Is Obama Decoupling Israel?

Alphen, Netherlands. 5 March. The great historian A.J.P. Taylor once said of Winston Churchill, “If he could not do something effective, he would do something ineffective”.  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu clearly has a similar view of President Obama and the latter’s efforts to secure a permanent P5+1 treaty with Iran that would prevent Tehran arming itself with nuclear weapons.  In what was a brazen intervention into US politics, and a deliberate snub to President Obama, Netanyahu warned the US Congress Tuesday that any permanent deal with Iran “could pave Iran’s path to the bomb”.  Netanyahu’s high-risk gambit was clearly a brazen attempt to boost his political standing prior to the 17 March Israeli elections.  Equally, his Washington intervention not only shows the extent to which the world views of Netanyahu and Obama diverge, but a dangerous fragility in the US-Israeli “strategic partnership”, and at a dangerous moment. Certainly, an imperfect agreement would tip the balance of power in the Middle East at several levels, a prospect that worries the Saudis just as much as the Israelis.

In May 1976, shortly after President Carter had taken office, senior State Department official Leslie Gelb wrote that the deployment of Cruise and Pershing missiles to Europe would create a Eurostrategic balance and thus have the effect of decoupling the US strategic arsenal from the defence of Europe.  Consequently, the credibility of the US strategic deterrent would be reduced and with it US extended deterrence of Soviet aggression.  Europeans also worried that as the Americans closed in on a warhead-limiting SALT 2 treaty with the Soviet Union the US nuclear deterrent would be further decoupled from the defence of Europe. Such an aim was clearly part of Soviet strategy at the time and the European Allies were particularly concerned by Washington negotiating over Europe's security with Moscow, and yet over their collective heads.  Netanyahu’s Washington speech echoes those concerns.

Netanyahu’s view of Obama is also reminiscent of then West German Helmut Schmidt’s view of President Jimmy Carter. A March 1977 editorial in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung said, “Bonn is concerned that Jimmy Carter is a man ruling the White House whose moral and religious convictions are incompatible with the demands of world politics”.  Contrast that with what Netanyahu said of the proposed P5+1 treaty, “We’ve been told that no deal is better than a bad deal. Well this is a bad deal, a very bad deal. We’re better off without it”.  

Netanyahu’s world-view is that one only deals with states such as Iran through strength and enforced denial.  Netanyahu’s fear is that as Obama approaches the end of his presidency he will become ever more focused on his legacy. And, that consequently, Obama might agree an imperfect nuclear deal with Iran over Israel’s head from which Iran could defect with relative ease and face little effective sanction. 

The Iranian negotiators seem to be betting on the same outcome.  In the Geneva talks they are negotiating particularly hard (the Iranians are hard negotiators) over on-site inspections and the extent and scope of the verification regime at the heart of the proposed treaty.  Their tactic seems to be based on the apparent hope that as time runs out on the Obama presidency the Americans would concede sufficient ground to enable Iran to continue clandestine development of an Iranian bomb. 

There are of course differences between Israel in 2015 and Europe in the late 1970s.  Back then the Soviet Union threatened the destruction of Continental North America. Iran could not possibly hope to strike America with a first generation nuclear capability.  However, given Iran’s missile arsenal  Tehran, at least in theory, could attack America’s allies, either in the region or in Europe.

Furthermore, Israel has some 450 nuclear warheads in its arsenal at Dimona as an independent guarantee against attack. Like the British and French nuclear systems the Israeli nuclear capability is designed as much to tie the Americans in as keep the Iranians out. And, although the US and Israel do not share the kind of formal commitments to nuclear deterrence and defence as those between Washington and its European allies, there is an implicit understanding that the US will afford Israel extended nuclear deterrence.  That implicit agreement is the ‘strategic’ in the US-Israeli strategic partnership to which Netanyahu referred.

However, an imperfect P5+1 permanent treaty could permit Iran to suddenly break-out of its commitment and announce to the world that it did indeed possess the capability to destroy the State of Israel.  If that happened much of Israel’s (and indeed America’s) conventional military capability in the region would be instantly stalemated.  Moreover, Tehran would have successfully crafted the strategic and political space to continue with its hybrid, proxy war against Israel, Saudi Arabia, and by extension decisively tip the balance of power in the Middle East.

Therefore, for all Netanyahu’s politicking in Washington this week he does have a strategic point.  A P5+1 treaty with Tehran, and any subsequent easing of economic sanctions, must be linked to a change in Iran’s regional strategy.  Netanyahu fears that Obama will focus instead on a narrow, rules-based approach and simply concentrate on the modalities of the proposed treaty without linking a final agreement to a shift in Iran’s wider foreign and security policy behaviour.

In 1975 Amos P. Jordan, the US Principal Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Affairs, wrote, “The thing that is troubling our European allies in particular is not our military capability but what they perceive to be shaky coherence and national unity which may make it impossible to use those military capabilities. It is the credibility of our commitment, not the existence of our commitments or the strength of our forces that is the doubt in their minds”.  These concerns were also held in Europe.  On August 20, 1978, The Economist wrote, “Some Europeans have always doubted whether the Americans would fight a nuclear war for Europe; and even the trusters are beginning to think that what might have been true when the United States had a commanding lead [in nuclear capability] is not necessarily true now”. 

Some say Netanyahu over-played his political hand in Washington this week. Given Israel's precarious strategic situation it is hard if not impossible for an Israeli leader ever to over-play a political hand given the possible alternative. Iran clearly has its own strategic interests as do all states and they must be respected. Equally, such interests remain driven by Tehran's determination to destroy Israel to confirm Iran's regional-strategic dominance. Therefore, whilst the Obama Administration has tended to emphasise an America that speaks softly, and not without effect, Washington must never forget its big stick.  Indeed, when it comes to matters nuclear it is always better to do something effective than something dangerously ineffective.

Of course, Tel Aviv's ultimate deterrent is that for all the current friction with Washington Israel enjoys something the British, for example, do not enjoy - a real Special Relationship with America. Any decoupling would only ever happen by mistaken strategic calculation and it is that which clearly worries Netanyahu.   

Julian Lindley-French

Putin’s Nemesov?

Alphen, Netherlands. 2 March. What does the murder of Boris Nemtsov’s murder mean for Russia and Europe’s security? A few years ago I met Nemtsov at an event in Geneva.  Unfailingly courteous, even self-deprecating, he was highly-intelligent and offered a fascinating glimpse into a better Russia, a different Russia.  Indeed, my impressions of the man and his ideas suggested that his great country still had a real chance of transitioning from autocracy to democracy, and through that transition, Europe could finally become whole, free, and at peace. 

Sadly, all that Nemtsov stood for was blown away on Friday by four bullets in his back - the cynical act of that other, all-too cynical Russia.  Many are blaming President Putin.  However, this is simply not his style, and is in any case far too close to home.  Why murder a leading opposition figure on the approach road to the Kremlin?  It is pure speculation on my part but it is more likely to have been the deed of the now-multiple ultra-nationalist groups that stalk Russian politics.  Well to the right of even President Putin such groups have tentacles that reach far into the so-called Siloviki, the security apparatchiks who run an increasingly powerful security state.  

The other day I had dinner with Putin opponent Mikhail Khordokovsky, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linus Linkevicius, Slovak Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajcak, former Swedish Prime and Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, and NATO Deputy Secretary-General Alexander Vershbow. Now, I am not at liberty to reveal the content of our discussion (and I will not).  However, I was struck by Khordokovsky’s concern for and about his Motherland.  Indeed, having listened to Khordokovsky I tore up my prepared remarks and put it bluntly to the gathered dignitaries; Europe’s strategic vacation is over, all the comforting self-absorbed assumptions about peace, stability and security we Europeans have clung to since the end of the Cold War will be torn up over the next decade…and Russia will do much of the tearing.

You might say my motivation was fairly obvious given the tragedy in Ukraine.  However, I was also driven to speak by the unworldliness of Western European politicians in particular.  Too many of them seem to believe that what is happening TO Russia, and what is happening IN Ukraine, is unfortunate, but remains a side-show to the ‘real’ issues of debt and ‘Europe-building’.  In fact, what is happening in Russia is extremely dangerous and concerns us all.  This weekend here in the Netherlands Gary Kasparov, the former Russian chess master, said that President Putin regards the West as weak and divided. He is of course right.  However, what is not understood is just how weak and divided Russia is itself, and just how dangerous such divisions are for Europe’s security. 

When he started his third term in office in 2012 President Putin set out to fulfil three parallel and connected strategic missions: to centralise power on the President’s office via the National Security Council; to marginalise all opposition to his rule; and to re-establish Russian influence over the states on Russia’s so-called ‘near abroad’, be they EU/NATO members or not.  Most commentators have assumed that the primary mission is the re-establishment of Russia’s influence over its ‘near abroad’.  In fact, President Putin is using that mission, and the appeal to nostalgic Russian patriotism it generates, to justify absolute control over the sprawling Russian state apparatus and, by extension, Russian society.  To President Putin the need for a stable Russia on his terms is far more important than a free Russia on our terms.

It is in that context that Nemtsov and his supporters have been portrayed as a threat to the Kremlin, because Nemtsov espoused the kind of European civil society which would see a Russia emerge that would indeed be on our liberal democratic terms.  It should be noted that in Ukraine Maidan was triggered by an EU agreement, not a NATO agreement.  

However, for all his concerns about Nemtsov and his ilk he is equally concerned about forces to his political right and the ultra-nationalist movements which could tear Russia apart, and by extension Europe, if they ever gained power.  Not versed in political reform as other Europeans would know it Putin sees the greatest danger to Russia as the ‘chaos’ that would emerge if a power struggle were to break out into the open between liberals and ultra-nationalists.  In that light Putin sees the focusing of power on himself as a move to stabilise Russia and thus prevent Russian fracturing under the triple pressures of nationalism, globalisation and Europeanisation.

Therefore, Nemtsov’s assassination is clearly a function of the very profound tensions that exist at the heart of Russian politics and society, and such tensions are likely to get worse. President Putin has manoeuvred himself into a political dead-end.  He offers Russians no political vision, no political development, and no political evolution which would over time help ease such tensions and create a Russia with state institutions of sufficient strength to cope with pluralism.  Rather, he is trying to divert such tensions by appealing to Russian nationalism, wrapping himself in the Russian flag, and by centralising all power on himself and using an assertive displacement policy.  Consequently, Putin himself has nowhere to go but more of the same assertive displacement policy.  If he fails Putin will be swept aside by the tides of change that are indeed boiling away below the surface of the Russian body politic.   Putin’s ‘strategy’ may not make sense to many strategically-illiterate western European politicians.  However, it makes ‘perfect’ Russian sense to the Baltic states, and indeed all states across Central and Eastern Europe who have ‘benefitted’ from past Russian rule.

Contrast all of the above with the utterances of last week of British Prime Minister David Cameron.  Amidst growing and justified concerns about further cuts to British defence spending (and blatant attempts by Downing Street to shut down any defence debate prior to the May general election) Cameron assured the British people that the UK can defend itself against the Russians.  That is precisely NOT the point, Dave, and you know it.  The real issue is whether the British armed forces will be able to fulfil their treaty commitments to NATO and provide critical forward deterrence to Britain’s allies. Today, the answer is just about yes. Any more defence cuts to the British defence budget and the answer will be an emphatic no as Britain effectively ceases to be a major power (see my new paperback – Little Britain? Twenty-First Century Strategy for a Middling European Power.  www.amazon.com)

Here’s the strategic cruncher. President Putin is looking at NATO anchor-states such as Britain to see if they have the resolve to contain him.  Indeed, if I want to be really provocative (and why not) I would suggest that in the absence of any meaningful strategic partnership Putin NEEDS the West to contain him so he can concentrate on consolidating power in Russia, and in his very narrow terms maintain political stability therein.  However, as Gary Kasparov pointed out, Putin certainly does not believe countries like Britain, or indeed any other European state, are up to the strategic task he has set them.  Sadly, I have to agree with President Putin.

So, will the murder of Boris Nemtsov be seen one day as Putin’s nemesis?  No.  However, it reveals a Russia that combines immense, over-centralised power with dangerous instability. And, if what is happening in and to Russia is not seen through the cold light of political realism Putin’s Russia could one day be the nemesis of us all.

Wake up!

Julian Lindley-French

Immigration, Society & Security

Alphen, Netherlands. 27 February. The purpose of this blog is hard analysis. That means I must regularly foray into areas of policy and consequence that Establishments would prefer remained cloaked in official secrecy, often to hide the mess politicians have made.  Nowhere is this more apparent than in the relationship between immigration, societal cohesion and security.  For too long the British Government has stuck its head in the sand and pretended that no such relationship exists.  Indeed, I witnessed myself the bizarre spectacle of British troops fighting in Afghanistan to keep Islamism at ‘strategic distance’, even as an 80% surge took place in immigration to Britain over the same 2001-2014 period from some of the most conservative parts of the Islamic world. This disconnect between immigration policy and security policy has led to a profound loss of balance in British policy and strategy, most notably in the balance of investments made in to protect society and project British influence and power.  The Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Armed Forces have been starved of resources to fund the domestic intelligence and counter-terrorism efforts.  The result is the most unbalanced British foreign and security policy ever, and an accelerated and exaggerated British retreat from influence.  Three events this week highlight the extent to which immigration ‘policy’ is in various ways distorting British security policy – the unmasking of ‘Jihadi John’, the latest immigration figures, and a poll of British Muslims.

The revelation that so-called Jihadi John is in fact a British Muslim called Mohammed Emwazi highlights the dark side of immigration.  Born in Kuwait in 1988 he came to Britain aged six and seems to have been radicalised by an Islamist group in West London.  His profile is similar to that of a lot of British jihadis, a first-generation immigrant from a difficult region who seems to have had difficulty identifying with the norms and values of British liberal society.  Such immigrants in many ways import the challenges of their home region into their adopted country, as evidenced by the worrying growth in anti-Semitism in Britain, which the left-leaning BBC, for example, refuses to identify as a problem that is almost overwhelmingly associated with British Muslims.

The second ‘event’ is the release of the latest immigration figures for the year up to February 2015.  Net migration last year was 289,000, the highest figure for over a decade.  Indeed, some 654,000 people moved to Britain from both within the EU, and from without the EU over the last year.  In other words, a city the size of Manchester came to the UK over the past year.  Now, the massive bulk of that immigration is a good thing as many are students and most come to take up jobs.  Indeed, 62% of all immigrants to London have a degree, and given that Britain is Europe’s most globalised economy such immigration is vital for the economy. 

However, such mass-immigration also has profound security implications which government must confront and too often does not.  Rather, the political class seems to have given up on the need for secure immigration.  Last night on the BBC senior figures from the three leading political parties all shifted from the need to ensure secure immigration to espousing the benefits of mass-immigration come –who-may.  This political shift away from secure immigration is evident in the current election campaign, which is perhaps the strangest on record.  Indeed, whilst the public want to talk about immigration mainstream politicians do not and in alliance with liberal media have in effect shut the debate down.  The man who currently runs Britain, Cameron’s Australian campaign manager Lynton Crosby, even forbade any senior Conservative from yesterday defending what is by any standards an appalling failure of government policy.  Yes, immigration certainly helps the British economy grow, but the greatest threat to British security, and indeed societal cohesion, is also a function of mass immigration.

However, a third event this week put the whole issue of immigration, society and security in perspective.  A poll of 1000 British Muslims conducted by ComRes found that 95% of British Muslims polled felt loyalty to Britain, something I have seen first-hand when dealing with British Muslim Servicemen.  And, 93% of British Muslims polled believe Muslims should obey British laws.  These figures really challenge those in society who believe the problem is Islam per se. 

However, 46% believed Muslims were prejudiced against in Britain, and 78% were offended by published images of the Prophet (which is why out of respect I refused to re-tweet such an image in the immediate aftermath of the Paris attacks).  Moreover, 11% of those polled felt sympathy for those who want to fight against Western interests, 32% were not surprised by the Paris attacks, whilst 27% had some sympathy for the motives behind the Paris attacks, and 20% believed Islam and Western liberal society would never be compatible. 

The number of Muslims living in Britain is some 3 million and growing.  Therefore, in February 2015 some 330,000 British Muslims felt some sympathy for those who want to fight against Western interests, 960,000 were not surprised by the Paris attacks, 600,000 believe Islam would never be compatible with Western liberal society, and 810,000 British Muslims felt some sympathy for the Paris attacks. By any standards this is a significant cohort of society that is in some way fundamentally at odds with the rest of society.  Indeed, if one assumes (for the sake of argument) that, of those 330,000 who felt some sympathy with the Paris attacks, 5% are actively engaged in promoting extremism some 16500 British people are actively plotting to attack fellow Britons and the British state. 

What are the policy implications?  First, there is no point in nostalgia.  Like many Britons I am horrified that politicians have allowed this situation to develop. However, the focus must now be on long-term policies that promote integration, instead of the disastrous multiculturalism which simply generated mutually-uncomprehending ghettos.  Second, respect and tolerance are vital weapons in this struggle.  Respect must be shown to Islam, which is now an integral part of British society, and tolerance shown to all those British Muslims who practice their faith within the framework of British laws.  Third, all forms of fundamentalism must be rooted out and exposed, as must the racism and hatred it seems to generate in a not-inconsiderable-part of the non-Muslim community.  Fourth, government needs to get its own house in order.  Too often politically-correct junior officials have thwarted attempts to block extremists and their efforts to radicalise young, vulnerable people.  For example, none of the sixteen recommendations made by a leading counter-terror expert to combat extremism in Birmingham schools has been implemented.  Fifth, counter-terrorism must not de-stabilise British foreign and security policy.  Britain can only exert its rightful influence as the world’s fifth largest economy and fifth most powerful defence actor across the strategic landscape with balanced policy, strategy and structure, and that is clearly not the case today.  Finally, British politicians must once-and-for-all confront the relationship that clearly exists between immigration policy and security policy and not simply run away from it as being politically inconvenient, and/or too difficult. 

Yes, Britain will and must change, but if such change is dangerous and goes unchecked sooner or later it will tear the country apart.  Therefore, it is vital that those who come to live in Britain share at least the core values of a Western liberal democracy.  Those that do not must not come, and ensuring that is an issue of sound government policy and practice.  The alternative is a British society that becomes a dangerous incubator of terror, led by wishful-thinking politicians, which is a threat not just to itself, but to others. The British people, non-Muslim and Muslim, have a right to expect more than that from their leaders.

Julian Lindley-French

Why the Appalling Brexit Debate Matters

Alphen, Netherlands. 24 February. Let me state for the record; Britain will not leave the EU.  Prime Minister David Cameron is utterly in the pocket of big business, which would happily scrap democracy and Britain for no-tariff pan-European trade.  Labour leader Ed Milliband (pronounced me-ee-bon) is in fact a Belgian Socialist, and like all Belgian Socialists he would happily scrap Britain to create a European super-state, he simply dare not say so.  Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg (pronounced clog) is actually a Dutch liberal (and a Euro-federalist to boot).  The Americans think Britain’s only purpose is to do their bidding in the EU - the Special Relationship.  The Germans believe that one day the British will awake to find the Germans were right, all along, about everything, and need to be protected from themselves.  The French desperately want the British in the EU to balance Germany, but only if Britain accepts the French view of ‘Europe’.  Therefore, those that think a) there will be a Brexit referendum; and b) (if it happens) it will be anything but rigged, are a) totally naïve; and b) fail to understand the nature of power in the EU and the elite relationships that hold the Onion together, and how little democracy actually matters.  

Yesterday, the Norwegian Europe Minister (who he?), a certain Mr Vidar Helgesen, told the British people not to leave the EU.  He made his intervention into British domestic politics at the euphemistically-named think-tank “British Influence”.  Led by Lord ‘I-actually-mean-the-opposite-of-everything-I-say-in-public’ (and former European Commissioner) Mandelson, ‘British Influence’ routinely leaves out the key word in its title which should read “Scrap British Influence”.  By the way, Mr Helgesen said he did not want to enter the Brexit debate.  Sorry, Mr Helgesen, but by speaking at “Scrap British Influence” you not only entered the Brexit debate, you dove in at the deep-end wearing lead-lined Norwegian divers boots.

Mr Helgesen seemed to be warning the Brits not to suffer the same ‘marginalisation’ Norway has suffered by being outside the EU.  Mr Helgesen clearly does not understand power and why the relationship between the EU and a non-EU UK would be different from the relationship between the EU and non-EU Norway.  Let me enlighten him. Norway, population 5m, has the world’s 50^th largest economy.  Britain, population 65m, according to CEBR (a think-tank) overtook France in December to once again become the world’s 5^th largest economy.  Now, I spend quite a lot of time in oil-rich Norway and it never strikes me as a country that is suffering too much from being outside the EU.  Far from it!

Mandelson’s tactic is to line-up a range of foreign pro-EU speakers to present ‘facts’ that demonstrate to the British people that a Brexit would mean the end of British influence, Britain itself, the National Health Service, and even Sheffield United Football Club, but not the House of Lords which goes on forever albeit for no apparent reason.  He also rather conveniently fails to point out that the incompetent and strategically-illiterate British elite have already done a pretty good job at ending British influence even without the ‘help’ of the EU.  Critically, Mandelson offers nothing positive about the EU or Britain’s place in it.  He simply peddles fear.

Mandelson is not alone in peddling such scare tactics.  Nick Clog routinely suggests that Britain would lose 3m jobs and 50% of its exports if it left the EU.  He achieves these staggering figures by counting up every single UK job that is somehow engaged in exporting to the rest of the EU, and then suggests a Brexit would destroy all of them.  As for 50% of British trade evaporating courtesy of a Brexit, only 44% of Britain’s trade actually goes through the rest of the EU, and of that figure 8% is actually trade re-exported via Rotterdam to the rest of the world. Moreover, Britain suffers from a massive trade deficit with the rest of the EU.  In other words, the real trade figure is 36%, and the rest of the EU does far better out of Britain, than Britain does out of the EU. 

Sadly, we can all expect more of this nonsense, and not just from the “Scrap British Influence” brigade.  The Brit-Kommentariat routinely blame Brussels for Britain’s many ills when it has nothing to do with the EU. There is no question that should the British get a referendum, and then actually vote to leave, some level of punitive action would be taken against the British by the EU “pour encourager les autres”. So Nige, no broad sunlit uplands for you mate!

However, the saddest part of the appalling Brexit debate is the now ritualistic Brit-bashing that occurs daily across the Euro-Kommentariat, and the role played therein by British apologists. European Geostrategy (a good thing) this week published a piece by Nick Witney in which he said, “The British are trapped in a crisis of post-imperial national identity and show no signs of emerging soon”.  What complete and utter tosh.  Most Brits do not even know about the Empire (poor education and no knowledge of history before Princess Diana), and even fewer can remember it (it was a long time ago, Nick). There is a lot Nick writes with which I agree, but not this. Such statements are symptomatic of the lazy, intellectual rubbish (sorry, Nick) that the Euro-Kommentariat routinely spawns about Britain.

For most Brits the EU on offer is not the EU they want – plain and simple.  It is not because we are supposedly (and aimlessly) wandering around dreaming great dreams of Kipling, Rorke’s Drift and the Raj.  For the record, I do not like the EU for which I once worked because it does not listen to me, it does not work, is made for others by others, makes ‘Europe’ weaker than the sum of its parts, and I am expected to pay a lot for it. Get it? 

However, my principled objection to the EU, which I share with many Brits born of the tradition of John Locke, concerns the relationship between power and the individual in Europe. Like many Brits I am a pro-European, EU-skeptic.  Yes, I believe in European co-operation but what worries me about the EU is that Brussels is fast becoming the complete opposite of Abraham Lincoln’s aphorism about democracy.  It is government above the people, imposed on the people, and most clearly not for the people and looks ever more like a corruption of another Lincoln aphorism; you can fool some of the people some of the time, but if you really make democracy irrelevant and power far enough distant, you can fool all of the people all of the time…or at least ignore them. The European Parliament? Forget it. The ‘EP’ is a rubber-stamping chamber designed to provide fig-leaf legitimacy for over-bearing power which has little to no legitimacy with citizens.  Look how Jean-Claude Juncker stole last year’s election results to claim a legitimacy that he simply does not possess.

In other words, in the year in which the anniversaries of both Magna Carta and the founding of the Mother of Parliaments are being celebrated, the EU makes me wonder why my British forebears fought for so long for freedom if my leaders are simply going to give said freedom away to a distant bureaucracy in which my country is blatantly under-represented, and/or a Berlin (or a complex mix of the two) that still too often confuses the words ‘Germany’ and ‘Europe’.  Yes, I admit it is better than giving away freedom to Moscow. However, I am sure Comrade Vlad could arrange that as well if the EU makes Europe any weaker than it already is.  This is not the EU in which I once believed.

Furthermore, far from preparing Europeans for a globalised world, the EU is fast becoming one gigantic protectionist racket which champions ‘Europeanisation’ as the denial of globalisation.   Take the proposed Energy Union which is being rolled out by the European Commission today.  On the face of it such a Union makes sense.  The Commission (as ever) claims it would boost consumer choice transnationally, generate pan-European energy infrastructure investment, and integrate energy supply systems on an EU-wide basis. In fact, the Energy Union is yet another opportunistic power-grab by the federalist Commission seizing on international friction to further extend its unaccountable power at the expense of national energy regulators, and by extension the legitimate European nation-state.  

For Britain, Europe’s most open and international economy (see the OECD report on Britain of yesterday), an Energy Union would mean yet more regulation, more protectionism and yet another raft of national public policy that Parliament is no longer permitted to oversee because it is ‘European Regulation’.  Do such concerns make me opposed to intense European co-operation?  No, of course not! Do I have the right to express such concerns as a citizen? It is my duty.

The new paperback edition of my book Little Britain (www.amazon.co.uk) poses the real question at the heart of the Brexit debate; how best to use the not inconsiderable power Britain still possesses in the twenty-first century world and, indeed, Europe.  Simply allowing British power to vanish into the mutual impoverishment pact the contemporary EU has become is in no-one’s interest, least of all the British.  As for the idea that the EU magnifies Britain’s place on the world stage I think The Economist for once got it right when it said recently, “European power diminished by two world wars, has disappeared down the rabbit-hole of European integration”.

Britain SHOULD stay in the EU but only if there is a new political settlement that once and for all ends the drift towards EU federalism, and properly establishes a proper balance of powers and competences between the EU and its member-states.  For most thinking Brits that means an EU that is more super-alliance than super-state.  Unfortunately, strategically-challenged Dave has told his EU chums that if they do not like that idea, and even if he does in fact honour his pledge to hold a referendum, he will campaign to stay in an unreformed EU.  Brilliant Dave!  The country is clearly safe in your hands.  Now, why not tell Vlad the Improper that if he goes on sending his nasty bombers over Britain you will scrap the British armed forces?  Oh, you already have. British influence?

In fact, my big fear is that the Brexit referendum does indeed takes place, Britons actually vote to stay in the EU, but do so through fear rather than conviction and thus go on pretending the EU is a ‘foreign’ imposition.  Should a ‘yes’ vote ever happen the Brits would have to finally and fully engage in the European Project (i.e. the creation of a European super-state) and rule from Brussels.  Why?  There is an old Italian joke that goes something like this.  Every day an old Roman goes to pray at the statue of one of the Apostles.  Day after day he cites the same prayer, “Please, Lord, let me win the lottery”.  After several years of this the statue eventually becomes so irritated he comes to life and in exasperation says to the old man, “Ok, Luigi, but please, for once, buy a lottery ticket!”

The issues thinking British EU-scepticism raises go to the very heart of freedom, justice and representation in twenty-first century Europe and for the sake of Europeans cannot and must not be dismissed as the post-imperial bleatings of a few Little Englanders. As for Mr Helgesen, just give your oil money to Syriza if its makes you feel better...and more 'European'.

Julian Lindley-French 

Little Britain 2015 New Paperback/Kindle book by Julian Lindley-French www.amazon.co.uk

Alphen, Netherlands. 23 February. After a short hiatus caused by the techno-prattery of your blogonaut the DEFINITIVE edition of my first self-published paperback (218 pages and very reasonably-priced) Little Britain? Twenty-First Century Strategy for a Middling European Power is available at www.amazon.co.uk.  There may still be the odd typo in the book because I have edited the book myself and of course do not have the same support I normally get from Oxford University Press and Routledge. However, I have now been through the manuscript so many times I could just about recount the whole book backwards.  My thanks to my old friend Chris Hayes for pointing out the glitches in the last version.  

Little Britain is blunt in its analysis, but positive in the solutions it proposes. The book is essential reading for all those with an interest in British, European defence and the transatlantic relationship. 

The Analysis

London's High Establishment - both political and bureaucratic -  no longer link defence expenditure with Britain's rapidly-deteroriating strategic environment. Rather, riven through with an ethos of exaggerated decline management London's High Establishment is engaged in the appeasment of reality and views defence as a luxury item the budget of which is continually raided to fund health, welfare, education, and other politically-expedient provisions.  Today, London recognises only as much threat as it thinks it can afford and by so doing dangerously undermines not just the defence of the realm, but Britain's wider influence.  Critically, the transatlantic relationship, NATO and European defence are also being damaged by London's defence-strategic myopia which will make the coming shock all the more dangerous. Ironically, Britain is still a major power that behaves ever more like a small one, bereft of leadership, statecraft or strategic direction.  

London has abandoned firm strategic principles for a form of strategic political correctness as short-term politics routinely trumps long-held strategic principles.  This retreat from strategic judgement has been reinforced by an obsession with austerity and cutting the deficit at whatever cost to foreign and defence policy, a lack of social cohesion, as well as uncertainty about US leadership, the future of the EU, and Britain’s place therein. However, the main cause of Britain's precipitous decline is a timid, divided, strategically-illiterate political class no longer committed to any level of strategic ambition, or a Britain able to play a serious role in the world.  Consequently, Britain today punches beneath, not above, its weight in the world, as evidenced by London's silence during the 2015 Ukraine crisis.  Add to that decline-laden mix a Whitehall bureaucracy that has become increasingly politicised, and which lacks all-important strategic unity of effort and purpose, and the reasons for decline become all to clear.  The politicisation of London’s High Establishment is evident in the ideological struggle between hard and soft power, and the consequent loss of all-important balance between the two, as London retreats ever deeper into political spin to mask actual weakness. Unless London’s High Establishment face the world as it is, and not as they would like it to be, 2015 could mark the true end of Britain as a world power after some four hundred years. And, Europe and the wider world would be very much more dangerous place for Britain's self-imposed retreat 

The Solutions

Britain is not fated to decline as Britain remains one of the world’s top five economies and one of its leading military powers.  Indeed, Little Britain 2015 rejects defeatism and argues that it is not too late for Britain to regain its strategic poise and place.   To do that the book considers the 2015 National Security Strategy and the Strategic Defence and Security Review in the round, and takes a positive view of the role Britain could play in the contemporary world if only the High Establishment could escape from the habit of decline management.   

Little Britain 2015 offers a series of solutions to take Britain out of its strategic malaise.  First, Britain needs a National Security Strategy that properly assesses Britain’s place in the world, what is needed to defend and protect Britain’s critical national interests, and exert influence over the grand alliances critical to the British way of strategy.  Second, the book calls on the National Security Council to be much strengthened so that it can help properly forge a real whole-of-government approach to national strategy and security, and thus ensure balance between the protection of society and the projection of British power and influence.  Third, Britain must create a radical future British military force powerful and agile enough to support the US and act as a high-end core within NATO and the EU that is configured to lead and support coalitions of allies and partners the world over.

This is not just a book about Britain; it is about the choices all democracies must make as Russia and Islamic State bring the strategic foreplay of the twenty-first century to a shattering end.  Strategic engagement or strategic pretence?  That is the choice Britain faces.  If it is the latter then Britain, Europe and the wider West will become victims of change, rather than the masters of it. Now is the time to act!

The book is currently available at www.amazon.co.uk. Enjoy the read!

Julian Lindley-French

How to Fix the Euro’s German Problem

Alphen, Netherlands. 20 February. Aeschylus in Agamemnon says, “It is in the character of very few men to honour without envy a friend who has prospered”. In Greek tragedy the Chorus acts as a running commentary on the drama, often revealing to the audience the secrets and sub-plots that the characters dare not reveal. As Greece and Germany bring the Euro to the hour of its reckoning there are many sub-plots that prevent a clear-eyed solution to this crisis.  And yet one solution is obvious; the EU and its benighted Single Currency needs a new mechanism to enable member-states to move between Single Market membership and Single Currency membership. So, why is common sense not prevailing?

Germany is the real problem.  The Germans have taken a lot of flak (excuse the historical pun) of late for appearing to treat Greece like some form of colony.  Certainly, the Greeks have at times made utterly unacceptable and insulting comparisons between contemporary Germany and Nazi Germany.  For a Single Currency to function there must be a disciplining agent – a Leviathan.  In the absence of a European super-state it has fallen on Germany to be just such an enforcer.

However, Germany itself is deeply conflicted over Greece and the Euro.  On one hand Germany wants Greece to stay in the Euro because the Single Currency is German ideology.  Having spent a lot of time this past year talking to senior Germans about the Eurozone crisis I know how deeply they feel about the Euro and how hurt they are to be accused of building a new German Empire.  And yet, there are clear elements in contemporary German thinking that see the Euro, and by extension the EU, as a mechanism for ensuring the German writ runs across Europe. 

For all that Germany is simply not prepared to pay the price of its own ‘European’ ideology.  Syriza is right; there is no chance Greece can ever pay back the €200bn the Greeks owe creditors.  And yet Berlin insists theologically that all Greek debt be repaid.  The reason for this contradiction is the disconnect between German ideology and German politics.  The cost implications for the German taxpayer of giving the Greeks debt relief, or even another debt holiday, would be enormous and quite possibly ruinous.  As a Dutch taxpayer I am all-too-aware that whatever happens this next week I am again going to get screwed by this crisis.  Sadly, no-one in Berlin apparently wants to tell the Germans. 

Implicit in the German-Greek stand-off (for that is what it is is a fundamental question; to mutualise debt or not to mutualise debt.  If a deal is done for Greece why not make the German (and Dutch) taxpayer responsible for Portuguese, Spanish, and possibly even Italian and French debt?  And what about the other debtor states?  Chancellor Merkel knows that her CDU party would be political toast if that happened, which could explain why one senior German told me that she is actively thinking of resigning this year.

Therefore, it is Germany not Greece that has to get real.  Germany cannot maintain its ideological commitment to the Euro, expect Greece to pay its debts, and avoid the consequence of its own ideological commitment to the Euro/European Project.  Therefore, Berlin must face the hard truth, be it this year or next if Germany is not willing to underwrite Greek debt Greece will leave the Euro.  It must also face the hard truth that the logical consequence of Berlin’s own ideological position on Europe is either a European super-state or a German Empire.  At present the German people seem to want neither which is why ironically the British view of the EU as an alliance of states may well now prevail (just don’t tell the Brits).

What Berlin needs is a mechanism to get it out of its own political/ideological fix that would enable Greece to exit the Euro without destroying it.  Certainly, a Grexit if properly managed could help Athens restore some economic vitality.  The new Drachma could be competitively devalued, and if and when Greece is ready (and subject to their still being a Euro) Athens could re-join.  Such a mechanism would also enable other member-states to move between Single Currency membership and Single Market membership of the EU.  Naturally, there would need to be a large reserve established to assist such countries transition to underwrite the currency and support banks etc.  However, some of that could be generated by transferring funds from the Common Agricultural Policy, and the various regional development and structural funds.

Unless Germany gets its thinking clear about the Euro, and Berlin properly re-establishes a relationship between its ideological and political priorities, a Greek tragedy could well become a European tragedy.

Julian Lindley-French

Little Britain update

Alphen, Netherlands. 18 February.

Little Britain? Twenty-First Century Strategy for a Middling European Power

People have been emailing me this past week asking when my new book on British national and defence strategic challenges will be published.  My aim is to make it available on Amazon next week.  After my losing battle with technology last week I am now going through the final proofs (again). Once done I will order a copy to check all is well and then re-launch it.  Sorry for the delay but this is my first self-published book and I do not have the normal support I get from Oxford University Press or Routledge when I publish with them.  Thank you for your patience which, immodestly, I think will be rewarded.  What I say in the book needs saying not just for the British but all Europeans at this moment of geopolitics re-born.

All best,

Julian