EU foreign policy is an antidote to the tragedy of reckless missions

Firstly is the reasonable position of many in Europe that Nato, having largely outlived its original purpose, has developed into little more than a system of outdoor relief for the huge US arms manufacturers – the talk being entirely of extra percentage of national wealth to be spent on defence, which is entirely the wrong way round. What should be asked is what is wanted, what we want doing, why do we want to do that and what is the most efficient way of doing it – spreading the cost between partners and both avoiding duplication and allowing speculation. What we have now intellectually resembles the poor, old Maginot Line – which would have been a very useful thing to have in the era before it was built but less and less so as things change and it continues to gobble up scarce resources. The speed of its final collapse into irrelevance will depend on future US administrations, faster with a Trump-style isolationist one but only slower under more sane Biden ones who see its utility for their donors in the arms industry.

I imagine the associated status of partners for peace will go down at the same rate as the core body.

Given an analysis of US decoupling and decreasing reliability, I find it reasonable that the members of the EU would want to establish a single defence union. I understand it to be an extension of the long-term Franco-German co-operation to bring in as many of the other member states as far as they are comfortable, giving the savings of working to common standards, avoiding duplication and allowing specialisation.

I think that it is part of what is meant on the single market tin – if one wants into the EU, that is part of the consequences to be embraced, and if one doesn’t, they are consequences to be avoided.

This basic in-out choice is one Cllr Doig has thoroughly discussed between us before at various venues and I doubt that either of us will re-evaluate our position before things have developed further.

I honestly can’t imagine such a European alliance involving itself in the Middle Eastern adventures of the US, with UK Governments acting as their over-enthusiastic hunting dog.

People may have good reason to criticise EU inertia from time to time. In this context it should prove a good antidote to sudden foreign adventures and their tragic consequences.

David Rowe

Beith

I WATCHED the Alex Salmond Show on Thursday and they were continuing the discussion on coronavirus from last week and why some countries were doing better than others at containing the virus.

South Korea, South Vietnam and New Zealand were all worthy of mention. These countries saw what had happened in China and introduced a quarantine curtain around their countries. Mass test-and-trace systems were put in place and anyone found with coronavirus was isolated in hospital, not sent home to self-isolate. In this way these countries clamped down on the virus, suppressing it whilst allowing those free from the virus to get on with their daily lives and keep the country paying its way. This, of course, was the advice from the World Health Organisation (WHO) at the time – test, trace, isolate.

In the programme, Salmond interviewed two people from the Faroe Islands (a dependency of Denmark). There they used the labs set up to monitor the health of fish – 95% of the economy of Faroe comes from fishing. By adapting a system that was already in place they were able to test on a grand scale and get the results back very quickly, speedy intervention by mass testing and tracing, along with a local test laboratory, was the key to their success.

Some years back the UK Government did a big practical exercise to see how the NHS would cope faced with an epidemic. It failed miserably, the system collapsed and yet nothing really changed. The UK had the same warning, possibly more than countries such as South Vietnam and South Korea, yet even as the virus swept across Europe, the Government sat on its thumb, then went into panic mode and closed the country down, to save the NHS from imminent collapse, trashing our economy in the process since the healthy along with the sick were stood down.

Six months on and we still do not have a handle on this virus, yet the Government is now using the media to put out the message that all is well, it is safe to go back to work, safe to go into pubs and children are safe to go back to school. All this and still not heeding the warnings of the WHO (and in some cases, people seem to be in total denial that coronavirus is a threat).

This is a war we are fighting and the whole country should be mobilised to fight that war. Only now, six months into this disaster, are we seeing more test facilities set up. Is this not too little, too late?

We have a huge Army, Navy and Air Force at our disposal, all with the logistical experience and equipment of any modern army in the world. Why have they not been mobilised in ever village town and city across the country?

Let’s get a handle on this before our society collapses. Let’s get the healthy safely back to work and the sick in isolation where they can be looked after properly and the NHS back to what it was doing before coronavirus: looking after the health of the nation.

Walter Hamilton

via email

WHEN the Hanoverian, Anglo/Brit/English army invaded Scotland in 1746, in pursuit of a Scottish Jacobite army, led by our own Scottish crown prince, Charles Edward Stewart, they brought with them a new song, which was sweeping England at the time. A London magazine had printed it in full, with all the verses directly insulting Scotland and the Scots.

From the point of view of the English, this was an excellent anti-Scottish song, written a year earlier to rouse the English against the Scottish Jacobite invasion of England. It would now be used as the theme song to accompany the Hanoverian ethnic-cleansing campaign, when, after their lucky victory at Culloden, they set up 400 army camps from the border right out to the Western Isles and up to the Orkney Isles. There they would stay ensconced for 10 long years, sending forth raiding parties in a reign of terror to rape, murder, pillage and steal, confiscate, commandeer and terrorise those inhabitants of the land called Scotland.

They, the Scots, were declared not just foreigners but aliens. This was not just a slur from those red-coated thugs, but an official bill voted through the English Westminster Parliament 40 years earlier in 1705, declaring all Scots aliens, some sort of low-life, not to be accommodated in any way or form, associated with or traded with.

The Royal Navy was to prevent their Scottish flag flying on ships entering English colonies to trade. Although the English delegation agreed to repeal this racist law prior to annexing Scotland in the grand con, called by some the 1707 Treaty of Union, this was just lie number one of the thousands to follow. This Alien Act was not repealed for another 162 years. The Scottish delegation had made it a condition of the Act of Union and made the mistake of taking the English delegation at their word of honour – something they didn’t have.

This left those red coats every loophole to exterminate and deport these aliens. When they burned a croft to the ground, murdered and pillaged at will, it was recorded that they stood to attention and sang this new hit song and, to add insult to injury, they would force it on these aliens to sing it as their own, even though it has three or more verses with anti-Scottish content.

One verse states: “God pray that Marshal Wade will like a torrent rush, rebellious Scots to crush, God Save the King (now Queen).”

It serves no purpose for Scotland. It was the song of the English enemy, and Burns wrote our real anthem – Scots Wha Hae, with Flower Of Scotland as a good stand-in on sporting occasions.

I hope the English find themselves a new non-racist anthem. Meanwhile, this alien will fight on for a sovereign, independent and free Scotland.

Iain Ramsay

Greenock and Inverclyde

THESE are clearly desperate times for Labour, particularly in Scotland. Any promising fresh blood that doesn’t follow the Blairite philosophy has been stifled at birth.

Anyone that mentions the word independence is sent to obscurity. Recognising they are heading for a disastrous Holyrood election, the few who have some vision are ignored or forced to resign or in the past have moved to the SNP, where some of their socialist ideas are championed.

So what can they do? Why hasn’t one of their main players from the past not come out of retirement to save their beloved party? It couldn’t be any of the ermine-loving crew, who prefer to fritter their life away in the warm surroundings of the House of Lords.

It couldn’t be Brown, who played a leading role in the Vow fiasco. But it could be Henry McLeish. He clearly likes to put his tuppence worth in and clearly regrets the financial scandal that brought his career to an end. He could make a difference and perhaps revitalise his ailing party. He no doubt could have been in the House of Lords but has chosen not to be.

If he did return to lead Scottish Labour, perhaps it would bring back some members to the fold. It could start increasing their vote and in doing so, maybe lead them to form a coalition with the SNP at Holyrood. For a party with few options, it’s maybe the best chance they’ve got.

Robin MacLean

Fort Augustus

ISN’T it time we stopped getting riled about the latest, revived Tory mantra about the fabled “once in a generation” claim?

The tone of Annie Wells’s hasty and sort of pally response to Ian Blackford – “come on Ian … can I jog your memory” – is indisputable proof that the Tories are having fun with this one. So let’s remove the toy. If people believe that any plebiscite should be a once-in-a-lifetime chance to influence political change, how would they feel if this applied to general and Scottish elections?

The UK would be permanently Tory and Scotland permanently SNP and we could stop making these silly concessions to democracy as the people will have made their choice. Oops, I hope Dougie Ross doesn’t spy on this paper for his boss or that could be Tory policy by tomorrow!

Noirin Blackie

Haddington

REGARDING the wearing of face coverings, I have a different experience from Alex Leggatt (Letters, September 4). A significant number of people are not wearing them correctly, ie they’re covering their mouths but not their noses, seemingly unaware that the virus is breathed in and out through the nose as well as the mouth. If you don’t cover both, you might as well not be wearing the covering at all.

Whether this is inadvertent or otherwise, it’s effectively non-compliance.

Mo Maclean

Glasgow