FW: Re: No to Nice

["D OC" <donaloc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

My apologies Michael, I sent this to your own address by mistake.


I'm glad that comrade Keaney has responded to my initial post on the No to
Nice campaign. Arguments similar to that he raised are heard from many other
comrades; however, I just do not agree.

First I think MK has made his point abundantly clear:

> The EU is a part of the imperialist chain whose author, coordinator and
ultimate defender is the US. Weakening that chain involves a number of
strategies for different actors across the globe. In Britain the chain is
best weakened by supporting efforts to integrate further into Europe...
It's about appropriate tactics as part of a long-term revolutionary
strategy, with an increasingly short-term proviso that the planet survives
long enough for that strategy to come to fruition. In other words the
urgency of the present developments means that neither the British nor Irish
left has the luxury to imagine that somehow they could go it alone with a
"plague on both your houses" approach to US imperialism and EU
sub-imperialism.

The self-contradiction here is inspiring. For a start MK recognises that the
EU is 'part of the imperialist chain', then he complements this (correct)
assessment with a call to vote for the Nice agreement so that the EU
structures can be strengthened!! This is the principal difficulty with this
argument. It is not hugely dissimilar to that advanced to justify fighting
for the Constitutional Monarchy of the British Empire against the
Dictatorial Monarchies of the German and Austro-Hungarian Empires. The
threat of planetary disaster which Michael holds before us is the equivalent
of the threatened 'rape of your children and wifes' which was hammered into
the minds of my Welsh great-grandparents. In the meantime, the Irish were
asked to fight for the Civilised or objectively 'right' side against the
'evil' hun in return for limited promises.

Today's British social patriots are seemingly ignorant of the fact that
their forces remain in our country and that they are still hated by people
living under their occupation. For Michael to point towards the evils of US
imperialism when his own country has forces in our country and in my village
is shameful to me. He may consider this too subjective but its objective if
you come from my village or county. Being part of an EU rapid reaction force
under the command of British forces (and no doubt Michael would like to see
the day where the 'combined' forces of European imperialists will challenge
those of the US imperialists) is just totally off the geiger-counter in
terms of an insult.

Britain wants out of the Falklands, Gibraltar and Six Counties, Michael
says. They are still here aren't they? They are still trying to recruit
informers, still spying on our people, still stopping cars and abusing
passengers. They are probably more interested in playing a 'bit part' in
support of global US imperialism - hence the fact that the US imperialists
can be used to 'rein' in the Brits in Ireland if enough political pressure
is brought to bear. So we agree to an extent. Michael's alternative is to
build an EU imperialist outlet which might attract the British into that
orbit. The outcome of this - even if successful - is to create two
imperialist blocs and if EU imperialism gets more powerful and feels that it
might be able to challenge US imperialism who knows where we will end up.
That might be a good way of hastening global obliteration? Few expected
Britain and Germany to go to war in 1910 either - it came about quite
suddenly with contradictions reaching antagonism over small incidents and
misunderstandings.

MK asks: Just what of any value does British state and capital derive from
Northern Ireland? He gives the answer: Zilch.

Let's start with supplying his argument with some supporting statistics. The
British state subvents the six counties to the tune of £3.5 billion a year -
that's the difference between revenue taken in through the various forms of
taxation and that spent by the state structures. That's approximately 30% of
the total spend for any pro-Unionists looking for an economic legitimisation
for partition and British involvement in Irish affairs. Of that £3.5
billion - £1.1 billion is spent by the Ministry of Defence and on the RUC -
which get recycled into the military-industrial complex. As many Republicans
have long realised, Britain gains alot in terms of military experience and
development in the six counties. Their Army is far better trained and much
more experienced than the US army. There is very little contest between the
SAS and the US specialist units, e.g. Green Berets, etc. When the US troops
in Afghanistan were having difficulties they had to bring in British
regiments to do much of the tough work. So they gain in terms of military
operations and experience - not something to be sniffed at and perhaps this
might be the reason for the strength of the 'securocrats' - a group who have
no difficulty in raising the possible rejection of New Labour Government
decisions - as illustrated over the past three years here.

Having said that they don't gain much economically from the North - but what
we really need to look at is what risks they run through losing control of
the six counties. These include destabilisation of the whole of the 'United
Kingdom', radicalisation consequent to national democracy in Ireland and the
sort of moral defeat which the British Tories and even Liberal Establishment
would feel.

MK: Re "neutral". A closer look at the activities of Sweden during the Cold
War illustrates the nonsense lurking behind that affectation (e.g.
Bofors)... And what to make of Myles Staunton's and former Irish Attorney
General Peter Sutherland's activities in the Trilateral Commission? Or of
Tony O'Reilly's and former Irish prime minister John Bruton's memberships of
the board of governors of the Ditchley Foundations? Or Albert Reynolds'
"private" diplomatic globe-trotting? No capitalist state is "neutral".

So we are to 'dump' our pseudo-neutrality and go whole hog into the EU Rapid
Reaction Force when it invades Somalia to ensure that French beef keeps its
market share??

MK: If it were it would soon discover the price to be paid, as Harold Wilson
found when he refused to send British troops into Vietnam and Jim Callaghan
discovered when he threatened to rein in public spending by cutting back on
NATO commitments...

This anglo-centric nonsense is disturbing. Harold Wilson is an object of
ridicule amongst Irish Republicans - the man who did nothing to end
Apartheid on his own doorstep. Even British Liberals blame him for the
'troubles' see:
http://www.politicos.co.uk/acatalog/Politicos_Online_How_the_Troubles_Came_t
o_Northern_Ireland_2410.html As for Jim Callaghan, he was the home secretary
who ordered British troops in to quell social unrest in 1969. These are the
paragons of the much more vociferous anti-imperialism which Michael appears
to prefer to Irish neutrality (despite its many failings). It is common for
British leftists to ignore the imperialism of their own forces and to focus
on that of other imperialisms - but that behaviour will not go unchallenged
on this list particularly when it is coupled with an opportunistic criticism
of Irish bourgeois policies.

MK: Any further integration of Europe will involve strengthening of the EU
state apparatus. How can it be otherwise? As it is a capitalist state we
know how this is likely to develop, although there are certain elements of
the EU's constitutional fabric which should not be underestimated as
political, legal and ideological weapons (e.g. charter on human rights,
which significantly improved civil rights under UK law, only for Straw and
Blunkett to desperately try to close those "loopholes". The US-inspired and
led "war on terrorism" which demands global compliance with White House
prerogatives, is only too happy to see the marginalisation of such things as
the convention on human rights, in addition to the Bill of Rights in the
US). We should not underestimate the gains won under bourgeois liberal
hegemony despite our fundamental opposition to that hegemony. These can and
should be used as part of the struggle against EU states' repression, and no
one is denying the validity of the cause. But some more internationalism,
rather than an exclusive emphasis on nationalism, is appropriate in a time
when global capitalism and its guardians seem hell-bent on leading us to
global catastrophe. It's a question of priorities. After all, we would like
there to be a habitable world capable of sustaining a united Ireland and a
Basque republic.

Yet again we are encouraged to support the construction of an admittedly
anti-democratic EU imperialist monolith with threats of human extinction.
The writer appears only too concerned with the 'extinction' of those peoples
in the imperialist centres. Those of us living in colonial and neo-colonial
states have had to suffer prolonged extinction for centuries at the hands of
the imperialist cut-throats. We are also asked whether there can be any
alternatives to 'strengthening the EU state apparatus' then told that TINA.
Yet, MK admits the ability of the US to change EU structures as it desires.
It should be apparent that the EU is being sold as a counter-weight to US
imperialism but in reality will act to solidify it. The so-called social
democratic veneer of EU market reforms conceal a commitment to uniformly
privatising sector after sector. Who's really calling the shots here? We are
being asked to support the creation of a structure which will attempt to
constrain and restain popular dissent. Shouldn't we be trying to reform the
existing structures rather than building new ones?

MK: These same neoliberalist, monetarist structures are strangling economic
growth within the eurozone and thereby dragging down the rest of Europe and,
by extension, the global economy. There is, as I have tried to illustrate in
other posts, a rising tide of official discontent at the constraints of the
stability and growth pact, and even its German authors are no longer
enamoured of it. When Duisenberg retires next year expect to see some sort
of restructuring, if not earlier, depending on how much the crisis deepens.

Is this an argument for supporting even further integration or for
reappraising where we stand and what alternatives exist?

MK: Incidentally, just what sort of policies do you see non-eurozone member
Britain implementing? Are they any less constrained by neoliberal orthodoxy?
The problem is a global one, and the Maastricht Treaty can be seen as an
effort by EU state-builders like Jacques Delors to adhere to what were then
orthodox tenets seen as providing "credibility" to European (and other)
institutions, at a time when the US, in its more liberal "new world order"
phase, was still supportive of deeper EU integration. The Bank of England
has to play by the same rules, as would an independent Bank of Ireland.

England is a bourgeois democracy - a unitary socialist democratic republic
of Ireland might direct an independent Bank on a much more radical
direction. That's a question for the future but if we do as you say we will
have to wait until political circumstances improve across Europe and
foreswear any localised moves. Passing power from our national half-way
democratic forms to unelected bodies isn't my idea of a good way to
progress. I'm for European integration but not on terms such as those
outlined in Nice. I think it was Trotsky who said that a United Europe was
impossible under capitalism - I still think he's right.

D OC


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