Never
able to forget the terrible consequences of war Churchill would be
alert to any possibility of it - or terrorism - the modern method of
Civil War.
He would reflect the swollen
discontent and disillusion with the Common Market which so frequently
results in acts of lawlessness in ill humoured France today. This
would lead him to consider the greater likely discontents of the
poorer European Union Member Countries, (and less politically mature
peoples) and whether they might erupt in IRA or Basque style
discontent and commit acts of terrorism.
On the 14th January 1963, two
years before Churchill died, France, led by President De Gaulle,
announced that she would veto the United Kingdom's accession to the
European Economic Community.
Had Churchill been alive and
active in politics during the next decade he surely would have argued
that whilst the UK was very happy to co-operate in Free Trade
matters, but that any proposal that Gt Britain should join a European
Parliament was unthinkable, as the political independence of Gt
Britain was not negotiable.
Were he alive today he would
undoubtably say that the present EU political pandemonium has been
caused - yet again -
'by
the failure of the Conservative Party to place the absolute
independence of Gt Britain at the centre of its political philosophy;
and that this is also the root cause of the British people's loss of
their historic vision. That a political union of European countries
is impossible, and if attempted, will end in a spectacular crash
causing immense antagonisms'.
He would remind us . . .
.
'that the European Parliamentary system is wholly
foreign to the British parliamentary system of government; permitting
only its bureaucrats to initiate legislation - not MEPs : and that in
so doing; it makes all the MEP's subservient to bureaucrats, and the
European Parliament superior to the British Parliament'.
This he would never, never,
NEVER accept.
He would jot down more notes. He
would remind us - using his own former words . . .
"of
the great inheritance in our possession which represents the
prolonged achievement of the centuries; that there is not one of our
simple uncounted rights today for which better men than we are have
not died on the scaffold or the
battlefield"
He would insist that . . .
.
'we
should mutiny against the servitude our political parties are leading
us into in a Federal European Union'.
That we should . . .
.
'not
flinch from our duty to fight to go back into the natural environment
of a sea girt isle - our former oceanic commercial role; using our
native skill, dexterity, and mercantile judgment to buy or
manufacture in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest, just as
the successful and independent
Norwegian, Singaporean, Hong Kong and Swiss peoples do - ie, trading
freely world wide in open and fair competition with
anyone'.
Churchill would assure us that .
. . . .
'we
are no more incapable today than we were 100 years ago . . . and that
. . . . . . those who assert to the contrary do so from a regard to
their own self interest'.
Knowing how wars happen
suddenly; he would be astonished to find himself even considering -
let alone underlining his notes . . . .
'That under no circumstances could the UK contemplate
European restraint upon British Armed Forces that only a British
protective hand should cover the British nuclear
button'.
How amazingly . . . and
delightfully . . . out of date this remark sounds in
1995!
He would anxiously enquire . . .
.
What
is the UK's relationship with the USA, with the UN and with
NATO?
Does the UK
still cherish that special relationship? Do members of the EEC still
resent it, and if so, why?
He would see with joy and
immense relief how European children had for so long now been been
able to grow up in what he promised if we were faithful to our duty
in the war -
"the
sunlit uplands".
He would rejoice in the recent
events in Russia and the former Iron Curtain countries: but examine
anxiously those in the Balkans - the latter having such familiar
echoes from his early political life.
He would make a note . .
.
'not to under-rate the threat
of continued ethnic conflicts there. . .
and jot down how important was .
. .
'the
speedy incorporation of Poland, Hungary, the Czech & Slovak
Republics - into the Europe's economic and trading
structures'.
He would note the serious
implications of the failure of (firstly) German and then European
state craft to have prevented the recent tragedies in the former
Yugoslavia. He would examine why Great Britain had had so little
influence for good upon these horrible and distressing reoccurrences
of European racial hatred.
Nor would he underrate . . . .
.
'the
threat of terrorism to the West by the rise of Islamic
militancy'.
He would privately caution the
government of the day again and again . . . . .
'that the Secret Service must be ever be alert to the
threat of political blackmail from a terrorist group using a DIY
nuclear device, or from germ or electronic terrorism'.
He would examine with the
greatest concern the latest CIA report that . . . . .
"Of
the nations that have or are acquiring weapons of mass destruction,
many are led by megalomaniacs and strong men of proven inhumanity or
by weak, unstable or illegitimate governments and that by the end of
the decade, we could see over 20 countries with ballistic missiles, 9
with nuclear weapons, 10 with biological weapons, and up to 30 with
chemical weapons.
In some
instances, the potential capabilities at the command of these
unpredictable men is more destructive than the Soviet threat to the
West in the 1960s."
Publicly he would say that we
would be . . .
'mad
to allow any future European Political Union to possess a veto over
our use of our military forces', and that we 'should never relax our guard or become
complacent about the risks of nuclear war'.
He would recall how he had
originally spoken of a permanent alliance between the United States
and Britain, and how as a consequence the North Atlantic Treaty
Organisation came into being and . . . . . again and again emphasise
. . . .
'how
important it is that we nurture the Alliance because it was the ONLY
way to ensure European and therefore world peace'.
Were he alive today he would
remind us . . . . .
'that as America has the resources, technology and
capital, she is the natural leader of the West. So long as she
remains in the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation the West remains a
great stabilising power for good in the world'.
That recent events in Bosnia
proved that were America to lose interest in NATO, the European Union
would not find solutions to renewed European ethnic conflicts . . .
'that the constant nurturing of
the Atlantic Alliance ensures European stability and the substantial
flow of capital into the new central European democracies and thus
their stability'.
He would speak about . . .
. .
'the
great importance of a North Atlantic Free Trade Area and how
important it is to widen it further to the great commercial advantage
of not only Europe but all the surrounding underdeveloped
countries'.
He would ask himself . . . . . .
'why
are the European politicians stampeding everyone into what they now
call - without permission of the people - the European
Union?
Why so much urgency? . . .
.
'why
is time not allowed to pass to allow new political and collective
governmental institutions to evolve at a less stressful and more
natural pace?'
He would observe how . . . . . .
.
'the
benefits of the Common Market can be seen to have been grossly
exaggerated'.
Churchill would query what was
behind it all?.
He would scorn as a myth, the
assumption that our national sovereignty - gained at such cost over
1,000 years of political evolution . . .
'is
worth trading for an unknown, unproven European Union collective
economic benefit'.
He would jot down to remind us .
. . .
'of
the dire results that all forms of collectivism have had this
century'.
He would be appalled to realise
that if the present course were continued by Parliament . . . .
'within five or six years, no political party would
rule Britain: its governance would be that of a province ruled from
Brussels under an anonymous tyranny of faceless, unaccountable
bureaucrats'.
He would be alarmed at British
apathy and how they do not realise that the nation's very existence
is again under imminent threat.
How once again the easy going
British people had been . . . . . . .
'hypnotised by people pleasing political pundits with
vote catching
'soft in the
heart - and soft in the head' rhetoric - and the politicians had bored them
insensate - into a 1938 type sleepwalking trance; which, if they be
not awakened in time, will deliver them them bound and gagged into
the tyranny of a European majority'.
He would see he the politician's
old trick of 'name changing'
to get their way; and how the Common Market was changed without
permission to the European Economic Community . . then was changed -
again without permission - to the European Community and then again
without permission to the European Union.
He would recall his war time
quip . . . .