Pat Kane: What force should an independent Scotland exert on the world stage?

Unless we have a self-extinguishing instinct (not entirely to be discounted), the consequence of two world wars – ending with a display of our potential collective annihilation – should be a drive towards what Immanuel Kant called “perpetual peace”.

A majority of Scots want to be inside a European Union that has, at its core, the idea of a zone where war between nations is structurally impossible. A large minority wants us to be represented in the comity of the United Nations, itself born out of the horror and exhaustion of 1945.

Another majority would like the removal of Trident nuclear weapons from Scottish soil. Yet another majority would also like an independent Scotland to join Nato, which is an alliance guaranteed by powers brandishing nukes. Scotland may be lucky in its confusion, being kept out of the organisation as it executes the former ambition.

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But military realism is visibly seeping under the door of Scottish independence politics – and it’s worth the watching, as it blurs lines and principles.

There’s an awful lot to say about the UK Government’s announcement this week of a new “Union Division”, as part of its future plans for the armed forces. It means an objective increase in soldiery and military spending in Scotland. And of course, it’s draped in the language of “pooling and sharing” and the “benefits of staying part of the UK”.

But c’mon. An increased military presence that explicitly identifies with “the Union” is also obviously a message to any of the indy-minded who might be considering autonomous referenda or any other Catalan-style secessionist moves. Message received.

Yet I was intrigued by the response of Stewart McDonald, the SNP’s military spokesman, which was that the Union Division was a “politicising” act. “Attempts like this to politicise serving personnel, who choose to go into a career in uniform with a desire to protect, is a sign of how desperate the Conservative government has become,” said the MP.

There’s a huge amount underlying this language. “Desire to protect” assumes a range of imperative threats to the Scottish “homeland”. Is that, in fact, the case? McDonald certainly thinks so.

He’s been tweeting about “the growing aggression and challenge to open societies presented by authoritarian states such as China and Russia… This is something that all liberal societies – not least in the EU – are struggling, and at times failing, to deal with robustly.”

Using insider military jargon like “robust posture” and “evolving threat profile”, McDonald goes on to tweet the “key pillars” of foreign policy for an independent Scotland: “1: A North Atlantic neighbour. 2: A good global citizen. 3: Multilateral institutions. 4: A modern armed forces. 5: A resilient state”. In the left-wing journal Conter, James Foley calls these “Natoist platitudes”.

Maybe. It’s worth assessing each one, for what they imply for the independence case. Which, in McDonald’s mind, “must look, sound and feel different to the last one”.

Scotland as a “North Atlantic neighbour” assumes the actions of an aggressive, territorially expansionist Russia, particularly as the Northern/Arctic trade passage opens up due to ice melt and global warming. Given the win-win for all parties, due to increased commerce from this development, are we supposed to just agree Scotland should fall in with force projection as the leading tactic here (which Nato membership, under American leadership, will imply)?

A “good global citizen” invites a multitude of interpretations. Certainly, one could imagine an independent Scotland as an exemplar of this in many ways. For example, setting aggressive zero-carbon standards. Or having a welcoming, considerate stance towards asylum seeking and migrancy. Or showing what a wellbeing-led economy, rather than growth-led economy, looks like. To be fair, I don’t see McDonald demurring from all that.

Yet “multilateral institutions” are not unproblematic, per se. Given Nato’s role in provoking aggression, by their extended influence into Russia’s border states, I’d still prefer an Irish or Finnish “partnership for peace” arrangement for an independent Scotland. This would allow some strategic distancing from the organisation’s moves.

Does McDonald mean that an independent Scotland would fall in with multilateral, intelligence-sharing networks like “Five Eyes” – comprising of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United States and (one assumes) rUK? Current talk about the expansion of the Five Eyes, maybe to include Germany, South Korea, Japan and others, is always conducted under the spectre of “growing Chinese aggressiveness”.

Given the extraordinary failures and faults of Western intelligence in recent years – from WMDs to Snowden’s revelations – should this be the kind of “multilateral institution” that Scotland falls in with, in order to be geopolitically “grown-up”? Again, might not independence imply the ability to make more nuanced geo-strategic choices?

“A modern armed forces” for an independent Scotland again invites wide interpretation. In November 2020, McDonald and Alyn Smith made a submission to the integrated review that produced the “Union Division”.

The paper is a mix. There is principle there. It calls for some form of professional representation for soldiers’ work and conditions. It also makes a request for the UK Government to stop evading legislation against Lethal Autonomous Weapons – and to tighten up drone usage.

BUT there’s also sheer self-interest (a military-industrial appeal to support 38,400 defence sector workers with better targeted investment, and no mention of “swords into ploughshares” or non-defence conversion). There’s also a creepy paragraph that engages with the UK Special Forces, their “valuable work in some of the most dangerous theatres in the world” and their need for “secrecy”.

But the creepiest point in McDonald’s list is the ambition for a “resilient state”. In their submission to the integrated review, they call for a kind of volunteer “citizens corps” in Scotland. One that “would help to bridge the civilian-military gap and ensure that every citizen of this country is aware of their role in providing a ‘total defence’ against hybrid threats, natural disasters or health crises”.

McDonald said to the New Statesman last year that we might need such a national service — “whether we were dealing with a shock weather event, a shock economic event, a pandemic or the extremely unlikely scenario of a kinetic invasion”.

Haud on a wee minute. I know “Team Scotland” is an attractive metaphor for SNP government political elites – but “Platoon Scotland”? Really? (Again, note McDonald’s security-state jargon of “kinetic invasion”.) I can imagine quite a few other ways one might help the Scottish population deal with the turbulence of the coming years.

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Take Universal Basic Income (and Services) and a shortened working week, for example. This would enable people to have more time for their lives as active, imaginative citizens, not just working-to-consume units.

However, this implies a Scottish state with a vision to shape our political economy, seizing the opportunity of ecological post-growth and labour-saving automation. Instead of one that dragoons us to “bridge the military-civilian gap”, using our free time to stay vigilant to the threats of “hybrid warfare” (mostly solved by turning off your social media, more often than not).

In summary, McDonald’s position – that there is some realm of military provision which Scots might agree is “unpoliticised” – is deeply worrying. We must make conscious choices about the utility of force in our new nation state. We’re not children, comforted by platitudes.

Do we want a Scotland independent in the world? Of course we do. However, should it just fit effortlessly into the current security structure, our gears meshing smoothly with the rhetorical machinery of the next cold war? I thought the whole point of this exercise was that Stephen Maxwell’s “moral community” of Scotland would express itself. Was I wrong?