Information Clearing House has today published its transcript of a John Pilger speech in London to a Stop the War fund-raiser, Artists Speak Out.
Britain’s Armed Services Memorial is a silent, haunting place. Set in the rural beauty of Staffordshire, in an arboretum of some 30,000 trees and sweeping lawns, its Homeric figures celebrate determination and sacrifice.
The names of more than 16,000 British servicemen and women are listed. The literature says they “died in operational theatre or were targeted by terrorists”.
On the day I was there, a stonemason was adding new names to those who have died in some 50 operations across the world during what is known as “peacetime”. Malaya, Ireland, Kenya, Hong Kong, Libya, Iraq, Palestine and many more, including secret operations, such as Indochina.
Not a year has passed since peace was declared in 1945 that Britain has not sent military forces to fight the wars of empire.
Not a year has passed when countries, mostly poor and riven by conflict, have not bought or have been “soft loaned” British arms to further the wars, or “interests”, of empire.
Empire? What empire? The investigative journalist Phil Miller recently revealed in Declassified that Boris Johnson’s Britain maintained 145 military sites – call them bases — in 42 countries. Johnson has boasted that Britain is to be “the foremost naval power in Europe”.
In the midst of the greatest health emergency in modern times, with more than 4 million surgical procedures delayed by the National Health Service, Johnson has announced a record increase of £16.5 billion in so-called defence spending – a figure that would restore the under-resourced NHS many times over.
But these billions are not for defence. Britain has no enemies other than those within who betray the trust of its ordinary people, its nurses and doctors, its carers, elderly, homeless and youth, as successive neo-liberal governments have done, Conservative and Labour.
Exploring the serenity of the National War Memorial, I soon realised there was not a single monument, or plinth, or plaque, or rosebush honouring the memory of Britain’s victims — the civilians in the “peacetime” operations commemorated here.
There is no remembrance of the Libyans killed when their country was wilfully destroyed by Prime Minister David Cameron and his collaborators in Paris and Washington.
There is no word of regret for the Serbian women and children killed by British bombs, dropped from a safe height on schools, factories, bridges, towns, on the orders of Tony Blair; or for the impoverished Yemeni children extinguished by Saudi pilots with their logistics and targets supplied by Britons in the air-conditioned safety of Riyadh; or for the Syrians starved by “sanctions”.
There is no monument to the Palestinian children …
A literally peerless journalist, a source of inspiration to many.
Agreed.
Hello Philip. Any thoughts on the vaccination programme? I have noticed that the BBC website has got a clause, as it were, in the small print that permits an opt out. The clause occurs about 2/3 of the way down:
“It won’t be compulsory though – no other vaccines in the UK are – as experts say this wouldn’t help create confidence in the vaccine.”
This intrigues me. It seems clear they want everyone to accept vaccination but the matter of “creating confidence” is clearly a major issue .
However, the logic of the virus narrative as given on the media inevitably leads to compulsory vaccination. If this virus is truly as lethal as made out then the justification is there to make it mandatory.
I work in care with vulnerable adults and will therefore have priority. Given the choice, I would refuse. But I suspect there will be an increasing scale of coercion. And I have read quite a disturbing article on the Daily Beast which advocates markers for those who refuse the vax. It honestly recalls Nazi Germany.
Of course these journalists blow off steam all the time so this may be on the level of the “shock jock” syndrome. Any thoughts?
Not really George – had my eye on other stuff. Would you consider writing a guest post?
‘Britain’ has enemies all right, but most of them can be found either in Westminster, MI5 & 6 headquarters, Scotland Yard, or in the City of London. There are probably a few more in Tel Aviv, Wall Street, Tory party and Labour headquarters, but generally – that’s it.
Unfortunately the Army is no defence against these.
The glimmers of hope I can see for the future are:- the dissolution of the UK due to Scottish independence and Irish re-unification, and the growing incompetence of both the UK and US governments. These two Neo-con regimes are proving to be more and more incapable of effective action. Trump and Johnston have both clearly shown that they are clueless to promote their preferred causes, while China and Russia are able to run rings round them. France and Egypt are in conflict with Turkey, the EU is in conflict with Poland and Hungary, and China has signed up most of South Asia including Japan to its new trade deal.
As Alfred Bester once said, “Tension, apprehension and dissension have begun” – “Interesting times”.