Warmongering Tories

Bombs away

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So it begins, the UK is now bombing Syria after all the Tories cheered the vote in favour of another illegal misadventure in the Middle East last night. We can expect to have full war rhetoric from the MSM from now until eternity, for there is no end for this war and our Dear Leader has already stated that this war would take “some time“, a nice open ended statement there. We are seeing a continuation of the perpetual war.

This is a war devoid of strategy or a clear objective, we were told that the target was Daesh but just 2 years ago the target was Assad. So which one is it, or is it both? No doubt we will be treated to some carefully vetted footage of bombs exploding, the camera position being 20000ft up. These will show the bomb hitting a nice safe target, with no civilian casualties in view. The mission will be called “successful”. We will not see the collateral damage, we will not see the bombs that go astray, as some bombs inevitably do.

The RAF were launching the first airstrikes against Syrian targets within 57 minutes of the vote, they “successfully” blew up some oil wells which were “successfully” destroyed just over a month ago. Either the first “bombing” wasn’t that successful or Daesh is very good at repairing the damage. Mind you it could be that the first mission did not take place at all, or was it the second one, who’s to know? But the RAF were “successful” which means that there will be huge oil fires burning in Syria and an environmental catastrophe as well. Those are the hallmarks of success in this perpetual war. At least there were no civilian casualties, or so we’re told.

The people of Syria must be thanking their lucky stars that there are even more heavily armed warplanes in their skies tonight keeping them safe. But it is the good old Tories who they really have to thank for all the extra thousands of pounds of high explosive flying overhead. The blue tories, the red tories and the yellow tories trooped off down the “non terrorist sympathiser” lobby and the share price of arms firms soared.

97% of Scotland’s MPs voted against bombing Syria, yet we find ourselves in yet another illegal foreign war. Only two Scottish MPs voted to send in the bombers: Viceroy David Mundell (blue Tory) and former Viceroy (and liar) Alistair Carmichael (yellow Tory). Let us remember these two when the terrorists turn up in our cities seeking revenge. We shall not forget that it was them who brought death and destruction to the people of Syria, and probably us too.

Warmongering Tories

Warmongering Tories

Given previous engagements by Russia and France in Syria, it seems likely that we will see a terrorist attack against the UK within 2 months. This will be used to justify the bombing of Syria. We will be told, “These are the exactly the type of attacks which we are bombing Syria to prevent.” The irony will be astounding. The attackers will be UK citizens. Apparently there have been 7 terrorist conspiracies uncovered in the past 6 months, so we have got to ask: how many arrests were made? How many were convicted? What were they convicted of? What were their sentences?

Then again the story could be untrue, couldn’t it? We are entering a period where the MSM will parrot the government in all things, they will not question the government’s story in any way. Everything that you see and hear about Daesh and the war in Syria should be taken with a very large pinch of salt, for it will most likely be pure propaganda.

I hate salt.

Hellfire Missile

Hi ho! Hi ho! It’s off to war we go.

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Our beloved leader, Chairman Cameron, was making the case for bombing Daesh (IS) in Syria today. He tried to persuade parliament that bombing Syria was a good idea 2 years ago, but that time we would have been bombing Syrian government forces. The ones that IS were fighting. So we would have been allies then. Hmm. This time , however, the bogeyman is Daesh so the Syrian government will be our allies. Double hmm.

Comrade Cameron told the house of commons that bombing Daesh “would make us safer.” That’s an interesting assertion that should be challenged. You see France decided that it would be a good idea to start bombing Daesh in Syria and the bombing campaign started on 27th September 2015. Daesh affiliated terrorists killed 130 and injured 368 on 13th November 2015. Russia started bombing Daesh in Syria on 30th September 2015, Daesh affiliated terrorists blew up a Russian passenger jet, killing all 224 persons on board, on 31st October 2015. So the evidence doesn’t really stack up on our Dear Leader’s assertions.

The main problem with bombing Syria is that it is a sovereign state, the only legal way to bomb it is with the agreement of the Syrian government. Something which the UK does not have. But who cares about legality? Tony Blair didn’t and he got away with it, so why should David Cameron? The Syrian government has already asked someone to aid in their fight, Russia. It is conceivable that the Russians would start to enforce the sovereignty of Syria, after all they have the means to do so and the shooting down of a Russian plane by Turkey also gives them a motive. There is a very real danger of the Syrian civil war spiralling into a full blown regional conflict, do we really want to get sucked into that?

The simple fact is that bombing of Syria will not defeat Daesh, if this was not the case then the combined might of Russia, USA, Saudi Arabia and others would have bombed them into oblivion by now. After years of civil war there is nothing left to bomb in Syria. Daesh have adapted to the threat from the skies and they still take territory. The only way to militarily defeat Daesh is to fight them on the ground.

Our Dear Leader has the solution though. He has managed to magic 70000 “moderate” jihadists from the harsh desert sands. They will be trained and armed by British military personnel and then set loose upon the hapless Daesh. But there’s a couple of problems with this. We have already trained and armed the Iraqi army who turned tail at the sight of the black flags and left all of their wonderful western equipment for Daesh to use as it pleased. The USA has already tried this and it was a disaster with most of the trainees selling their equipment to Daesh and others, some of them even went on to fight for Daesh. Another problem is that Russia is bombing the groups which have magically increased in size, does that mean that Russia will be bombing our troops? Then there is the small matter of the EU arms embargo, supplying arms to Syria is illegal, so how is that going to work?

Assuming that we do go bombing in Syria we can rest assured that the weapons that will be used are “precision” weapons. They will dangle under the shiny new drones which are to be bought with the money that the OBR conjured out of thin air in the Autumn Statement. The weapons of choice will be the GBU-12, a 500lb guided bomb, and the AGM 114 Hellfire missile. The GBU 12 has a “casualty radius” of between 200 – 300 ft. 50% of the people caught in this area will perish. The Hellfire missile is a modified anti-tank weapon which is fitted with a fragmentation sleeve around the warhead, it has a “wounding radius” of 65 feet and a “kill radius” of 50 ft. Again, if one goes off near you, it’s going to hurt. There will be innocent victims caught up in these bombs, but they will be called “militants” or “combatants” in order to hide the war crime. Anyone who wants to find out more about the use of drones have a look here.

My final point about the upcoming misadventure into another Middle Eastern war is this, how do we know if we’ve won? Do we have to kill all of Daesh or is it just a set ratio? Is it 90%, would that be a victory? How can we tell when we have reached the desired ratio, will we send Daesh some census papers? How much magic money will be committed to the reconstruction of Syria, because if you blow it up you have to fix it, that is laid down in the Geneva Convention. How long will that take? Did Comrade Cameron mention this or was it overlooked in all the excitement of talking about war?

The whole proposal is a disaster waiting to happen. No one knows what the objective is, Daesh or Assad? No one knows how to win. No one knows how to tell if we’ve won. The risks of sparking a wider conflict are huge and increasing by the day. This is one fight which we should leave the hell alone.

One last word for those who advocate putting “boots on the ground”, get yourself down to the Army careers office. I’m sure they will have some boots and rifle for you to take with you to the sandpit. I wish you luck, you’ll need it.

 

Fluffy

I must be unreasonable

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So the Scotland Bill has passed through the house of commons, a bit like a turd is passed through the human body, and the Smith Agreement has been delivered in full. According to Fluffy, the Viceroy and Governor General of Scotland, “These improvements will strengthen the Scotland Bill and put beyond any reasonable doubt for any reasonable person that the Government is delivering the Smith Agreement exactly as we promised we would.”

Notice how he uses the word “reasonable” twice in that sentence. The first instance is “beyond reasonable doubt”, this term used as the standard of evidence required to validate a criminal conviction. We’ll take a look at that one in a moment. The second use is “for any reasonable person”, again this is a legal term applied in common law. By using it here Fluffy is suggesting that if you disagree with him then you are clearly unreasonable. I must be unreasonable then, for the evidence that I will present here clearly shows, beyond reasonable doubt, that the Smith Agreement is not delivered in full by the current Scotland Bill 2015-16. The Vow has not been delivered either, despite it’s promises being as woolly as Fluffy’s hair.

The only concrete promise in The Vow is, “The Scottish Parliament is permanent.” This was agreed by the Smith Commission, the agreement states, “UK legislation will state that the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government are permanent institutions.”

So what does the Scotland Bill say about the permanence of the Scottish Parliament? “The Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government are a permanent part of the United Kingdom’s constitutional arrangements.” So it would appear that the Scotland Bill does indeed make the Scottish Parliament permanent.

But what’s this? Two paragraphs down the bill states, “In view of that commitment it is declared that the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government are not to be abolished except on the basis of a decision of the people of Scotland voting in a referendum.” In other words, the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government CAN be abolished. That doesn’t sound very permanent to me. But then I must be unreasonable. Or maybe I am reasonable and Fluffy is lying.

Let’s take a look at some of the other parts of the Smith Agreement. There’s the part which deals with the Crown Estate which states, “Responsibility for the management of the Crown Estate’s economic assets in Scotland, and the revenue generated from these assets, will be transferred to the Scottish Parliament. This will include the Crown Estate’s seabed, urban assets, rural estates, mineral and fishing rights, and the Scottish foreshore for which
it is responsible.” The Scotland Bill states, “The Treasury may make a scheme transferring on the transfer date all the existing Scottish functions of the Crown Estate Commissioners
(“the Commissioners”) to the Scottish Ministers or a person nominated by the Scottish Ministers (“the transferee”).”

So the Treasury “may” make a scheme, although it doesn’t have to if Gideon doesn’t want to. What if he’s blown all the dough on hookers and coke and he’s feeling a bit skint. He may decide that he won’t make that scheme after all. But let’s assume that he’s feeling all warm and fuzzy and makes the scheme after all, what would it contain? Well it would contain all of the Crown Estate wouldn’t it?

Errr no, You see, two paragraphs down there’s this, “Where immediately before the transfer date part of the Crown Estate consists of property, rights or interests held by a limited partnership registered under the Limited Partnerships Act 1907, subsection (2)(a) excludes—
(a) the property, rights or interests, and
(b) any property, rights or interests in, or in a member of, a partner in the limited partnership.”

So the whole of the Crown Estate in Scotland is not being devolved, as was agreed by the Smith Commission. So it would be reasonable to say that the whole of the Smith Agreement is not being delivered by the shiny new Scotland Bill.

Here’s another part of the Smith Agreement, “The Scottish Parliament will have the power to prevent the proliferation of Payday Loan shops.” What do we find in the Scotland Bill? Well nothing as it happens. Now why could that be I wonder? It would be because the Tories are largely funded by people associated with legal loan shark companies would it? Surely that’s what any reasonable person would think, isn’t it? But it’s just another part of the Smith Agreement which is not featured in the Scotland Bill.

As for the rest of the Scotland Bill, it’s beyond me. The language is couched in the most tortuous legalese that lawyers will be cashing in for years. But It would be reasonable to say that the it’s beyond reasonable doubt that the entire Smith Agreement has not been delivered by the Scotland Bill 2015-16 as it currently stands. Does that sound reasonable to you?

What about the veto which wasn’t a veto? You know the one where the Scottish Government has to consult the Secretary of State and get his agreement before they can implement anything. Well there’s this in the Bill, “If—
(a) the Scottish Ministers make regulations to which this section applies,
and
(b) the Secretary of State considers that it is not practicable to implement a change made by the regulations by the time that change is to start to have effect, (our emphasis)
the Secretary of State may by regulations made by statutory instrument amend
the regulations so that the change is to start to have effect from a time later than
the time originally set.

So Fluffy could say, “Yer nae deing that until 2025!” That sounds like a veto to me, or am I just being unreasonable?

A Princess

Some news you may have missed

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The press is busy promoting our beloved Prime Minister’s attempts to deflect attention from his complete lack of ideas over negotiations about the UK’s membership of the EU (apparently he will be publishing his “list of demands” next month which is a bit like his answer to the leader of HM Opposition at PMQ’s which in a nutshell was “we have no idea so you will have to wait and see what Gideon comes up with”).

But if you can be bothered to read the article there’s an interesting paragraph right down at the bottom where you will see that Michael Froman, a US Trade Representative, stated that, “We have no FTA with the UK so they would be subject to the same tariffs – and other trade-related measures – as China, or Brazil or India” if the UK left the EU. Now I may be a little bit cynical here but surely that should be a headline item? Would it have been a headline if it were directed at Scotland outside the UK? I’m sure that it would have made the front page of every newspaper and it would have been the headline on every TV and radio news show. But I’m just a blogger, I should leave these things to the people who know. Mind you, RT saw it as a big enough story to headline it which probably means that it’s propaganda or something.

In some other news, the majority of the European Parliament voted to drop all charges against the American whistleblower Edward Snowden. It was a slim majority mind you (285 for and 281 against) but that’s democracy for you. The MEP’s urged member states to, “drop any criminal charges against Edward Snowden, grant him protection and consequently prevent extradition or rendition by third parties, in recognition of his status as whistle-blower and international human rights defender,” in a press release.

The press release goes on to say, “Parliament is concerned about “recent laws in some member states that extend surveillance capabilities of intelligence bodies”, including in France, the UK and the Netherlands. It is also worried by revelations of mass surveillance of telecommunications and internet traffic inside the EU by the German foreign intelligence agency BND in cooperation with the US National Security Agency (NSA).” So it would appear that the EU is not too bad an outfit after all. Oddly there is not much coverage of this in our media, but oh, look there’s a princess. There’s absolutely no mention of this story on our beloved, unbiased, BBC. Maybe someone missed it?

A Princess

A Princess

And finally, 343 UK university professors say they will “halt all cooperation with Israeli schools in an effort to draw attention to Israel’s violations of international law.” The action is part of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions campaign which aims to” boycott Israel as part of  non-violent resistance to defend the Palestinian cause.” Surely such a move would be bound to feature in the organs of the UK state? Well they don’t appear on the BBC, although BDS appeared back in July. Look there’s Harry! Is that a potential princess he’s with? Phwoar.