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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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I think my relationship with the BBC is finally settling into something quite satisfactory. Having been through the stages of disillusion, mistrust, contempt and loathing I now find that I have reached the point where I now regard the BBC as reasonably reliable reverse indicator.
For example, whenever the BBC presents an event as a spontaneous outburst of public feeling, I immediately turn my mind to the possibility that it is anything but.
A case to consider is this series of nationwide anti-war protests by schoolchildren:
Hundreds of children are among crowds protesting at Westminster.
School children have been played a big part in many demonstrations across the UK while others have staged their own protests at their schools.
Sixth-former Sam Beste, from Fortismere School in north London, has organised many protests against the war.
He is staging a demonstration with dozens of others in Muswell Hilll before heading for Westminster.
In Carlisle, the police were called to a school after hundreds of pupils staged an anti-war demonstration.
There were two separate demonstrations in Belfast with more than 1,000 students and schoolchildren mounting a sit-down protest, blocking the road outside Queen’s University.
In Nottinghamshire, more than 100 pupils walked out of lessons at West Bridgford School to stage a demonstration on a nearby playing field.
In Manchester, about 200 school children joined a big demonstration.
The article makes no specific claims but first impressions would lead one to believe that these pre-pubescent protests are just breaking out everywhere like typhoid. Who knows, maybe they are. I certainly cannot prove anything but, for me, this wave of teenybopper discontent bears all the hallmarks of orchestration. And, if that is so, who are the conductors?
Far be it from me to point the dirty end of the stick at their teachers and lecturers, but it would not be an entirely unreasonable inquiry to make. Just don’t expect anyone at the BBC to make it.
Polly Toynbee, doyenne of the transnational progressive movement and all-round-leftist prig, is shocked, shocked! that Tony Blair’s forthright denunciation of France’s perfidy over Iraq is damaging our prospects of getting deeper into bed with the Eurofederalists…
Once again <drums roll!> – excellent! Let’s hope that a woman who is so consistently wrong is actually correct on this one!
The Cuban Human Rights Commission reports 65 dissidents, mainly independent journalists, have been arrested in a three day crackdown.
Castro, as cynical as ever, is taking advantage of the world’s attention being focussed on the overthrow of another Socialist military dictator.
Paul Staines
For those who have not yet heard of Salam Pax, here is his latest entry:
the all clear siren just went on.
The bombing aould come and go in waves, nothing too heavy and not yet comparable to what was going on in 91. all radio and TV stations are still on and while the air raid began the Iraqi TV was showing patriotic songs and didn’t even bother to inform viewers that we are under attack. at the moment they are re-airing yesterday’s interview with the minister of interior affairs. THe sounds of the anti-aircarft artillery is still louder than the booms and bangs which means that they are still far from where we live, but the images we saw on Al Arabia news channel showed a building burning near one of my aunts house, hotel pax was a good idea. we have two safe rooms one with “international media” and the other with the Iraqi TV on. every body is waitingwaitingwaiting. phones are still ok, we called around the city a moment ago to check on friends. Information is what they need. Iraqi TV says nothing, shows nothing. what good are patriotic songs when bombs are dropping
Add another perspective to the real-time war on our screens…which is, by the way, an astounding technological feat.
Eight Royal Marines and four Americans were killed in a non-combat related helicopter crash last night.
In an interesting Order of Battle snippet, it is also now clear that 3 Commando Brigade (Royal Marines) is fighting with a battalion of US Marines under the control of its HQ. As RM and USMC often train together and have famously cordial relations, I suppose this is not all that surprising.
Also, it is being reported that 3 Commando Brigade (Royal Marines) have secured the strategic Al Faw Oil Facility. I assume the success of this operation on the Al Faw peninsula will lead to a move towards Basra next, which Sky News reported has come under air attack this morning.
Astonishing pictures of some significant fighting in the town of Safwan were coming out live on television this morning (UK time), showing that some elements of the Iraqi army were putting up a fight against USMC forces. A group of USMC vehicles could be seen pouring machinegun and grenade launcher fire into Iraqi positions, and gunship helicopters were seen firing cannon and rocket fire to suppress outgoing Iraqi gunfire.
It now seems that taking the border town of Umm Qasr, reported to have fallen to the allies last night, required more fighting that was initially claimed by US news reports. USMC mechanized infantry was apparently pinned down by Iraqi fire for two hours, requiring Royal Marine artillery support before the advance could resume.
On the left flank of the allied move into Iraq, forward elements of the US 3rd Infantry Division are reported to be as much as 90 miles in from the Kuwaiti border and although as of now (08:40 GMT) the US division is reported to be stationary whilst it refuels, there does not seem to have been any serious opposition yet to what is probably the main American advance.
18:45 GMT Ministry of Defence sources are reporting that British ground forces are now engaged with the enemy in southern Iraq.
Earlier reports indicate USMC artillery and gunship helicopters were also in action in the 5 km wide demilitarised zone along the Kuwaiti border.
Update: 18:45 GMT: M.O.D. has announced that 3 Commando Brigade (Royal Marines), supported by RAF Harriers & Tornados plus US Navy SEALs, have launched an ‘offensive’ against the Al Faw peninsula in southern Iraq.
Update: 21:30 GMT: The attack by 3 Commando Brigade (40 & 42 Commando plus artillery, HQ and logistic assets) on the Al-Faw peninsula was initiated with a fast hovercraft mounted amphibious assault which put the Royal Marines assets ashore along with supporting Scimitar light tanks of the Royal Dragoon Guards. The Brigade is said to have now ‘moved inshore and though its initial objectives’.
We have got the war we argued for. Now we who called for it can only pray that the cost is not too terrible for the soldiers of the United States and Britain, nor of course for the long suffering hapless people of Iraq. At this moment of truth for the Anglosphere I have very few words of my own right now that do not stick in my throat, so I will just quote Julia Ward Howe’s famous song (large file) that was also sung at the funeral of Winston Churchill.
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored,
He has loosed the fateful lightening of His terrible swift sword
His truth is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.
I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps
l can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps
His day is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.
I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnish’d rows of steel,
“As ye deal with my contemners, So with you my grace shall deal;”
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel
Since God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.
He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.
God speed, Gentlemen.
Here in my office, the early stages of the war in Iraq are accompanied by a sort of low, whining tone of complaint from colleagues seated all around. Some are actually joking about Saddam’s taunts at Bush. What big men and women they are.
I have tried in my own mind to figure out what goes on inside the heads of supposedly intelligent people – folk with university degrees, who can produce work of great skill and complexity, but who, on this terrible issue of the day have the moral intelligence of total imbeciles. A sort of collective death wish seems to have gripped whole swathes of the smarter elements in our population. I am not just talking about the usual assholes on the far Left, mind you. Let’s not forget the head-in-the-sand isolationists with whom we occasionally mix in the libertarian parish. Not to mention the Pat Buchanan-style wackjobs either.
When this whole dreadful period in our history is over, and I hope really soon, I would like to renew my request to the anti-war folk who I would broadly classify as libertarian as to what they would actually do when confronted with terror and state sponsors of terror. And let’s have answers instead of the usual “we had it coming in the past so in future we should keep our heads down” evasions.
As the decibel count rises amid the drumbeat of war, we try to do what we can to see the cheery side of things. These are grim times, but my fervent hope is that in a few decades, Baghdad will be the Hong Kong of the Middle East, al-Quaeda and Saddam will be a distant memory, Iraq will be one of the richest countries on the planet, Jacques Chirac will have been put behind bars, the EU will be just a free trade zone and Samizdata will have more readers than Fox, CNN and the BBC combined.
But what has really fired my determination to be optimistic is the report, in today’s Financial Times (only available in print edition), that quintessential British media megastar Basil Brush, emblem of all that is finest about this island, is to release a pop record. Magnificent.
(Apologies to non-Brit readers. The last paragraph will be totally meaningless).
I’ve had half an eye on British TV all evening, and you might be quite surprised how gung-ho it has rather suddenly become. Finally, we are getting all the stuff about what a total bastard Saddam Hussain is, from fearsome looking guys with towels on their heads. On Newsnight they’re now discussing the nuances of the fighting that might happen, with an elderly military guy who sounds confident and expert and who I’ve never seen before. Funny how war seems to cause all manner of total strangers suddenly to pop up in TV studios.
All this makes me remember that there is just one more guess about this “war” that I want now to get on the samizdata record before events overtake me and leave me having to say: “I said that! Didn’t I say that?!” So now let me say it.
There’s been a lot of grumbling in the blogosphere, and from the likes of Mark Steyn and many others, about how absurdly delayed this “war” has been, and what a “rush to war” there hasn’t been.
The dominant explanation of this now is that Dumbo the Elephant alias George W. Bush has been standing like a greyhound in the slips (Henry V – please pardon the mixing of the animal metaphors) and that Tranzi Tony Blair has been restraining Dumbo with a lot of flummery about the UN, World Opinion, and other such foolishnesses not held in very high regard in our corner of the blogosphere.
But what if the reason the “war” has been so delayed is that it has taken a long time to get it ready? If I understand the Americans correctly they’ve been planning this war since 9/12. And one of the things they have been most concerned to achieve is low casualties, on both sides. And one of the most important ways they’ve been setting about how to get that result is by throwing technology at the problem. → Continue reading: What if the wait turns out to be worth it?
War looms but life goes on. I’ve been reading Steven Pinker’s The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature. Quite a few surprises already. I didn’t realise quite how vicious and unscrupulous the hostility towards sociobiology has been. But some of the book has been tough going, and in the toilet this morning I dipped into the later stuff I haven’t yet got to officially. I found myself in what I later identified to be Chapter 20, entitled “The Arts”, and in it I came across this (on page 416 of my 2002 BCA paperback edition):
As for sneering at the bourgeoisie, it is a sophomoric grab at status with no claim to moral or political virtue. The fact is that the values of the middle class – personal responsibility, devotion to family and neighborhood, avoidance of macho violence, respect for liberal democracy – are good things, not bad things. Most of the world wants to join the bourgeoisie, and most artists are members in good standing who adopted a few bohemian affectations. Given the history of the twentieth century, the reluctance of the bourgeoisie to join mass utopian uprisings can hardly be held against them.
What is startling is not the sentiments themselves. They are all pretty obvious stuff, certainly to me. What is pleasing is who is saying them, and in what context.
Pinker is a respected scientist and scholar, and a fearless and extremely capable defender of his scientific speciality – and scientific decency in general – against the attacks on it, both from the left (who accuse him and his ilk of being “genetic determinists”) and the religious right (who accuse him and his ilk of reducing the soul to a mere bodily function). The Blank Slate is only one of several very good books that Pinker has written. He’s relatively young, a personable and winning TV presence, and a terrific scientific synthesiser and populariser. To encounter notions that you usually expect to find only in the windy and ignorant writings of people who have swallowed the entire right-wing package and nothing else, and are booming forth with it in something like The Daily Mail or The Sun, is most pleasing. → Continue reading: Steven Pinker on modern art
So it appears that we are now a few days, or possibly even a few hours, away from being engaged in an honest-to-goodness, actual, balls-out, fighting war. Despite the misgivings of Antoine Clarke, I believe HM forces will acquit themselves admirably although there is no doubt that the bulk of the war effort will fall upon the much larger US contingent.
We are here now because Tony Blair has prevailed over the anti-war sentiments of much of his own party. Without wishing to sing his praises per se, he has confounded the sizeable number of British commentators who believed that he did not possess the spine to see through his pro-war commitment. He clearly does and he clearly has. Last night’s vote in the House of Commons, on a motion to delay hostilities with Iraq, was defeated despite a record number of Labour rebels voting for it and, ironically, with most of the opposition Conservatives voting against.
Of the Conservatives who voted for the motion, some are undoubtedly what Mark Steyn has called ‘defeatist patricians’. In all but name they are Social Democrats and are driven by sentiments that are not so much anti-American as they are pro-EU. For them, the top-down, corporatist paternalism of Europe is much more resonant of the natural order of things than the racey vulgarity they see as intrinsic to the American way of doing thigs.
But there are others on the British right who are vigourously opposed to Britain taking any part in the attack on Iraq not because they harbour anti-American sentiments (indeed, they heartily reject such nonsense) but because they believe that it is not in British national interests to do so. They are far from confident that any US administration would go to bat for Britain in the way that Britain has gone to bat for America and whilst this may or may not prove to be the case, they (and I) do have genuine cause for complaint about the kid gloves that successive US administrations have put on when dealing with the IRA.
However, it would appear that at least some of isolationist argument in this regard is based on the erroneous (and largely left-inspired) view that Tony Blair is merely acting as George Bush’s ‘poodle’; that he will get his ‘orders’ direct from Washington and that he will send British troops off to yomp around the planet in whatever direction the Whitehouse commands.
It is this kind of thing that makes for good copy, but it is not actually true. For good or for bad, Blair has very much acted as his own man throughout this whole affair. Had it not been for Tony Blair, the Americans would almost certainly have not agreed to take (the ultimately fruitless) UN route to disarming Saddam. Had George Bush had his way, the war in Iraq would, by now, have been over and done with. Try telling anyone in Washington that Tony Blair is their ‘poodle’. I think you will be sharply disabused of any such view. → Continue reading: The widening channel
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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