The Dark Soul of Libertarianism

One of the most notable developments in modern life is the tendency for us to lead ever more separate lives.  Changes in our economy have led to jobs for life becoming ever rarer.  These same changes have led to people seeking work further and further from their homes leading to villages and towns with communities having ever more transient communities.  This problem has been exacerbated by the fact that it has become ever more difficult to get on the property ladder thanks to ever increasing prices, leaving many captive in the rental market, encouraging mobility for better opportunities above staying put and establishing roots.  In many ways our culture has reflected this seeming transcendence of a collective existence to a more nomadic one.  The internet seems to have given a massive impetus to a kind of 'me' culture, which includes an aptly named Youtube where people often share the most intimate parts of their lives.  In a way the internet almost seems to simultaneously embody both trends, an older yearning for a community and a tendency towards collectivisation and it's opposite a more recent trend toward a more libertarian existence remain important to us.  My argument is this piece is that while libertarians would push us towards a soulless and apathetic society and collectivism would impose suffocating paternalism a future course surely belongs in some sort of middle path.

Libertarianism's two governing themes come from the Liberal and Conservative ideologies.  The Conservative one that is recurring is individual responsibility.  This is defined as responsibility mostly to oneself, to be disciplined, take responsibility for one's actions and their well-being.  The Liberal theme is one of individual liberty.  At face value their importance is hard to argue against.  We all have responsibilities for our own well-being and our place in society.  Our individual freedom of course is precious and often under threat.  However the relatively modern concept of using the state as an engine for social improvement and advancement is a trend that has earned the deep suspicion of classic liberals who place an importance on individual freedom.  While this is an important danger to keep one's eye out for libertarians turn this into a kind of paranoid obsession.  Universal healthcare and welfare is regularly described as "tyranny".  Of course the use of such hyperbolic language threatens to confuse the question of what a tyranny actually is. 

Joining the obsession with any state involvement in people's lives with an iron clad belief that all such involvement is doomed to failure, the importance of helping people in a wider community is lessened.  Their individual circumstances of not being able to achieve this vaunted individual liberation is also wilfully dismissed as not worth a concern.  The late British MP Tony Benn's question "how can someone be free if they are enslaved by debt?" is willfully ignored by such ideologues since it takes them out of the comfort zone of their world view.  A libertarian would argue that their anti-state goals pushes people to not let the state take care of the social ills in their community and thereby force them to  step up to build stronger community organisations.  While there is a certain logic to this in that people have a responsibility to keep the fibre of communities strong, it dangerously overestimates people's capacities by themselves to tackle the many problems that pervades it.  Of course the state is not a solution to every problem, but that does not automatically validate the libertarian argument that the state cannot ultimately help in anything.

Libertarian's justification for self improvement above helping others extends to international relations.  Libertarians view our commitments to the international community simply in terms of trade and diplomacy for strict narrow self interest.  The concept of international norms, rules and laws going against their fundamentalist interpretation of the concept of individual liberty have no place in their world view.  This attitude has grave implications for tackling global problems and facing down atrocities.  Since the end of the Second World War the concept that certain crimes are universal and violate Human Rights has been advanced, albeit over troubled terrain.  Wide-ranging international agreements such as the Geneva Convention Against Genocide are all too often not hailed as valiant measures against crimes against humanity are snarled at libertarians for just providing an avenue for sorting out "other people's problems".

 In their quest to persuade the British public, shell shocked from interventions in Iraq and Libya, that we can ultimately do no good in the world libertarians have made an unholy alliance with the Far Left.  The myths of the Far Left with regards to Western foreign policy are swallowed whole in order to provide seemingly legitimate excuses for writing off any grand designs we have for our troubled world.  And yet their world view goes against the evidence.  International cooperation to tackle global problems is a hard road with some notable successes, not a futile one.  Through international cooperation CFC's were outlawed largely successfully in order to stop severe damage to the Ozone layer.  Through such cooperation Polio is nearly extinct and AIDS is on the way to the same fate.  Thousands of people have been saved by international relief efforts provided after natural disasters, not because it would ultimately help them but for the single concern for preserving life.  At the same time many libertarians willfully deny the existence of global problems such as climate change in order to justify their aloofness to international affairs.  And yet ignoring rising sea levels is unlikely to stop them rising.  For the cause of keeping out of 'other people's wars' they also spurn concepts vital to our security such as collective security, which in the form of NATO has preserved the freedom of Western democracies against determined opposition.

Like many ideologies that become important libertarianism is seductive in it's simplicity.  All state intervention is an unacceptable violation of human liberty.  All problems can be related to state involvement.  This kind of simplicity is of course misleading.  Ultimate freedom without state aid or any aid means nothing to someone who is in distress.  The freedom to be not helped and waste away without anyone knowing, caring or doing anything is not a sign of progress.  Libertarian's ultimate problem is it's seeming obsession with persuading us away from wider fights but our own individual improvement.  Individual improvement and enjoyment  is of course important, but the promotion of it as a soul concern of our own lives I find is ultimately soulless and not a little depressing.  The soullessness is perfectly captured by millennial generation enthusiasm for US Libertarian US Presidential candidate Gary Johnson.  Here is a man who glorifies in his ignorance of the world and his enjoyment of recreational drugs.  What he does in his spare time I could care less about, but the promotion of ignorance I cannot respect. 

Ultimately libertarianism is a creed that promotes a society governed by a shrug rather than a call to action against it's ills and those further afield that we can do something about.  Ultimately it is an anti-society ideology.  My opening point about our lives becoming more separate is not to try and set the clock back, but merely to bring up the point that such trends have consequences which we should seek to address.  Wherever we end up and for however long it is important for us to try and learn to respect the people we live near and foster a certain pride for our community.  I don't want people to be cemented to where they live thereby passing by life changing opportunities, but ignoring the community that is right in front of you is it's own kind of failure.  Some communities can make it on their own and they should be left alone as they wish.  But struggling communities need state support to avoid tragedy.  There is no shame in asking for help.

Military Coups: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

"When the generals have up to now managed nothing, the colonels have now to step in".

Colonel Claus Von Stauffenberg, 1944, ringleader of the "Valkyrie" German Military conspiracy against Adolf Hitler

Most countries at one time or another have had their destinies changed by the intervention of their militaries into their internal politics.  Brazil's military moved against their monarchy making the country henceforth a republic.  In the closing chapter of the English Civil Wars General George Monck made the fateful decision to send his forces down from Coldstream in Scotland to occupy London in order to bring about the restoration of British Monarchy.  Recently the elements of the Turkish military allegedly took part in a coup against the controversial President Erdogan.  If this was a genuine attempt by the Turkish military to implement regime change, then this is in many ways a continuation of a tradition the military has had in anointing itself the guardian of the values of the republic Kemal Ataturk helped found which include secularism and (with some irony) democracy.  While in power Kemal Ataturk forbid the Turkish military from participating or interfering in partisan politics, but seemingly contradictorily gave it the responsibility for being the guardian of the constitution.  Militaries throughout the world are charged with defending their country and it is often with this reason in mind (at least nominally) that they have taken the extraordinary step of pushing aside their political masters.

Coup d'etat translates directly from the original French as "blow of state" is used in modern political language to refer to a forceful seizure of power by a certain party.  Samuel Huntington identified three different types of coup d' etat; Breakthrough coups, Arbiter coups and Veto coups.  Breakthrough coups are when soldiers play the part of a radical reformer, in Huntington's context to create a society where the middle classes are more involved in governing decisions.  Arbiter coups are said to take place in a post-breakthrough society, where the military steps in because public order has broken down.  Veto coups take place in an effort by the military to deliberately prevent mass participation in politics or allegedly guard the values of a given society.  The recent coup in Turkey can roughly be categorised as a Veto coup since it involved the military acting against the elected Government of Turkey, ironically for the stated purpose of protecting democracy.

Breakthrough coups which have been initiated have not always been carried out to help the middle classes, since the working classes have often benefitted too.  Army Captain Thomas Sankara of Burkina Faso led a coup against another coup clique heralding a reformist government which introduced environmental programmes, mass vaccination and anti-poverty programmes.  Napoleon Bonaparte's coup of The Directory at the end of the French Revolution was in many ways a combination of all three coups.  Napoleon did introduce reforms such as the Code Napoleon and the emancipation of the Jews and yet this also had support to stop the disorder associated with the revolution, while he controlled which parts of the middle class advanced in his regime.  However some coup leaders have seized power while advertising this effort as a genuine radical people's coup only to betray such ideals.  Idi Amin's seizure of power in Uganda in 1971 exemplifies this tragic incidence very well.  Amin's coup was popular since his predecessor Milton Obote was widely acknowledged to be a tyrannical and corrupt.  However Amin proved to be much worse introducing years of disastrous policies including but not exclusively the mass killing of political opponents, rampant defense spending, rampant corruption and disastrous economic policies.

Arbiter coups are most unusual since they are seemingly blatant violations of democracy made in the name of defending it.  Some of the most interesting examples of this can be found in Africa.  In Nigeria Olesum Obasanjo who was a part of a military junta handed power back to a civilian government.  Obasanjo based the new democratic constitution for Nigeria on the United States Constitution before the handover.  In Ghana Flight Commander Jerry Rawlings overthrew a civilian government after it got embroiled in a financial crisis but later restored multi-party democracy.  Early on in Pakistan's history Pakistani civilians had street celebrations when the military took power for the first time from a civilian government widely seen as dysfunctional, corrupt and incompetent.  Although as time went on, uncertainty grew and Pakistanis started to wonder loudly how long it would be until the soldiers returned to barracks.

Veto coups much of the time exemplify clearly the folly of having the military involved in politics, as well as the human tragedy it can bring to a given country.  Perhaps the most infamous example is General Augusto Pinochet's coup in Chile on 11th September.   This military coup like many others in Latin America was given covert support and encouragement by the United States and was initiated with the declared aim of fighting Communism.  President Salvador Allende was indeed a Marxist, but one who undoubtedly had an electoral mandate.  It is also clear from historical record that much of the economic chaos existing in Chile at the time was more due to the economic war the United States was waging on the country (to help justify the coup) than Allende's economic policies.  While the economy stabilised under Pinochet this was at the grotesque cost of thousands of lives.

It could be said that military coups are times of great uncertainty and at worst a sign that a country is on a downward spiral.  It is not a complete coincidence that they often occur in newly independent countries where institutions are weak.  This does not mean that military coups cannot happen in  long established countries.  France faced the real possibility of a military coup during the Algeria Crisis, which is widely thought to have it's roots in the French military's losses in the Second World War.  However in the case of the newly independent countries the coups normally happen due to widespread dissatisfaction with political elites who are often corrupt or ineffectual, therefore the military are often seen as the ones to get things done.

However even the apparently good coups came with a price.  Thomas Sankara's revolution in Burkina Faso came with the price of a lack of democracy and an abysmal human rights record.  Jerry Rawlings' time in power in Ghana led to approximately 300 citizens disappearing due to his "house clearing".  In the case of the "Valkyrie" plot against Hitler many historians cite the plotting officers' old Prussian militaristic ideology as reason to doubt that if they were successful, they would plant the seeds of a new German democracy or submit to unconditional surrender conditions.  And of course most coups, though not all, come with some form of loss of life and liberty.

I think that perhaps instead of daring to praise the military coup men themselves it is perhaps more honest to the spirit of democracy to remember those who have courageously stood against them.  The former President of Brazil Dilma Rousseff spent many years being brutally interrogated and put in isolation for her defiance to the Brazilian Military.  Aung San Suu Kyi refused to leave Burma and surrender to the military even when her husband was dying on the other side of the world.

I would say the strongest argument against coups apart from the damage they cause is the way they make democratic institutions less credible, since they are merely overridden.  That said I will leave readers to consider the dilemmas faced by people who live under two examples of non-military tyrannies that render such institutions meaningless already.  In Zimbabwe corruption is rife as is political violence thanks to the old dictator President Mugabe who uses his power to make elections and the judicial branch completely meaningless.  In Venezuela President Maduro gets ever more powers from a parliament that bows to his every whim as he imprisons more and more opposition politicians and activists.  Some of the Venezuelan opposition has openly called for the army to intervene.  My question is; could a coup make things any worse?

Can the Northern Ireland Conflict and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflicts be compared?

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

George Santayana

While I was in Belfast attending a Model United Nations Conference, representing Pakistan, shortly before I flew home I went on a legendary Belfast Black Cab tour.  These tours which are often staffed by former paramilitary members from Northern Ireland (NI) The Troubles era are intimate tours of the city's infamous past (and sometimes present) trouble spots.  At the first stop on the tour was the Divis Flats, reportedly the sight of the first casualty of The Troubles in Belfast; a sleeping 8 year old boy killed by a stray police bullet.  While pondering at the irony that the first victim of The Troubles was an innocent person I noticed a Palestinian flag flying from one of the Flats’ windows.   My tour guide was largely dismissive of this when I asked about it, saying that person probably displayed it just because another Nationalist did.  Even more intriguingly, further into the tour I notice Israeli flags clearly on display in a Unionist era.

This experience led me to wonder; are these two conflicts in any way comparable?   In NI a body count threshold seemed to have been reached as well as a threshold of international concern to almost lock into place a peace process which at least seems durable.  And thus the 1998 Belfast Agreement and power sharing between the previously violently conflicting parties was signed.  This begs the question; could a similar process happen in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict?

That both conflicts have deeply rooted historical backgrounds is not in doubt.  The oldest of those histories is undoubtedly that of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict since the Jewish Zionist movement, that forged the concept of a modern Jewish homeland in the region of Palestine, cites the Jews as a people as originating from this region.  This was well before the birth of Christ, vastly outdating the Norman landings on the island of Ireland and the Ulster Plantations being established in the north during the 1500s AD.  It is disputable how much of a difference this makes practically since the opposing sides of both disputes are as likely to mythologise events that happened 50 years ago as much as they would for ones happening 500 years ago.  But the past does not stay buried for long and both conflicts have historical baggage that will be very hard to clear up, if that is even possible at all.

For the sides of both conflicts nationalism is a very serious force, as is religion.  Religious differences trumped nationalistic ones in Ireland for many years since the formation of Irish nationalism is only really a concept that is at most a few centuries old, next to older religious identities.  Inter-communal violence has taken place in NI since at least the late 18th century when Protestant Peep-O-Day boys fought against the Catholic Defenders.  Zionism is the next youngest self-determination movement, having it’s roots in the late 19^th century.  Palestinian nationalism is even younger, coming to the fore with the rise of Arab nationalism during the post-war period.  It is arguable that nationalism, Zionist and Palestinian, merely hardened group identities and communal grievances rather than created them.  But now nationalism is present it may be hard if not impossible to put the genie back in it’s bottle in both cases.

There are intriguing similarities and differences between the opposing factions in the different conflicts.  While the Unionist governed province of the UK, NI, recognised the existence of the Republic of Ireland (and the Free State before that), much of the Irish Civil War was fought over the acceptance in the majority Catholic south about the NI's right to exist as a separate political entity.  There is a similarity to the widespread Palestinian rejection of the 1947 UN partition plan to divide Palestine up into two states, although the rejection seemed more widespread in the Palestinian case.  Differences in culture, historical background or the leadership of the Palestinian’s with the highly structured and recognised leadership of the First Dail may account for the difference, although this is far from certain.

It is worth noting that while the most prominent Palestinian political groups have been founded on the principle of armed action against Israel, starting with Fatah who formed with this specific objective in mind, nationalism in Northern Ireland has taken on two recognised moulds: Constitutional Nationalism and militant republicanism.  Constitutional Nationalism in NI seeks to improve the rights of ordinary Catholic nationalists while the majority of them push for a united Ireland, all by peaceful means.  Militant Irish Republicanism stands for pushing for a united Ireland, the perceived ultimate guarantor of Catholic rights, by any means including armed struggle.

What is interesting is that while a militant Palestinian nationalist tradition is clearly visible, it would seem that a Palestinian Constitutional Nationalism is largely absent.  In many ways this is what Fatah has become by default as the Islamist militant party and militia Hamas has stolen their thunder as the standard bearer of militant nationalism.  Unlike the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) in NI which grew out from the Catholic civil rights movement, the SDLP was born in tradition, while Fatah merely found it’s way there by circumstance, in many ways much like the former militant Sinn Fein party.

The Protestant Unionist and the largely Jewish population of Israel in many ways have similarities.  The main difference is though that as bad as inter-communal violence got during The Troubles, there was hardly ever an intention to wipe out Protestants in NI as a people.  While the IRA directly called for the overthrow of the NI  State, their propaganda never reached the blood curdling proportions of Hamas who look favourably on the Holocaust and the wholesale killing of Jewish civilians.  By contrast recent evidence has revealed that while the IRA too often practiced sectarian killing, they eschewed it where they could to minimise their potential supporters becoming upset.  However in the heat of battle these differences can look academic.  There are some striking similarities between the siege mentalities of both the Israelis and the Unionists.  In many ways the former was more justified since they faced national armies challenging their existence.  At the height of The Troubles the Irish Government authorised the planning of Exercise Armageddon as an emergency measure to protect Nationalists, but this was never implemented and only conceived as a measure to protect Nationalists.  Because of this no other state forces entered this conflict apart from the UK’s.

Not all conflicts have a singular silver bullet, especially when it comes to the conflicts discussed.  When I asked an Israeli friend of mine about their opinion on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he was pessimistic that a solution would be found soon and cited a difference of narratives on both sides.  This is the ultimate link between the two conflicts.  Neither side can wholly connect with the other, in the context of both conflicts.  In NI recognition, albeit begrudging, between the two sides and their narratives have been established.  This was one of the main issues that made the difference between the 1973 Sunningdale Agreement failing and the 1998 Belfast Agreement succeeding (just).

Putting aside the different scales in the different scenarios the one thing the NI Nationalists had going in their favour more than the Palestinians was an articulate but determined Constitutional Nationalist movement that won praise by championing the promotion of civil rights over armed struggle while practising a degree of empathy with their opposite numbers.  As long as Fatah and Hamas are in a competition to look the most defiant against Israel , as oppose to looking for a long term peace, the killing will surely continue.

The Future of British Foreign Policy in Africa

“Africa was not created piecemeal.  Africa was born no later and no earlier than any other geographical area on this globe.  Africans no more, no more and no less than other men, possess all human attributes, talents, deficiencies, virtues and faults”.

Former King of Ethiopia Haille Selassie

Why should the British Government and it’s people have an interest in having anything to do with Africa?  Not half a century ago decolonisation was accelerating, relinquishing large areas of Africa from British colonial control in an effort to balance the books of an unruly economy back at home.  Our foreign policy usually centres around two axis, that of security and prosperity.  In terms of the former parts of Africa continues to be a concern.  Jihadist groups have proliferated in North, West and the Horn of Africa with groups like Boko Haram and Al-Shabab becoming a part of a loose nexus of such groups in Africa.  In the wake of Libyan leader Colonel Gadaffi’s demise Libya has become a land of warring militias and refugees who are struggling to get the Europe, while the Islamic State announces it’s sinister presence in the country.  Prosperity wise there are interesting opportunities.  In recent years over 10 of the fastest growing economies of the world have been African.  African economies are evolving, albeit in an uneven way across the continent, with some of them becoming more Service Sector orientated closer to our country’s model.  However various structural deficiencies in the African economies limit their growth, providing a possible opportunity for Britain to play a constructive role.  In the mean-time regional trends hint at new opportunities as well as dangers.

While our footprint in Africa seems to be quite modest, other nations seem to have much more grand designs for the continent.  Our neighbour France has long been intimately been closely involved in Africa.  France has not always been on the right side of history in terms of it’s involvement on the continent, leading to accusations of necolonialism which had merit at least half of the time.  While France still has ulterior motives such as promoting exports from it’s arms industries in recent years it has taken more of a positive role on the continent.  On 1^st August 2014 France initiated Operation Barkhane; a 3,000 strong military deployment in it’s former West African colonies including Mali, Chad and Burkina Faso.   This was a follow up to Operation Serval, the French intervention in Mali against a separatist and Islamist insurgent takeover of that country.  The US meanwhile under the United States Africa Command has carried out missions on the continent such as drone strikes in Somalia and Special Forces raids against IS in Libya to keep Jihadists at bay.  Meanwhile US aid efforts have ambitiously taken aim at one of Africa’s biggest economic problems, lack of power generation capability.

However the big story of great power involvement in Africa in the past 10 years has been that from China.  China’s energy hungry economy has had much to gain from extensive economic links with a continent brimming with minerals.  Chinese construction and infrastructure companies have also penetrated a market desperate for development in both fields.  Research by Foreign Policy magazine has shown that the Chinese are making serious efforts to invest in skills and training in African workforces, suggesting that their interest in the continent is long term.  The Chinese Government has also announced plans to construct a military base in Djibouti, a country already crowded by foreign military base.  Many Africans and Western powers alike are unsure about China’s interests on the continent.  Since China is run by an authoritarian government it stands to reason that it has very little interest in fostering civil society in Africa, the roots of sustainable democracies.  African civil organisations in the past few years have stood against Chinese property developments that they have eyed with suspicion, showing the potential flowering of African democracy to come.

The past year has seen attitudes to liberal ideas heavily challenged.  Some Presidents of African countries such as Paul Kagame of Rwanda have sidestepped constitutional term limits with little consequence.  In Burkina Faso the former President Blaise Campaore was ousted from power when he tried the same trick.  The President of Burundi, a country long plagued by ethnic violence, threatens to plunge his country into bloody chaos over his plans to remain in power.  At the top of the African Union (AU) the megalomaniac President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe is chairman.  With his encouragement African Governments, including South Africa, are pushing for AU countries to leave the International Criminal Court (ICC) in preference for an AU run court.  Considering that most of these governments have made it clear that in principle they do not want international courts to put serving African leaders on trial, it is obvious that their commitment to a liberal vision of Africa is questionable at best.

Africa is currently faced by many economic challenges.  These can broadly be presented as three main problems; a lack of infrastructure, underdeveloped agriculture and the collapse in oil prices.  A lack in infrastructure hampers everything.  A lack of schools hampers training skilled workforces. A lack of railways and roads means that goods cannot be supplied to markets and security forces cannot respond to emergencies quickly, such as the Boko Haram one.  Shortages of electricity keep African economies moving at a snails pace in a super-connected and energised global economy.  African agriculture has great potential.  That sector used to make much of the continent a breadbasket until state control, war and strife squandered this.  But African agriculture needs technology transfers, skill transfers and a genuine global commitment to free trade.  European Union (EU) and American subsidies stand in the way of the latter.  Many of Africa’s fastest growing economies in recent years are major oil producers.  The collapse in oil price, which has much to do with China’s slowing economy, has hammered the finances of many of these countries.  These economies need to diversify if they are to avoid being vulnerable to further oil price shocks.  Helping to solve this dilemma is something that the British Government should set it’s mind to.

Britain should have a long term strategic interest in Africa.  The economic opportunities are massive.  Britain’s engineering expertise can help tie African countries together with infrastructure projects.  These projects should be geared towards inter-African trade, which remains shockingly underdeveloped, as well as trade for further abroad.  Britain also has an opportunity to help tackle the problem of Africa’s power supply problem, with the assistance of it’s world class university research capacity as private sector expertise.  In the former the University of the West of England has started on an interesting project to use human urine as a power source.

In terms of the illiberal turn on the African continent Britain can turn to reforming the Commonwealth to make it more trade orientated and an organisation that promotes liberal values.  If the Brexit from the EU occurs organisations such as the Commonwealth may take on a new importance and meaning.  if it remains in the EU then the UK should push for the reform of EU agricultural subsidies, so African produce can enter world markets on fair terms and ultimately reduce food prices for all. Opportunities for increasing links between our Service Sector and their young African equivalents should also be explored. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development may also want to consider having greater involvement in civil society schemes, much like how the US State Department does which trains local democracy activists.

New IRA? Old Problems?

“Let us not waste our energies brooding over the more we might have got.  Let us look upon what it is we have got.”

Michael Collins, Irish Independence leader speaking about the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty

Irish Nationalism as an ideology has always been about it’s followers having to face divisions between their high hopes and political reality.  Michael Collins, the Irish Republican and independence leader was the first to confront this dilemma and was ultimately killed by it.  He argued that accepting the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty, while it fell short of the outright independence and Irish unity that he and his compatriots had fought for, was a foundation for greater freedom to be achieved.  It was ironically his main opponent in the Irish Civil War, Eamon De Valera, who after Collins’ death proved him right by taking back the treaty ports leased to the British by diplomacy and made the Irish Free State a republic by constitutional change.  But the Republic of Ireland and it’s leaders came to the eventual, if reluctant, realisation that complete Irish unity between the north and south was a long way off to being achieved.

Much like the time during the time of the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty, when the 1998 Belfast Agreement  was signed and ratified many Irish Republicans consented to the will of democratic process and laid down their arms.  However a minority chose to fight on with the aim of uniting the 26 counties of the Republic of Ireland with the 6 of Northern Ireland, despite the Irish Constitution under the terms of the Belfast Agreement disavowing territorial claims to the north.  These rebels against the Belfast Agreement are known as “dissident” republicans and carry on their paramilitary activity to this day.

For much of Northern Ireland’s post-Belfast Agreement history paramilitary activity behind the scenes in the province had been simmering behind the scenes, but nowhere near the levels of the horrors of The Troubles period.  Unionist suspicion of Sinn Fein and their alleged links to paramilitary groups remained, but the party nevertheless consistently and vocally denounced instances of such activity when they broke out into open violence.  However changes in the fortunes and politics of dissident republicans means that the British Home Office has recently taken the position of publicly acknowledging them as more of a threat to national security.

On the week ending the 9^th May the Home Office publicly declared that the threat from a possible dissident republican terrorist attack has increased from “moderate” to “substantial”.  This is largely because of the emergence in recent years of a dissident republican group popularly known as the” New IRA”.  The New IRA was formed in July 2012 as a new group consisting of elements from Republican Action Against Drugs (RAAD), the Real IRA and other miscellaneous dissident-minded individuals.  The former is a vigilante group whose professed mission of violently opposing drug dealers hails from a tradition started in the “Free Derry” era of The Troubles.  This new alignment of dissident groups only leaves the Continuity IRA as the only major organised dissident entity left, although commentators say this group is in decline due to it being riddled with informers.

The New IRA is thought to have a strong presence in West Belfast and Derry  but also operates in areas such as Tyrone, mid-Ulster and Fermanagh.  It’s leadership includes a former member of the East Tyrone Provisional IRA, an area infamously known by the British Army “Bandit Country”.  The groups attacks centre on gun and bomb attacks.  The latter was instigated in March against a prison officer Adrian Ismay who was killed by a car bomb.  This is a chilling reminder of some of the worst days of The Troubles when in revenge for authorities defying Provisional IRA hunger strikers, the group targeted prison officers and brutally murdered them.  An increase in paramilitary style assaults, by republicans and loyalists have been increasingly evident in the news in Northern Ireland in recent months.  One of the New IRA’s gruesome calling cards is the “Six-pack”, the shooting of joints in the arms and legs.  According to statistics from the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), 52 bomb attacks across Northern Ireland in the past 12 months compared with 36 the previous year.

The British security services believe that what makes the New IRA especially dangerous in addition to their willingness to use violence is their arsenal.  These services believe that the IRA has managed to acquire approximately a quarter of a ton of Semtex which is a plastic explosive originally manufactured in former Czechoslovakia during the Cold War.  This stock was sent to the Provisional IRA by the late former leader of Libya Muammar Gaddafi in his efforts to destabilise the West through his sponsorship of various terror groups.  Semtex was originally used as a so called “booster” by the Provisional IRA to set off larger chemical-fertiliser bombs such as the devastating bomb detonated in the London Docklands in the 1990s.  The location of this particular stash of explosives, which was hidden in County Cavan in the Republic of Ireland, was unknown to the Provisional IRA group that participated in the arms decommissioning, but known to a man who became a dissident republican and eventually joined the IRA.  The security services also worry that former Provisional IRA men, who are members of the New IRA, may use their engineering expertise to somehow use the Semtex to make armour-piercing weapons, which in all likelihood may make the group more willing to take the fight directly to the security services themselves, in addition to softer civilian targets.

What can be done?  For a start the UK Government can act on the recommendations of the former governor of Hong Kong Chris Patten who called for the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) to be increased from it’s current standing force of 6,500 to have 600 more additional officers.  At the same time a careful eye will have to be kept on public perceptions about the force, to avoid the poisonous public relations that surrounded it’s predecessor the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC).  Sinn Fein denials about the links between many of it’s member and past paramilitary activity is playing fast and loose with the truth to the extreme.  And yet the Unionists must resist the temptation to use the party as a political punch back when it should instead welcome it’s condemnations of dissident republican activity.  As former supporters of the armed struggle, their calls for peace are all the more meaningful, and the Unionists should seek to encourage them to hold to their commitments as oppose to goading them.  It also has to be said that the Unionists have to eat some humble pie since while they wax lyrical about the failure of republican paramilitaries to disarm, a recent UK Parliamentary report clearly cites the Loyalist paramilitaries as a least as well armed as their opposite numbers.

The people and politicians should take their advice from the Torah; “living well is the best revenge”.  If a stable and prosperous Northern Ireland is built in spite of the dangers then that will be the ultimate victory over terrorism.  It also has to be remembered that as bad as dissident republicans are, the group most likely to attack the UK is still the Islamic State.  That challenge ultimately will require a deeper commitment of resources and determination to overcome.

The Changing Face of Organised Crime in the United States

“You can get more with a nice word and a gun than you can with a kind word.”

Al Capone

The American Dream is the popular American myth that any American who works hard will be assured of great rewards for their labour.  However not all elements of American society have chosen to pursue that dream by legitimate means.  Organised Crime in America has changed and evolved with societal changes that have touched the nation, from the early waves of European migration to the banning of illegal drugs.  Even war and the 1960s counter culture has left it’s mark on the mosaic that is Organised Crime in the United States (US).

The Italian-American Mafia, in particular of the Sicilian migrant origin, is perhaps the most popularly known type of Organised Crime syndicate in the US.  It’s power and ability to terrorise has been played out in popular films such as “The Godfather” and “Goodfellas”.  This form of Organised Crime cam very closed to being strangled at birth.  The Black Hand extortion rackets and other Italian-American gangs would of likely died away thanks to improvements in policing, was it not for one of the biggest political mistakes in US political history.  That mistake was the passing of the Volstead Act which came into effect in 1920, enforcing the 18^th Amendment to the US Constitution that banned the sale and distribution of alcohol.

Prohibition was like a shot of adrenaline to the dying heart of Italian-American organised crime and the wider criminal underworld.  All of a sudden a huge and popular illegal market was established.  Alcohol was mainly either imported over the US’s giant coastlines and land borders.  In addition alcohol was often distilled domestically, often using suspect ingredients such as formaldehyde in order to provide crude flavouring to products.  The Sicilian based Mafias known as the Cosa Nostra (our world/thing) proved to have the rigid organised structures, discipline and ruthlessness to take the most advantage of this market.

This success inevitably brought renewed interest from Salvatore Maranzano, the most powerful Mafia figure from Sicily who waged the 1930-1931 Castellamerese War in order to assert Sicilian control over all Italian-American Mafia operations by defeating New York kingpin Joe Masseria.  Maranzano won, in no small part due to Charlie “Lucky” Luciano betraying his boss Joe Masseria at a dramatic showdown on Coney Island.  Before long Luciano felt Masseria outgrew his usefulness and hired Jewish gunmen to gun him down.

After coming out of top over his boss Luciano brought about a new order for the Cosa Nostra which survives to this day.  The families in New York were organised into Five Families (Genovese, Gambino, Bonano, Lucchese and Colombo) who today have manpower of between roughly 1,500-3000 in each family.  The Commission was founded to oversee the operations of the National Crime Syndicate, an organisation accompanying the Five Families and other recognised criminal enterprises.  Luciano, having long worked with his Jewish associate Meyer Lansky rejected the narrow racism of the “Moustache Pete’s” generation of the recently deceased bosses in favour of cooperation across the races where possible for profitable business.

American popular culture has long made much of the lone motorcyclist or “biker” as a solitary misfit dedicated to the open road in films such as “The Wild One” and “Easy Rider”.  Such figures began to be seen in gangs more and more after World War Two.  The appearance of these drifter-like men after the war is no coincidence and the war veteran backbone of the first American Motorcycle clubs was reinforced by the arrival of veterans from the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 1970s.  Many of these men found it hard or undesirable to fit into regular civilian life, opting for the rough and ready biker life known throughout this culture as simply “the life”.  The most well-known biker gang is the Hell’s Angels club founded in 1948.  After that time biker gangs proliferated.  They were at first treated as a kind of curiosity of 1960s counterculture.  But soon things turned sinister.

The promotion of the rough and ready "life" combined with club members needs to earn a living inevitably led to their involvement in crime as many, though not all, Motorcycle clubs became Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs (OMC’s).  OMC’s have been documented as being involved in kidnapping, drug running, contract killing and many other crimes.  OMC’s have often committed crimes on behalf of older organised crime movements such as the Cosa Nostra.  The OMC violent subculture has even spread to the club’s international "Chapters", including an episode in Scandinavia where munitions from a government armoury was used.  These days OMC’s typically adopt a structure that includes a chain of command that includes a President, Vice President, Treasurer and a Sargent-at-arms.  The US Department of Justice still recognises OMC’s as an ongoing organised crime challenge.

Illegal drugs have supercharged organised crime activity and competition to a point where there is essentially a second Prohibition era.  The Cosa Nostra have been split by the conflict between their old world traditions and their ambitions for power on the issue of drugs.  Some Mafia families chose drugs as a lucrative earner and a way to beat the competition, while others stayed away eyeing the ever harsher drug laws being voted in.  The same drug trafficking routes for Marijuana markets via the Caribbean to Miami were soon used to fuel a Cocaine market, then a Crack Cocaine market.  The Colombian cartels dominated this trade during the 1980s and much of the 1990s with the Medellin and then the Cali cartels posing as significant adversaries to US Law Enforcement.  The fall of the Colombian cartels and the heavy patrolling of the Caribbean route led to the drug market simply adapting.  A Mexican route was established through the border while Mexican drug cartels began to establish major drug distributing routes through the US-Mexican border.

All organised crime is in some way financed by certain groups breaking the law to give people what they want, be it gambling, sex (by prostitution) or drugs.  Recent studies have proven that the US’s private healthcare system has exacerbated a mid-west heroin epidemic by unscrupulous doctors too readily prescribing opiates, leaving their patients curious about illegal markets in similar products.  The US has a drug problem, as evidenced by the rise of the Mexican cartels financed by American addicts (and ironically armed with Americans arms). The US Justice system also needs an overhaul.  Quite simply the system of elected judges and District Attorney’s (DA’s) has ruined the system’s chances of tackling the root causes of any crime let alone organised crime.  DA’s who are often ambitious for a political career like to make their bones looking tough by locking up minor offenders for unnecessarily long amounts of time.  This leaves them prey to the last and perhaps most insidious form of Organised Crime in the US.

Prison gangs proliferate as the US prison population proliferates.  The US prison population has increased exponentially from the mid-1990s onwards and has stopped long after the Crack Epidemic it was a response too.   In need of protection many new inmates join gangs often in order to stay alive.  The white supremacist Aryan Brotherhood started off as a prison gang to defend white prisoners.  La Eme and La Familia are Latino prison gangs that like the Brotherhood have grown massive outside criminal interests.  If the issue of US prison overpopulation is not tackled then US prisons will cease to become institutes of reform and become little better than crime colleges.

The International Brigades: My Novel

A while ago I set myself the goal of embarking on the project of writing a novel.  As a voracious reader, in many ways this was almost a natural progression for me.  In my late childhood leading into my early teens when I came back from living in the United States living and my family was temporarily living in my grandma’s house I didn’t have many distractions to keep me occupied.  I didn’t get along very well socially at the school so I didn’t have any friends to meet up with and do things with.  So I eventually started to write.  First of all there were small plots here and there followed by entire series of my beloved series Star Trek Voyager.  Eventually I conceived of an entire series of books about a bounty hunter in space who only took contracts to fight bad guys with a robot sidekick in tow.  This boy was, and in many ways still is, a science fiction nerd. It certainly passed the hours by.  And while many of those creations back then make me feel slightly embarrassed now (although they were pretty creative for an aspiring author so young) I still have a bit of pride in me for the results of my efforts. 

A few years ago I caught the writing bug again and attended first a short course in novel writing for a day then one that went over months.  I remember vividly coming into class in the evening from my latest soul destroying job.  Sharing ideas with people.  Being inspired by new ideas for my novel.  Getting excited when a plot twist idea came out of nowhere.  I decided to pursue a vaguely conceived idea of a police detective story including vampires, set in Bristol of all places.  Its working title was ‘West Sector Nine’.  It was mean’t to be like The Wire or The Shield with vampires.  Why vampires?  Well to be honest I was sick with the Twilight craze and wanted to try to bring vampires down to earth.  No more sappiness and portrayal of vampires as mysterious, ethereal and often improbably attractive and athletic looking (despite the long term deceased condition).  I wanted to seriously conceive of how the characters of vampires would change and how it would living as second class citizens to humans effected their view of the world.  Vampires I decided ultimately would be more startling in their similarities just a lot more world wise.  Some would be nice and some would be appalling characters who frankly wouldn’t care about suffering they inflict, either just to survive or to gain supremacy over their human rivals.  They would be a mixed bag of characters, much like ourselves.  But most intriguingly for a detective story they would have learned from human behaviour from many years and as a result become exceptionally skilled liars and master manipulators.

But the more I pursued this project the more frustratingly impractical and elusive it became for me.  Vampire stories have been done to death in films, books and TV series.  I could sense the cringe when I mentioned my pitch to certain people.  When I gave my pitch it was often inevitably followed by the inevitable “True Blood have already done this”.  In the end I decided to put the project on ice.  Not destroy everything, just shelf it until further notice.  My interest in the project waned and in the end I recognised that I had nowhere near the staying power of the writers of True Blood.  To the victor the spoils.

But at the beginning of this year the novel idea just wouldn’t let me go.  Perhaps it had something to do with this year being one which I began with the objective of setting myself ambitious personal goals.  I told myself I would not be in the same place career wise that time of year in a year’s time.  After seeing a documentary about the Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa that moved me to tears I decided to do something I never did before and run a half marathon to raise money for the relief effort.  Two months onwards from then I was running 3 miles for my training, which was 3 miles more than I have ever ran before.  I continued on my merry way satisfying my acute hunger for reading, absorbing ideas as I went.  I mostly read non-fiction but now and then I would stumble on a stand out piece of fiction that gripped me and taught me lessons about novel writing that I will never forget.  The book “I am Legend” is a prime example of this.  More on this later.

But ultimately my ideas for novels tend to stem from contemporary debates and by observing the wonderful and god awful things that happen on this crazy planet, this latest project being no exception.  Looking at these things from a comparative historical point of view can also put an interesting light on things and can produce a goldmine of ideas.  With West Sector Nine I wanted to recall many issues that seemed to be hovering around the country at the time.  My own experiences of the abuse of police power and the shocking revelations that came out about the Hillsborough disaster made me want to pick up on the moral problem about giving individuals too much power.  I wanted to express the public’s cynicism about politics and the politician’s dilemma of being ever demonised by them no matter what they do.  Recalling from my own experience I wanted to play on the theme of lasting friendly relationships unexpectedly forming between unlikely people, which is pretty much the happy story of my life.  But the world turns quickly and before you know it the news cycle has turned once again.  A new strand of thought began.

The year 2014 saw the emergence in the world media of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.  They seemed to spring forth from the ashes of wartorn Iraq and Syria, from the press's simplified perspective at least.  Here we have a genocidal horde who are so evil an ultraviolent that even Al Qaeda, hardly pacifists themselves, denounced them as being devils.  Their motto "we expand" seemed then to suit them well ( and in many ways still does) since they seemed to effortlessly take entire swathes of Iraqi and Syrian territory.  But one of the aspects of this threat that seemed to chill western countries including this one was the speed with which many, but mercifully not anywhere near the majority, of disaffected Muslims sought to leave this country and join this group of religious fascists.  Britain has been left dealing with the prospect of approximately 500 and growing trained jihadists coming back to our shores once the Islamic State is no more.  There seems to be a majority consensus that those fighters who return from the Islamic State must be detained in some way or another, lest they merge back into the population and become ticking time bombs.  But what most interested me when reading into this topic was the increase in reports of Britons going abroad to join groups that are fighting against IS.  An edition of BBC Question Time seemed to capture the dilemma well.  Most of those in the audience wanted to see the British IS fighters dealt with, no surprises there, but they were more divided over what do about those that went out to fight on the opposite lines.  Much of the audience was baffled.  Who would do this?  Isn't it a bit strange to just get up and fight in some far off land when you can stay at home and change the channel?  The Tory MP guest seemed to be advocating locking up all of the returning fighters up regardless of what flag they were flying.  Then a woman put her hand up and asked something that seemed to give everyone pause for thought; "Aren't those going out to fight IS just like the brave people who volunteered to go out and fight fascism in the Spanish Civil War?"

The Spanish Civil War broke out between the elected republican government of Spain and it's supporters known as the Republicans against much of the Spanish military and it's supporters under General Francisco Franco in 1936.  This was during the age of fascism where Hitler had been in power for 3 years and Mussolini had been in power for 14 years.  The Blackshirts in London started to stir too.  It seemed as though fascism was on the way up.  In response to this socialist, communist and anarchist parties within and without Spain called for volunteers to help form the International Brigades.  Volunteers from all walks of life answered the call such as ex servicemen and various members of the working class of different political persuasion, all united by their opposition to fascism.   Even a few now well known writers including George Orwell joined the fight. In terms of international support for the different sides of the conflict there was a power imbalance since while the Soviet Union supported the Republicans and the Fascist powers supported the Nationalists, the main democracies in Europe stayed neutral. 

So this all led me on to the idea of writing about the concept of a modern International Brigade.  My novel would explore various questions such as most notably how would it work?  Wouldn't such an organisation be essentially an illegal paramilitary organisation?  Or indeed technically a terrorist group?  What would separate the members of this group from terrorists?  Why would people even want to join in the first place?  Why is this idea seemingly less attractive now than it was back in the days of the Spanish Civil War.  I think the latter has a lot to do with the fact that thanks to 24 hours news the images of war and it's horrors are a lot closer.

In many ways this novel concept is my cheeky act of revenge against the parts of the political left who don’t fail to disappoint me.  Years after the wars in Libya and Iraq it seems many voices just can’t help themselves and say a little too smugly “I told you so”.  Those voices even go so far to talk up the leaders who came before those wars, making Gaddafi sound like Mother Theresa with a secret police force.  It is not that those people’s opinions don’t have a point about raising cautionary tales about interventions, to me what I find distasteful is the extent they take them to.  What is more frustrating is that it works more as a mental roadblock more often than it works as a practical argument when it comes to working a way out of the difficulties we face today.  For instance in a typical argument on a political forum on Facebook, any discussion about IS and what to do about them is met by the overheard “well we created the conditions that brought them there”.  Thanks for that Sherlock, any suggestions about what to do about this awful situation.  Essentially then the person espousing this view will argue to do nothing, either by referring to their initial answer described or by implying that anything we do is useless since we are ultimately selfish.  Yes the standard of debating is set that low on the internet.

But if you dwell on the concept of an International Brigades group formed for the sole purpose of fighting against tyranny and promoting democracy you find there is definitely not a shortage of tyranny out there.  In Equatorial Guinea a tinpot dictatorship has been in place longer than I have been alive.  After the not so affectionately named previous president Mad Uncle Macias was executed his nephew took charge of this tiny African nation.  After discovering massive oil and gas reserves in the country the lions share of the oil money went to the President’s family and government officials.  The President’s son Teodora is famous for spending the country’s annual education budget on luxury cars, yachts and hotel suites.  All the while the country is ruled by a climate of fear.  In The Gambia President (formerly general) took power in a military coup in 1994 and has since not left.  He is notable for making outlandish comments such as claiming that he can make herbal remedies for AIDS and Yellow Fever.  Police violence is endemic as is corruption through all levels of society.  The most well known African basket case at the moment is Zimbabwe, on which my planned novel will focus on (albeit with a fictionalised variant).  Robert Gabriel Mugabe the man once lauded as a freedom fighter and a beacon of hope has now pretty much become the complete opposite.  Betraying every ideal he seemed to stand for Mugabe’s Zimbabwe is a democratic society in paper only.  The economy is a mess.  The health system is near hopeless.  Corruption is everywhere, especially centred on the President’s family and loyalists. Democratic elections may as well be relabelled civil wars given the scale of government supported violence that occurs during them.  As one student opposition activist says “As peaceful revolution becomes impossible, it makes violent revolution inevitable.”

Character wise I am very excited at the prospect of developing the African dictatorship angle.  The dictator (for simplicity’s sake I will refer to him as Mugabe) has a lot of potential to develop as a frightening but at the same time very diverse character.  He will be portrayed as someone who is outwardly charming and polite in one on one interactions, but someone who at the same time is slowly losing their grip on reality.  He would be someone who is constantly planning ahead, checking potential threats in the immediate and long term.  He will often be nostalgic given his elderly age and at the same time persistently worried about his vulnerabilities, which are most obviously manifest in his physical ailments.  His firey and often blood curdling speeches will hide an inner addiction to violence as well as an inner insecurity, but at the same time serve its purpose to fire up loyalists.  But as his age advances he becomes more aware of his rivals; his defence minister and heir apparent and now more worryingly his wife the First Lady.  The former is an outwardly charismatic but inwardly Machiavellian character who is playing a quiet but ruthless long game for the presidency.  The latter who was before dismissed as no more than a corrupt debutant is now gaining in political confidence, destroying rivals unexpectedly at a rate that worries even her husband whom she nonetheless has a massive influence on.  As the conflict with the International Brigades gets more heated, so do the tensions between these players.

And what of the International Brigades myself?  Whose idea was it anyway?  In the novel I plan to have this most unlikely of organisations assembled by some of the most unlikely and motely collection of individuals you could imagine.  This would include hated figures in British society such as a tabloid journalist and a corrupt and flamboyant City banker (as well as his long suffering PA who loathes him).  A disillusioned Secret Intelligence Service Case officer will also lend their expertise to the project as will a South African ex apartheid-era assassin.  They will be accompanied by a less flamboyant and humble figure who is a taxi  driver by trade but also voluntary relief worker.  This taxi driver figure is based on a real life person who was tragically killed  by IS, so if this novel becomes a reality and goes towards being sold, I will need to consult his family out of respect for them.  I read about his story in the BBC News and I found his story a touching one, and his warm character one that other people would likely learn to appreciate and connect with.  As you can see some of these people do not sound like the most selfless people in the world.  It is hard  to imagine all of these people being in the same room, let alone organising a paramilitary group with altruistic intentions.  But this is when the central themes of my novel come into play. From  a personal point of view, there is no real definitive type of person I am friends with.  My friends are a humble and diverse coalition of the strange.  Some people I get on with and others I do not.  Often with the former this tends to happen with people who are from completely different backgrounds than my own.  To this end I wanted to play on the theme of a group of seemingly random (and sometimes antagonistic with the banker and the journalist) group of people, putting up with each other’s eccentricities and faults and working towards a common cause.  The theme of redemption will also be very important, with some characters seemingly against their nature trying to fight for it.  Sometimes this craving for redemption is prompted by a life changing event, such as it does with the banker, or the acknowledgement of feelings that have been building up in them for a long time, such as the case with the assassin.  With some of the originally most selfish characters, the nature of the enterprise that they are in leads them into unavoidable moral conflicts.  After all the group has been formed to create violent struggles, albeit for good causes.  This does not always run smoothly alongside their mission to make the world a better after spending most of their lives doing the opposite.

So there we have it; my novel.  Please do not ask when it is going to be done because I do not have a bloody clue.  This is not on a strict timetable and the story arcs may evolve over time into a direction I haven’t considered before.  Either way I am confident that this will be a personal challenge worth embarking on.