Tuesday 28 February 2017

Nation Revisited # 125 March 2017

Communication

Every political party is a coalition of various factions; left and right, north and south, town and country, Catholic and
Protestant, and pro and anti-European.

The Tory Party's 330 MPs are divided between 'One Nation' Tories under Theresa May and hard right reactionaries led by Boris Johnson and Liam Fox.

The Labour Party's 230 MPs are split between the general
membership led by Jeremy Corbyn and the parliamentary party which is leaderless and despondent.



The Liberal Democrats' 9 MPs are united on the main issues and they lead the fight against Brexit in England.

Ukip only have one MP, Tory defector Douglas Carswell. Their leader, Paul Nuttall, was defeated in the Stoke-on-Trent Central by-election.

The Greens also have one MP, the talented, intelligent and attractive Caroline Lucas.

The extra-parliamentary left wing parties follow their long-dead leaders; Marx, Trotsky, and Mao. Their main function is organising riots and trying to stop free speech.

The numerous parties of the far-right have been completely eclipsed by Ukip. In the Stoke-on-Trent Central by-election the BNP was even beaten by the Loony Party.

Our only hope lies in information and education. We will not be saved by the spirits of our ancestors, our genetic heritage, or our knowledge of Freemasonry, but if we can persuade enough people to stop reading The Daily Mail, we might rescue our country from plutocracy. The answer is to avoid factions and devote ourselves to reading, writing and communication.

Years of Neglect

Britain’s problems did not just happen. Earthquakes and hurricanes just happen but the underfunding of the National Health Service, our chronic housing shortage, prison overcrowding, and our low wage economy are the result of years of neglect by Labour and Tory governments. These problems were not caused by immigration but they are aggravated by it. The loss of industrial jobs is the result of global capitalism, automation, and mass migration that has been encouraged by greedy bosses looking for cheap labour.

Both major parties have had an equal share of government since the war but they have failed to build a successful economy. The Labour Party usually increases public spending and taxes the working class into poverty. The Tories cut benefits and give tax breaks to the rich. But neither of them keep their election promises.

The Socialist Party of Great Britain was the original party of the working man. It predates the Labour Party and the Communists Party and has always had a comprehensive manifesto. Mosley’s Union Movement was the same; it had policies for everything. But some of the little parties are single issue groups with little understanding of economics.

Political parties should publish detailed manifestos and be held to them by law. They should be accountable for their actions, apart from events beyond their control, like a war, or a worldwide slump. When Dave Cameron promised to reduce immigration to the tens of thousands and then let in over 300,000, he should have been arrested and charged with electoral fraud, or something similar.



The House of Lords should be replaced by a Senate charged with monitoring the House of Commons. It should have the power to dismiss ministers who go back on their promises, and MPs who are caught fiddling their expenses.

Ukip have made promises that can't be kept. We import half
of our food and fuel but we have not fed ourselves as a nation since the eighteenth century, and despite having 1.6 million unemployed we still need immigrants. If we ban Europeans we will simply import Afro-Asians in their place.

Theresa May has promised a golden future for the UK when we leave the EU. We are enjoying a temporary boom because of devaluation but it will inevitably lead to inflation. And we will not save money on membership fees because we will face a divorce settlement of £60 billion.

Our politicians have been dishonest but nothing will be done to punish them. Throwing them out is not good enough. They should face imprisonment and disqualification from public office. That might stop them from telling lies and making impossible promises.

Islam and the Reich

The atrocities committed by Muslim terrorists around the world are inexcusable. And so are the murders committed by nominal Christians such as David Copeland in the UK, Anders Breivik in Norway, Dylann Roof in the USA, and Alex Bissonnette in Canada.

Crimes against humanity are universal and Muslims have often been the victims. Professor Ataullah Bogdan Kopanski tells the story of the Crimean Tartars in his essay Islam and the Reich, available from Steven Books.

In the Crimea, under the rule of General Manstein, the Muslims enjoyed full religious freedom. The mosques were opened in all towns, and muezzins called faithful Crimeans from minarets to prayer. Austrian Alfred Fraunfeld was nominated as a Generalkommissar for the Crimean Peninsula and he was very sympathetic to Muslim requests. He ordered the establishment of national Islamic-orientated schools for Tartars. The German administration granted the Tartars full political rights. In 1942, many exiled Muslim intellectuals returned from Turkey and Romania to the Crimea. Imams provided Islamic religious services to the Tartar troops. The Germans sponsored radio broadcasts aired an Islamic khutbas on Fridays. The Germans planned to open a new Muslim university in Akmacet (Simferopol), but the Russo-Anglo-American allies forced the Germans to withdraw from the Crimea.

Stalinist AV Mokrusov’s death squads raided and burnt 128 Tartar villages. Mokrusov’s partisans exterminated the Muslim population in Prolom, Alach, Kara Elstiza, Kasan, Baksan and Beshui. They kidnapped young Muslim girls, and after raping them, mutilated them.

In 1943, the German authority of the Crimea restored the institution of the Mufti, abolished by the Bolsheviks. In Berlin, the new Mufti, Ozenbashi, guided the Crimean Tartars until April 1944, when the Soviet army had re-conquered Crimea. During the first two weeks of the anti-Tartar Pogroms Soviet soldiers had murdered 12,000 Muslims. In Achjar (Simferopol) the streets were lined with corpses hanging from tree branches and telephone poles. Even women and children were shot without trial or formal charges. One witness reported that intoxicated Soviet soldiers raped Tartar children.

In 1945, the former ancient mosque of Yalta, was converted into a guest house, for the “Big Three”, Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt where they signed the notorious Yalta Treaty, which divided Europe into American and Soviet zones of subjugation for the next 50 years. During the conference, Stalin said to Churchill: “Eastern and central Europe will not be permitted to group themselves into any federations or association…The rest of Europe will be reduced to military and political impotence.”

The Will of the People


Maximilien Robespierre (1758-1789) was a French lawyer who believed implicitly in "the will of the people." His Committee of Public Safety sent 16,594 men and women to the guillotine and shot and bayonetted to death another 25,000. Anyone accused of flouting "the will of the people" was deemed to be an enemy of the Republic and duly executed. No defence was possible and no mercy was shown. Eventually the Revolution devoured its incorruptible prosecutor. Robespierre was charged with treason and beheaded on the orders of his own blood-stained committee.

Two centuries later we are hearing again about "the will of the people." The 52% that voted to leave the EU have been glorified by the popular press and the 48% who voted to stay are vilified as traitors.

History is littered with politicians like Robespierre who were  executed by their own henchmen. At the moment "good old Nigel" is basking in the approval of the mob but when our economy collapses and we are overrun with Africans and Asians sent to replace the Poles; then he should take that job in America.

The Ukippers want to return to 1972 when we were still an "independent" state. In that turbulent year 23 million working days were lost to strikes. Brigadier Frank Kitson urged the army to prepare for civil unrest.  Unemployment doubled and inflation reached 8%. In Birmingham 40,000 engineers went on strike forcing the closure of the Saltley coke depot. The government took emergency measures to preserve coal stocks as Arthur Scargill led gangs of flying pickets. The dock workers threatened strike action and the construction workers went on strike. Twenty-four trade unionists were arrested, including Ricky Tomlinson, in an incident known as the Shrewsbury 24. To think, that we gave all this up to join Europe.

The Failure of the Far-Right
Minority political parties don't win elections but they have a responsibility to inform and educate their supporters. Left wing parties like the Socialist Party of Great Britain have been campaigning for over a hundred years. They have never attracted a mass following but they have introduced thousands of people to their political and economic ideas. Many activists in the trade unions and the Labour Party were influenced by the SPGB and similar socialist groups. They have helped to create a climate of opinion.
But their opposite numbers on the far-right relied on crude sloganeering and never developed an ideology. Their economic policies dated from before the war when we still had an empire, and so did their obsessive racism.


John Tyndall was a brave and determined man but he was
an old-fashioned insular Briton. Some of his colleagues had a wider perspective but they failed to speak out against a culture of petty nationalism that inevitably led to Polish workers being attacked. If they had devoted more time to 
educating their followers and less to grandstanding we might have a genuine patriotic party that stands for Britain and Europe; instead of gangs of crusty old reactionaries.

The far-right parties have now been overtaken by Ukip but following Paul Nuttall's failure to win in Stoke-on-Trent, they too are a busted flush. The Tory Party has stolen Ukip's policies and they are turning the UK into an offshore tax haven with the backing of the popular press.

This lurch to the Right in Europe and America is being hailed as a revolt against the Establishment. But men like Donald Trump, Rupert Murdoch, Lord Rothermere, Richard Desmond, and the Barclay Brothers, are pillars of the Establishment. What we are witnessing is an old-fashioned Tory revival. It's not "the will of the people" so much as the power of big business.

Confusion

People often hold two conflicting opinions at the same time. Typically, they want to reduce taxation and increase public
spending. Logical thinking is an acquired skill like playing a musical instrument. Some people have got a natural ability but they still need tuition and practice. Others are tone deaf and some are totally confused. 

I once heard a man in a saloon bar holding forth about immigration. He sounded like an out-and-out racist who wanted to round up all the blacks and sent them home "in banana boats." His admiring entourage nodded in agreement but he ended his outburst with the words: "as I always say - live and let live."

Veteran nationalist Eddy Morrison is an avowed atheist who thinks that religions are based on "falsehoods and fairy tales" but he often invokes the name of Odin. He is entitled to his beliefs but Norse mythology, with its giants, elves, dwarfs, Valkyries, and dragons, is an unlikely choice for someone who does not believe in fairy tales.


The far-right movements are constantly begging but they condemn society for being materialistic and money-grabbing. They want to hang the bankers and blow up the stock exchange but they welcome bequests and operate Paypal
accounts to facilitate donations. 

Before the BNP's spectacular collapse their website featured a picture of a Second World War Spitfire. This turned out to belong to a Polish squadron that had fought in the Battle
of Britain; an unfortunate propaganda image for a party 
running a spiteful campaign against East Europeans who they accused of stealing British jobs.

It's only human to fall into hypocrisy but the far-right make a habit of it. The original British Fascists were founded by a reputed lesbian, Miss Rotha Lintorn-Orman, who drank herself to death at the age of 40. But their modern counterparts frequently engage in fits of moral outrage.



They also co-operated closely with the security forces. Maxwell Knight was a prominent member of the British Fascists who went on to join Oswald Mosley's pre-war movement but he was also an MI5 officer.  

The established parties are just as confused and illogical as the far-right. Perhaps George Bernard Shaw was right when he said that a wise man changes himself to suit society but a fool tries to change society to suit himself; and that's why the world is run by fools.

Marches and Demonstrations
The National Front held some spectacular marches in the seventies. I only went on one of them, the Red Lion Square march of June 1974. I disagreed fundamentally with the NF about Europe but I was persuaded to support the march because it was specifically about immigration.

We assembled at Victoria and marched through London without incident until we got to Holborn where a battle was raging between the police and hundreds of "anti-fascist" demonstrators. Thankfully, there was no contact between us and the mob. We later found out that a student called Kevin Gately, had been killed. This was not surprising as the police were defending themselves with batons against the thugs 
who were attacking them. Thirty-nine officers were injured keeping the peace.


This picture of Paul Barnes, Bill Barnes and me on the 1974 Red Lion Square march is a screenshot from a film by Roger Clare. All three of them are now dead, and, in the words of Joe Cocker: "I don’t feel too good myself."

Despite the threat of Red violence the NF defiantly held marches and demonstrations until their collapse in the early eighties. They were banned from radio and television, constantly misrepresented in the press, and denied the use of public meeting places. Marches were one of the few ways they had to make themselves known.

I was pleased to see the police at the Red Lion Square march and more than forty years later I was pleased to see them when a meeting of the London Forum in Kensington was besieged by a screaming mob of 'anti-fascists'. The police dispersed them and escorted us safely to Gloucester Road Station. Three cheers for the boys in blue.

European Outlook
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