap labour.

22. In 1985, the Glasgow’s Mile’s Better campaign celebrates the city as one of the most beautiful in the world.

23. By 1990, oil revenues have given Scotland one of the hardest currencies in the world, and the Scottish pound becomes a safe haven currency, alongside Switzerland and Norway’s. (2)

24. A sovereign oil fund is created in 1990 to prevent successive Scottish Labour governments spending oil revenues on infrastructure Scotland no longer needs, and to keep inflation down. Despite this, Scotland is soon regarded as one of the most expensive places in the world, but not for the locals, who are paid in local currency and find everywhere else in the world ridiculously cheap. Scottish students become known throughout Europe for their annoying leather backpacks and free higher education.

25. Scottish unemployment drops to among the lowest in the western world, while the Scottish welfare state is the envy of Europe, with poverty almost non-existent.

26. By 2000, Scotland’s population reaches 7 million, having grown at the same pace as other similar size European countries since 1950, supplemented by extensive reverse emigration. (3)

27. In late 2008, a consortium of Scottish and Norwegian banks bails out Iceland, after the Welsh Prime Minister of Britain – known popularly as 'Flash' Morgan for his role in the credit crisis there – invokes anti-terrorism laws to seize Icelandic assets to protect British investors.

28. In 2009, Scotland shrugs off the credit crunch and the subsequent depression by dipping into its $326 billion sovereign oil fund, recently hit by the world economic downturn. (4)

I hope this gives at least some Scots an idea of how much their birthright has been stolen from them, and how much is at stake in the coming referendum.

Any resemblance to actual events or to persons living or dead is purely intentional.






References

(1) Murray G.H. Pittock, Scottish Nationality, Palgrave, New York, 2001, pages 100-102

(2) See http://www.oilofscotland.org/

(3) Norway – from 3.2 million to 4.6 million; Denmark – from 4.3 to 5.3 million; Sweden – from 7 million to 9 million; Portugal – from 8.4 million to 10.7 million.

(4) This is the current balance of the Norwegian Sovereign oil fund, which is spread across a mixed portfolio of ethical investments. Twenty nine corporations are barred from receiving any of the funds.
http://www.swfinstitute.org/fund/norway.php

Open Letter to MI5 and Special Branch re: Scotland

A. To the English Bosses of MI5 & Special Branch's Scottish Operations:

How are you today? Busy week at the office? Looking forward to a relaxing Sunday browsing the papers? Off to church later on?

I have couple of questions for you.

How often have you wondered why certain Scots proclaim their Britishness far more than the English?

Seriously, how much of a prat do you think the PM is? How much is he driven by the desire to strut the world's stage, to cement his legacy for posterity, and by the fight for his political survival at the next election?

Does he even care about England?

Truly, how much loyalty do you feel you owe him and his party after they tried to fit you up for the dodgy dossier on Iraqi WMD?

On the other hand, do you honestly believe that Scottish nationalists are bad people? Are you aware that some members of the SNP are English born, while others have served in the armed forces?

Aren’t English and Scottish independence simply ideas about fairness, democracy and identity?

So why do you feel the need to have your field resources monitor, undermine and discredit Scottish nationalists? Is it really worth your while running interference on Scottish independence, when it’s something more and more English want every day?

Won't what you're doing to derail Scottish independence only sour future relations between our two nations?  England and Scotland can look forward to having more in common than most other nations - a shared language, the same royal family, and stirring fireside stories about how we ran an Empire together.

Will England not need all the friends she can get?

Being a Scottish nationalist does not mean that I hate England. Only that I love Scotland, just as you love England, and that we now wish to manage our own affairs.

Without self-serving prats like Gordon Brown lording it over us both.

B. To the Scots involved in MI5 & Special Branch's Scottish Operations:

There is probably not much I can say to convince you to let Scottish independence run its course.

You are probably consumed with a visceral hatred of Alex Salmond and the SNP.

You sincerely believe your job to be threatened by Scottish independence, and sometimes feel as if you are fighting for your career, your reputation, your pension, your very professional existence.

And you feel under constant pressure to prove your loyalty to your controller and/or station chief.

Sound about right?

Now, I’m probably not too far off the truth in saying there aren’t too many MI5 resources allocated to monitoring the English independence movement just yet. In fact, many English men and women in MI5 probably share a secret sympathy for it. They probably feel in their hearts – without even realising it – that English independence would probably be the only legitimate way to break up Britain, when England is good and ready.

So ask yourself this: how many English men or women have you met who harbour the same visceral hatred of the English independence movement as you do for the Scottish version? Not many?

Why is that?

Scottish independence will almost certainly happen, sooner or later, regardless of how you are ordered to slow it down. And then Scotland will have its own intelligence service, cooperating on a daily basis with our English colleagues on international terrorism and security.

So remember this, next time you are asked to gather information on Scottish nationalists, provide dummy explosives to radical activists, or help rig a by-election:

1. Scotland will need experienced intelligence officers with good contacts in Thames House who know how to set up a state security apparatus.

2. You could play a valuable role in establishing it.

3. Scotland and England will have the same enemies.

4. Your career is not dependent on the structural integrity of Britain.

5. The Scottish security services will still swear loyalty to the Queen.

Over to you.

Is Salmond Up To It?

Compare if you will the Ireland of 1798 to that of 1920. Or the India of 1857 with 1947. The rebellions on the earlier dates (1798 & 1857) were doomed to fail, taking on a British Empire at the peak of its power. The latter dates (1920 & 1947) were the culminations of successfully orchestrated struggles, using concerted colony-wide campaigns of obstruction and resistance to disable Britain’s ability to rule each region.

Both colonies were ultimately successful at gaining independence, although by very different means. Both of Ireland’s rebellions were violent. In contrast, after the suppression of the 1857 rebellion, Indians realised they could not leave the Empire by force of arms and eventually adopted Gandhi’s policy of non-violent resistance.

In contrast, the successful twentieth century rebellions were both begun while Britain was engaged in fights for its very existence.

This is again the case today.

Britain is now undergoing the worst financial disaster in its history. Its self-appointed political super-class has managed to mire the pseudo-state in unprecedented and almost unimaginable levels of debt. Its banking system is falling apart at the seams with a run expected on sterling, hyperinflation a possibility, and talk of the IMF intervening.

Make no mistake, Britain is on the ropes.

If there ever was a right time for Scotland to walk out of this Union, this is surely it.

The question is this: is Alex Salmond is up to the task of leading her out?

Because if Whitehall tries to delay, prevent, annul, or nobble Scotland’s independence referendum - as it almost certainly will - there may well be a groundswell of popular democratic outrage, but if the moment is not seized, the opportunity will be missed altogether.

We all know Alex loves a curry, but is he up to being Scotland’s Gandhi?

The Accidental UK

I often wonder how Britain would have turned out today if certain world events had not gone quite the way they did. Because, as any historian will tell you, history is most definitely not a long sequence of predictable outcomes. Rather, it is a series of throws of the dice, random results and accidents, every one of which could have gone a very different way, with vastly differing consequences for all subsequent events.

The historical record is in fact littered with moments where something utterly different, or the exact opposite – or nothing at all – could just as easily have happened.

So for a bit of fun, I thought I might try my own hand at counter-factual history. It’s what no serious historian will admit to doing but for many it's an obsession. The idea behind it is this: if history is all one long inexorable progression of inevitable facts and dates, how come no one actually knows what’s going to happen next? Just as random things happen today, events in the past could equally well have had many outcomes.

The relevance for all you budding English and Scottish nationalists out there - or indeed for any political activist - is this: if you can’t see all the possible outcomes at certain key historical turning points, how on earth can you recognize the possibilities that lie right in front of you at this very moment?

For me, this is what makes history interesting.

Take, for example, the Spanish Armada: if it had avoided the storm, dealt with the English fire-ships and allowed Parma to mount a successful Spanish invasion of England in 1588, England might well have reverted to Catholicism after its brief flirtation with Protestantism. The plantation of Ulster would never have happened, the Americas could have become entirely Spanish and Catholic(1), regal union with Scotland would not have occurred in 1603, and England would have been divided religiously from Protestant Scotland instead of Catholic Ireland.

Or had the wind that held the French fleet off the Irish coast turned, allowing them to land at Bantry Bay in December 1796, it might easily have led to a successful French invasion(2), sparking an Irish rebellion two years earlier than 1798 and possibly the end to British rule in Ireland, which would have had a republic 125 years earlier, a base for any subsequent French war with Britain, and the Peace of Amiens might have held.(3) Napoleon might have died in his sleep in Paris as an old man.

Or if General Lee’s strategic intentions had not been discovered via his lost Special Order No. 191, the South’s invasion of the North might then have been an enormous success, the traumatised Northern population would have sued for peace and the South would have won the Confederate War of Independence. Lincoln's war to save the Union would have failed, and the Confederacy would have become the independent CSA with a slave-based cotton economy.(4) With the defeat of the American democratic experiment, US General Sheridan would not have toured Germany in 1870 to advise the Germans on how to wage total war on the French(5) , the French would not have thirsted for revenge for 44 years, the catastrophe of WW1 might have been averted, and Martin Luther King would not have been demanding civil rights in 1963, but an end to slavery.

As for Britain, if the South had won, the electoral franchise would probably not have been extended in the wake of the US Civil War. Patriotic British historians like to dispute this, arguing that Lincoln’s victory had minimal influence on Britain’s own idea to extend the franchise with the Reform Act of 1867.(6) However, the evidence strongly suggests that with their powerful pro-Confederate bias, Britain’s ruling landowning classes would have liked nothing better than to see American popular democracy crushed.(7) A year after Appomattox in April 1866, future Prime Minister William Gladstone recognised the true significance of the victory:

“The one single and important point of the effect that has been produced in America by a largely-extended population franchise [is] …the wonderful…almost incredible effect that has been produced by that system of giving expression to the national will…we ought to… appropriate the lessons.”(8)

And without the vote of the working class, Keir Hardie would have had no reason to form the Labour Party.(9)

And if in 1914 General Oskar Potiorek had remembered to tell Archduke Ferdinand’s driver of the change of route, they would have avoided the assassin Gavrilo Princip, who had given up waiting for them and was having a sandwich.(10) There would have been no assassination, no ultimatum, and the First World War might easily have been avoided. With Britain not distracted by war, there would have been no Easter Rising in Dublin. Neither would there have been a Russian Revolution, a lost generation, German hyperinflation, a Nazi Party, and the British Empire might have lasted another hundred years.

The British parliament might also have passed the first Scottish Home Rule Bill of 1913, already approved on its first reading.(11) Instead, in the rush to war it was forgotten and, rather than getting a devolved Scottish parliament within the Imperial British state on the edge of a peaceful Europe, Scotland saw 110,000 of her sons sent to their deaths in the trenches, nearly 20% of Britain’s war dead.(12)

A sobering thought, and something to think about for those who think Scottish nationalism is a recent reaction to the discovery of oil.

There is also something here to ponder for those who think there is something special, noble, pre-ordained, planned or sacred in the structure of the United Kingdom today. As we have seen, history shows it to be little more than a series of ad hoc reactions to historical accidents - which will continue to happen - and that the current political structure has no more legitimacy than any other.

Notes

(1) Geoffrey Parker, “The Repulse of the English Fireships: the Spanish Armada Triumphs, August 8, 1588”, in What If?, Pan, London, 1999, pages 139-154

(2) It was a significant French invasion force of 15,000 troops. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Rebellion_of_1798

(3) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Amiens

(4) Harry Turtledove’s Timeline-191 novels deal with this perfectly plausible scenario, and extend the timeline as far as WW1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline-191

(5) When the French defeat at Sedan in 1870 did not lead to expected cessation in hostilities from the French people, US General Sheridan gave the following advice to Bismarck: “The proper strategy consists in inflicting as telling blows as possible on the enemy’s army, and then in causing the inhabitants so much suffering that they must long for peace, and force the government to demand it. The people must be left nothing but their eyes to weep with over the war.” As the record shows, Bismarck subsequently followed Sheridan's advice.

Henry R. Winkler, Review of ‘Heard Round the World: The Impact Abroad of the Civil War,’ in The Journal of American History, 56, 2. Sep.1969, pages 388-389

(6) A typical denial is found in David M. Potter, Political Science Quarterly, 86, 2, June 1971, p288.

(7) Dean B. Mahin, One war at a Time: The International Dimensions of the American Civil War, Brasseys, Dulles VA, 2000, pages 25-26

(8) From H.R. Allen,‘Civil War, Reconstruction and Great Britain,’ in Heard Round the World: The Impact Abroad of the Civil War, Harold Hyman (ed.), Knopf, New York, 1969, p48

(9) In 1888 Keir Hardie helped form the Scottish Labour Party (no connection with the Unionist lapdogs of today), whose party president was the socialist Robert Cunninghame-Graham, who went on to found the National Party of Scotland, forerunner to the SNP. In 1893 Hardie then helped form the Independent Labour Party in England. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keir_Hardie

(10) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gavrilo_Princip

(11) Murray G.H. Pittock, Scottish Nationality, Palgrave, New York, 2001, pages 100-102

(12) Pittock, p103

Whatever It Takes

Lately I’ve been watching the British news with what can only be described as morbid fascination. Will the rump of the Empire survive its present woes, or are we witnessing the death throws of the artificial construct that is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland? I’m not the first to ask this question: political commentators, investment analysts and historians (1) have been predicting Britain’s inevitable demise for decades. My goal here is to summarise the political forces for both cohesion and disintegration, and to speculate on how the existing British state might counter these political threats to its existence. 

The array of constitutional forces tearing at the fabric of the British state is truly staggering. At one end of the tug-o-war are limbering up the combined forces of disunity – the movements for English (2), Scottish (3) and Welsh (4) independence. Two of the team members have a youthful, steely demeanour, but are wary of the third whose heart does not seem in it. At the other end of the rope are three middle-aged men. One is muttering about the need for English votes for English laws (5), another is an academic type arguing about the case for a devolved English parliament within Britain (6), while the third is a Unionist Scot, pleading with the others to pull harder in a celebration of British identity. He falls silent when he realises the others are not listening.(7)

English demands for change are of course being whipped up by elements of her right wing press, outraged at having to foot the bill for subsidy-scrounging Scots (8) and bailing out her banks.(9) The motivation for these articles would seem to be to sell newspapers, but their half-baked arguments cut no ice with Scottish nationalists, who are all well versed in the facts: it’s a long time since ‘Scottish’ Banks were Scottish run, and tax earned on Scottish oil revenues has subsidised England for 35 years to the tune of £250billion ($360billion).(10) Indeed, the dependence of Britain on Scotland’s oil was stripped bare during the Grangemouth strike of 2008.(11) The irony is that these anti-Scottish rants play right into the hands of Scottish nationalists, who I sometimes think must be behind the stories themselves, causing as they do so many pro-Union Scots to question how much common cause they have with Englishmen. If nothing else, independence would certainly end all debate about who’s sponging off whom.

Should it happen, it would be a traumatic event for British Unionists to see Scotland go, and for several reasons. I believe their fear has four distinct components: loss of identity, loss of personal income, loss of status, and fear of change. All four anxieties scream in unison in the Unionist politician. You can hear the hate and fear rising in the throat of British PM Gordon Brown when he says he will do “whatever it takes” to preserve the Union.(12) Ominous stuff, but what does he mean? Just what is he prepared to do?

An intriguing factor is the correlation between the survival instincts of the Labour Party and the British state: should Scotland become independent, Labour is almost certainly facing political oblivion for a generation in Little Britain, if not for good. You can be sure Labour party strategists understand exactly what is at stake and have not been complacent: key by-election results have been rigged (13), and attempts to reform the electoral system are routinely ignored or headed off, with proportional representation kept in reserve as a rearguard action.(14)

As for the Tories, the stench of desperation is absent. They seem much more ambivalent to the prospect of an independent Scotland, probably because they stand to hold power for many years if Scotland goes its own way. And although Eton Rifle (15) and PM-in-waiting David Cameron has also stated he will do “everything in his power” to preserve the Union, personal ambition has a lot to do with his stance. “I want to be PM of the whole UK!” he announced recently, sounding more like a spoilt child stamping his feet in the toy department of Harrods than a statesman.(16) I suspect Cameron’s sentiment is closer to that of middle England than Brown’s cornered rat snarl. You get the sense that Cameron will do anything as long as it’s legal, whereas Brown will simply do anything. You can see Cameron’s point too, or at least his thinking. How could Little Britain continue to tell others how to run their affairs? And what about her status on the international stage (17), and her seat at the UN Security Council?

So much for the politicians, but what about Whitehall? Just how far would the state machinery go to save UK Inc? You can bet your soon-to-bottom dollar that the Whitehall minions know exactly where they stand should Scotland go her own way, and though I would be surprised if they stand back and let it happen, I would, however, be astonished if force is used to keep her. Yes, it would secure what is left of the oil reserves for London, but as a strategy it would be too stupid and too obvious for words, laying the foundations for a British civil war that would take generations to put out. England, land of cricket, fair play and twitching curtains, doing the dirty on her former partner in Empire, with the world watching on? I just can’t see it happening.

No, the most likely outcome is that the unelected faceless monolith of the Whitehall civil service and the UK security services will continue to work the old ways, using every underhand clandestine trick in the book, carefully deployed over time to sap the Scottish will for independence. Whitehall was certainly complicit when the true extent of Scottish oil revenues was suppressed in 1975 to avoid stoking the nationalist fires.(18)

Frustrating Scottish independence would also appear to be within the remit of MI5’s Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure.(19) MI5 is known to have infiltrated the SNP in the 1950s (20), and has played a active part in the fostering of independence movements in the Orkneys and Shetlands since the 1970s, however unsuccessfully.(21) The political infiltration and interference will no doubt continue, but I seriously doubt there will be a return to the heavy-handed tactics of the 1980s and the assassination of a key Scottish nationalist by Special Branch(22):

On the other hand, given that the British government has done its best to deny it ever happened, and the fact that the agents are probably still on the payroll, anything is possible.

The bottom line is that Whitehall will have its hands full over the next few years, with or without Scottish independence. Even if it manages to remain intact politically, Britain is about to endure a barrage of economic woes: depression, hyper-inflation (23) and the collapse of sterling (24) are widely predicted. And should Scotland become independent – even if hyperinflation could be avoided and sterling saved – the rump state of Britain would be an impoverished shadow of its former self, stripped of any means to repay the truly gigantic national debt that has been accrued.(25)

Or would it? Perhaps the mandarins of Whitehall have already seen the writing on the wall. They would seem to be planning for every eventuality: in the event the Scots do break free, the Scotland-England sea border has been surreptitiously relocated north, moving many formerly Scottish oil and gas fields into English waters.(26)

Sir Humphrey likes to hedge his bets, you have to give him that.

Notes

(1) As the historian Norman Davies said in 1999, ‘I happen to belong to a minority who hold that the breakup of the United Kingdom may be imminent.’ See Davies, The Isles, Oxford, 1999, p1053

See also Tom Nairn, The Break-Up of Britain: crisis and neonationalism, London, 1977

(2) For the movement for English independence see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_independence

(3) Currently scheduled for late 2010. Should either Holyrood opposition parties or Westminster either sabotage it or prevent it from taking place, a free and fair referendum will become the central issue in the Scottish election the following year. See http://www.snp.org/issues/manifestos/holyrood

(4) Welsh independence does not seem as popular as the the English and Scottish varieties. http://www.politics.co.uk/briefings-guides/issue-briefs/legal-and-constitutional/welsh-independence-$366564.htm

(5) English votes for English laws’: See Alan Cochrane, ‘Devolution gives English votes for English laws’, Daily Telegraph, Dec 13, 2008 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/3643053/Devolution-gives-English-votes-for-English-laws.html

(6) Even left wing intellectuals have recognised the case for an English parliament as a democratic necessity. George Monbiot, ‘Someone Else’s England,’ Guardian, Feb 2, 2009. http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2009/02/17/someone-elses-england

(7) Patrick Wintour, “Brown: Remembrance Sunday should become ‘British Day’”, Guardian, January 14, 2006, https://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2006/jan/14/britishidentity.labour

(8) The Daily Express is a good example, stirring up discontent in middle England. See Jimmy Young, ‘Cameron Must Rally England in Revolt Against Scottish Perks,’ Daily Express, Aug 12, 2007.

Those in power have not been shy in pandering to this sentiment. See Gerri Peev, ‘London “Subsidising Scots Lifestyle”, says Livingstone,’ Scotsman, June 7 2006

(9) For example, Dominic Lawson’s intolerant rant: ‘A Sorry Tale of Scottish Shame – and English Tolerance,’ Independent, Feb 17, 2009

(10) The figures at http://www.oilofscotland.org/ depend on whether you consider the oil to be Scotland’s. But as Ken Livingstone, former Lord Mayor of London, has said, “It’s most probably true that Scotland subsidises the rest of Britain if you take into account a classic international law interpretation of who the oil belongs to.” Quoted from Magnus Linklater, ‘Before you start laying into those subsidy junkies . . .: Defending the Scots against English bile,’ TimesOnline, June 27, 2007

(11) ‘Strike to Close Key Oil Pipeline,’ BBC, April 25, 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/7366367.stm

(12) Patrick Hennessy, ‘Brown Won’t Let Union Split,’ Daily Telegraph, May 10, 2008

(13) Jill Sherman, “Massive voting reform needed to block fraud loopholes”, TimesOnline, August 17, 2008.

A public enquiry has also been launched into the disappearance of the Glenrothes electoral register, which would have shown who actually voted in the by-election of Nov 08. See Robbie Dinwoodie, ‘Demand for enquiry as Glenrothes by-election register is lost,’ Herald, Feb 4, 2009.

(14) Peter Facey, ‘Electoral Reform after the Review: where now?’, Jan 25, 2008 http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/2008/01/25/electoral-reform-after-the-review-where-now/

(15) A youth military cadet group at the famous school. Cameron was a member of this group at Eton, and even likes the song by the Jam, much to the disbelief of Paul Weller. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eton_Rifles

(16) David Cameron, “I Would Govern Scots With Respect,’ Scotland on Sunday, Feb 8, 2009

(17) Jack Straw, govt MP: ‘Our voting power in the European Union would diminish. We'd slip down in the world league GDP tables. Our case for staying in the G8 would diminish and there could easily be an assault on our permanent seat in the UN Security Council.’ Quoted from ‘Jack Straw Q & A,’ BBC Question Time, Sept 28, 2006.http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/5388078.stm

(18) Ben Russel & Paul Kelbie, ‘How black gold was hijacked: North sea oil and the betrayal of Scotland,’ Independent, Dec 9, 2005. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/how-black-gold-was-hijacked-north-sea-oil-and-the-betrayal-of-scotland-518697.html

(19) MI5’s Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure has the authority to ‘protect national security by helping to reduce the vulnerability of the national infrastructure to terrorism and other threats’ (my emphasis). The nature of these ‘other threats’ is not stated. https://www.cpni.gov.uk/about

(20) See Marc Horne, ‘Files prove that MI5 spied on SNP’, Scotland On Sunday, September 16, 2007.

(21) Magnus Linklater & George Rosie, 'Secret Plan to Deprive Independent Scotland of North Sea Oil Fields,' TimesOnline, Feb 14, 2009

(22) The suspicious circumstances surrounding the murder even reached pro-Labour govt tabloid Daily Record, probably as a swing at Margaret Thatcher: Reg Mckay, ‘The McRae Mystery,’ Daily Record, Oct 19, 2007.
 https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/special-reports/crimes-that-rocked-scotland/2007/10/19/the-mcrae-mystery-86908-19978476/

(23) Heather Stewart, ‘Bank of England governor paves way for “quantitative easing”’ Guardian, January 20, 2009. Various market forecasters have predicted this will end in hyperinflation. For example: https://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article7526.html

 

(24) Graham Tibbetts, “Gordon Brown risks 'collapse of sterling' says George Osborne”, Daily Telegraph, Nov 15, 2008

(25) Ashley Seager and Nicholas Watt, ‘Bailouts add £1.5 trillion to Britain's public debt,’ Guardian, Feb 20, 2009, https://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/feb/20/public-debt-gordon-brown

(26) In 1999, several hundred square miles of Scottish territorial waters were quietly moved into English jurisdiction by a private Westminster committee vote. No vote was taken in the house. See Craig Murray "Scotland/England Maritime Boundaries", https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/01/scotlandengland-maritime-boundaries/