eNovella: A Little Piece of Europe.

The very near future. Welcome to the European Union Safezone in North Africa.

2 million refugees trying to make a life in a city-state on the edge of Europe.

For the disgraced former British prime minister and his Irish deputy put in charge of running it, a chance at redemption.

For the refugee Syrian businessman, it’s a chance at a new life for his family.

For the young Somali woman fleeing terror, it’s a chance to perhaps no longer be afraid.

For the young Islamic State operative, it’s a chance to strike at the west… 

Now available as an eBook on Amazon here.

ALPOE cover

 

What do we actually mean by neutrality?

What does Irish “Neutrality” actually mean? It’s a phrase that gets thrown around with a common assumption that we all agree on the meaning, but I doubt that’s the case. For example, are we neutral between Israel and Palestine, or Russia and Ukraine? I would say no, and I would say that the majority of the Irish are comfortable (as much as they give it any thought, which is another issue) with our state’s heavy leaning towards one side in those conflicts.

Being a constitutional republic, we have a written (as opposed to hearsay) constitution which allows us to declare specifically as to what values we identify with. With that in mind, I’ve attempted to write a rough draft of what a constitutional amendment on neutrality would actually attempt to say.

One interesting thing: when you put this stuff down in black and white, it has sometimes unforeseen consequences. For example, if we recognised Palestine as a sovereign state, wouldn’t it mean we’d have to stop funding the Palestinian state as that would be a breach of neutrality as we would have defined?

Maybe it’s better just to stick with the “Whatever you’re having yourself” model we currently have.

Anyway: here’s the draft for divilment.

1. Ireland is a neutral country. We shall not assist any country, including other EU members, in their defence from attack in any way.

2. No Irish government shall seek or accept any military or any form of other assistance in the event of any form of military or other security attack upon Ireland.

3. Ireland shall not source any military or security related material from abroad but shall manufacture those required domestically.

4. Ireland shall not contribute or supply resources of any kind to any state involved in any form of military conflict with another state.

5. Ireland shall primarily place her security in the hands of the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, namely the United Kingdom, the Russian Federation, the People’s Republic of China, the United States, and the French Republic.

A movie worth watching: Presidents (2021)

“Presidents” is a French comedy starring Jean Dujardin and Gregory Gadebois as two former French presidents named Nicolas and Francois (Yeah) who are struggling to deal with life after the Elysee and their electoral ejection from it. It’s a gentle comedy and also stars Pascale Arbillot and Doria Tillier as their respective partners, and is an entertaining look at the gap between the men who become head of state and the country they led.

Worth a look.

What if….Europe elected a president?

The creation of the office of President of the European Union was one of those perfect storm moments that occurs in politics. As an idea, it drew relatively little support, but many of those who supported it did so with a vigor bordering on fanaticism. When that was mixed with the hubris of national politicians who thought it didn’t matter and the short-termism of a political system that only sees policy as a quick solution as opposed to long-term strategy, political tectonic plates started to move. The final key variable was the European Parliament, which had amassed power almost silently like a dog chained in a basement who has grown huge and strong because nobody in the house realizes that they have all been feeding the dog. Politicians stung by accusations of being “undemocratic” had thrown one power after another at the once rubber-stamping talking shop without grasping that all the combined powers were in fact creating a powerful transnational parliamentary assembly. When the parliament itself named an elected president as its price for treaty change the pols rolled over, once again assuming that it could be finessed with some retired prime minister doing a lap of honour. That was assuming the system even got off the ground, given how vague the details in the actual treaty were.

The problem for the “It’ll never happen” brigade was that this was Europe, and for every European thought there’s a well-funded committee that starts working out the details with almost self-pleasuring enthusiasm. Immediately, the committee ran into a problem. It wasn’t hard to figure out what powers would be held by the new office: the committee rapidly concluded that the simplest thing was to directly elect the commission president, with the president of the council acting at a intergovernmental balance.

Continue reading

What if…Putin detonates a nuclear weapon in Ukraine?

It’s not impossible. Vladimir Putin, facing stalemate or possibly even defeat by a better motivated and well-resourced Ukrainian army, might decide to play the “madman” card.

A small, low-yield tactical nuclear weapon, detonated in a low population rural part of Ukraine. Not a military act, but a political one, to cause panic in the nuclear-phobic West and particularly in western Europe.

The message would be clear: I am willing to go further than you, so give me what I want. Stop helping Ukraine and let me defeat them. 

It’s a high-risk strategy, but also a viable one. The panic it will cause in NATO will be very real, and the response not automatic or even obvious. The idea that NATO will automatically respond with a like-for-like nuclear retaliation should not be assumed at all.

Continue reading

Europe needs a plan.

Wrote this last year…

And it is as much about where Europe is not heading as where it is.

If you ever want to increase your general euroscepticism, spend a few days hanging around EU institutions. The sheer complexity of getting anything done, in a union of 27 countries with competing political systems, national prejudices and hangups is nothing as compared to a certain type of EU official you meet for whom the answer to ever problem is…go on, guess.

More Europe.

Let me be very clear: I’m a European federalist. I believe in a United States of Europe. But that does not mean that I think that every solution involves Brussels. Indeed, I could even be convinced that maybe some existing powers should be returned to the member states.

Continue reading

What will actually happen if Marine Le Pen wins?

Let’s cut to the proverbial chase: what will Marine Le Pen do if she reaches the Elysee? The truth is that we don’t know, and neither, probably, does she. As we witnessed with Brexiteers and Trump: often the populists don’t have a plan beyond winning.

She’s given clues, of course. She’s said she will withdraw France once again (as de Gaulle did) from NATO’s military command (but not seemingly NATO itself) and it’s not unreasonable to think that she will stop French support for Ukraine. She has suggested that she does not feel France is bound by NATO’s article 5 guarantee to defend any NATO member that is attacked. If true, that is huge, because France is physically vital to NATO’s defence of Europe. A Europe without French access will struggle to be supplied by the US. It would, in short, be an act of treason against Europe.

Continue reading

The High Risk Voter.

Whatever happens in the French presidential election, there is a reality that will need to be confronted. It’s a phenomenon we have seen in the last two US presidential elections, in the Brexit referendum, and will no doubt be a feature in future elections.
It is the huge danger caused by reckless voters.
Now, let me be clear: this is not your standard Metropolitan Globalist Liberal (of which I am all three) complaining about how disappointed I am about people who don’t share my views, or their level of intelligence or prejudice. I accept that there are many decent people who voted for Trump, Brexit and yes, even Marine Le Pen. People who in many cases did not share the more extreme views of those candidates.
I even accept that there are people, particularly non-urban, low-income and low-educational achievers who vote for candidates I would regard as extremist because they simply feel they are being ignored by the mainstream parties. I get that too., and it may surprise you that I don’t blame them.
Continue reading

A free eNovella about the future of Europe: Fulcrum

Something I wrote about 5 years ago. Dated in parts, not so much in others. 

Fulcrum

Europe. The near future.

The Russian invasion of Europe has been defeated.

An EU safezone holds millions of refugees in North Africa.

In Brussels, a woman directs the continent.

To some she is a saviour.

To others a tyrant.

To one man, a target.

You can download a PDF of “Fulcum” below. Enjoy!

Fulcrum eNovella

 

Beware of nuclear blackmail.

With rational people talking of the possibility of President Putin utilising a chemical or nuclear  weapon in Ukraine, it’s worth having a discussion about how we in Europe and the west generally shall respond to such an event.

First, we have to recognise that it has to be possible to have a discussion about nuclear weapons without falling into Armageddonesque hysterics or into cold Strangeloveian normalisation of what would be a major event in human history.

Consider the following image: the impact of a B61 nuclear bomb (the smallest in the US arsenal) on Dublin if exploded over the GPO.

Would it cause massive devastation, panic, evacuation, economic damage and kill thousands? Yes. Would it end Dublin as a city? The answer is quite simply no. Even with fallout, and a sealed off central zone for decades, Dublin would recover eventually.

If Russia dropped a Tsar Bomba on Ireland, the biggest single bomb ever detonated by Russia, on the middle of the country (Sorry Tullamore) most of Cork, Limerick and Galway city would escape undamaged. The devastation would be immense, and millions would die from the blast and the radiation poisoning, and the presumable collapse of the country as a functioning nation.

The point is that there are different types of nuclear weapons, and a B61 being detonated is different from a Tsar Bomba.

What isn’t different is the psychological effect: the the Russians (or anyone else) have suddenly used a nuclear weapon for the first time since 1945. It becomes the most important story in the world. It is bigger than anything else. People will stop what they are doing in work. Planes will immediately land. Some people will commit suicide.

That’s also what Putin is counting on: the idea that populations in European democracies will be swept up in hysteria and demand their governments immediately acquiesce to whatever he wants to avoid “the end of the world” as he pretends to be (we assume) a madman with nothing to lose. In the only countries that matter in this scenario, the US, UK and France, furious debates will be held as to how to respond. Responding by detonating a comparable weapon against Russian forces in Ukraine is not an option. Nor is detonating a weapon over Russian territory. Therefore, the most likely option would be a massive conventional attack using non-nuclear weapons (Aircraft and cruise missiles) against Russian forces in Ukraine to inflict a high price on Russia for crossing the nuclear threshold without escalation it.

The problem with that is that such a response could, ironically, push Putin further into a corner by a) being attacked directly by NATO forces, and b) by devastating his forces in Ukraine making defeat there far more likely.

This is also against a background where, almost certainly, possibly millions of Europeans will protest demanding their governments abandon Ukraine so as not to provoke further use of nuclear weapons by Putin, the very thing he is hoping.

What if he detonates a second weapon in Ukraine, again of very small yield but nuclear nevertheless? How does NATO respond then? Let us not forget: Putin believes the west is weak. That our people are spineless and obsessed by gender identities and race and celebrity and will buckle when a real man puts his thumb on our collective jugular. That when he shows that he is willing to go further than we are, we will beg him to stop and give him everything he wants.

He may well be right.