I have been following the Iraq situation now for 15 years! I was actually in Riyadh during the Gulf War. The British military attache told us that we were too far away in Riyadh from Iraq to be threatened by missiles, but a scud missile from the Iraqi desert was then launched shortly after - and then almost every evening thereafter just after sunset: the launchers came out of their holes after dark. These official briefing meetings in Embassies either demonstrated the ignorance of government officials or alternatively that they knew the truth but wouldn't tell the truth in order not to alarm anyone. But that seems silly when a missile was launched anyway. Eventually a scud landed quite close to me, and for the first time I thought perhaps I ought to defend myself!
Saddam Hussein was badly advised! I would have fired 30 Scuds at Riyadh on the first night, and the whole of Riyadh would have decamped to Jeddah that very night! Luckily our leaders do not understand.
Seeing Saddam Hussein go to his death left me in two minds. Admiration that he went to his death with some dignity: A rueful acknowledgement that if someone fires a missile at me, I would reluctantly retaliate. My reaction is a measure of how uncivilised I am.
My objection today in 2007 four years after the second invasion of Iraq is that British and American politicians are mouthing excuses for their gigantic incompetence, ignorance and lack of imagination. If we are to undertake some great task, we owe it to all people to do it well. Worse, it looks to me that the people who are making these awful decisions on our behalf are not properly educated or trained in the realities of global power, nor have any real sympathy with the displaced Arab peoples, who indeed do need our help - but not this sort of help. Why is it we can spend $10 billion on war at the drop of a hat, and yet money is not available for development? If we really wish to apologise to Africa for the slave trade, then the money spent on war should be diverted to a better cause.
Beggar the thought that I could contribute to any solution to the problems of the Middle East. But sometimes I do wonder whether after 12 years in Saudi Arabia and a total of 17 years in Moslem countries, I might not have some glimmer of understanding on how to find a solution. Our existing politicians surely could not have made it worse, and yet the world is full of people these days who know the world well and sympathise in a way that our politicians do not.
So what I think is happening is that there is a disconnect between our politicians who stay at home and an international diaspora, growing ever larger and influential, who so far serve no useful function in international politics. My only consolation is that Tony Blair knows what he has done, and it shows in every new wrinkle on his face!
Monday, March 26, 2007
Monday, March 19, 2007
Dscrimination & Private Education
As an Englishman, and as the Welsh ploughboy I would have been 200 years ago, I have always been a bit confused at the British class system: especially as my father unaccountably paid for my education. I suspect I live in two worlds - the world of privilege and the revolutionary world of the peasants.
Many top Republican Americans also seem to have been to private schools in the USA, although why this is different from the British system I am not sure. Perhaps many WASP Americans never quite escaped from King George III after all and remain faithful to an aristocrat class system without quite realising it.
Then there is the caste system in India! Again I was never quite clear why apartheid was wrong in South Africa, but the caste system in India seemed quite acceptable to British and American governments. Certainly the high-caste Hindus I met were very pleased with their position in life and very affable people. Perhaps the British were a bit ashamed of saying anything at all against their old Indian Empire?
In some countries, old feudal systems still seem in operation. This seems to consist in a top-down authoritarian system whereby orders 'must be obeyed without question' and retired generals are often government ministers.
Now quite where democracy fits into this sort of description of modern society is also obscure. If those in command in the old democracies of America and Britian depend on large sums of private money and private education to reach the top, it suggests most of us do not get much say into what happens. I hear many British governments get elected on a minority vote of the total electorate, and then claim a mandate. It is a puzzling old world.
Many top Republican Americans also seem to have been to private schools in the USA, although why this is different from the British system I am not sure. Perhaps many WASP Americans never quite escaped from King George III after all and remain faithful to an aristocrat class system without quite realising it.
Then there is the caste system in India! Again I was never quite clear why apartheid was wrong in South Africa, but the caste system in India seemed quite acceptable to British and American governments. Certainly the high-caste Hindus I met were very pleased with their position in life and very affable people. Perhaps the British were a bit ashamed of saying anything at all against their old Indian Empire?
In some countries, old feudal systems still seem in operation. This seems to consist in a top-down authoritarian system whereby orders 'must be obeyed without question' and retired generals are often government ministers.
Now quite where democracy fits into this sort of description of modern society is also obscure. If those in command in the old democracies of America and Britian depend on large sums of private money and private education to reach the top, it suggests most of us do not get much say into what happens. I hear many British governments get elected on a minority vote of the total electorate, and then claim a mandate. It is a puzzling old world.
Scotland
I never gave it much thought fifty years ago. Scotland was a cold country far to the north, apparently usually allied to France, but my inclinations and destiny lay in other directions to the south and east. Clearly the Scots benefited from their link with England!
I have never been to Scotland, although once attached to the Pembroke Yeomanry I did fire field-guns live across the border but without any malice.
Today I see that Tony Blair has laid the groundwork for Scottish independence, and it is not altogether surprising that our predominantly Scottish government should hanker after independence. Perhaps they cannot tell us but this was part of New Labour policy all along!
I have had many Scots colleagues over the years all over the world and very able they proved to be. They do often seem to have edged out the English, which is surprising when one considers what a small population Scotland has.
So we must congratulate the SNP in advance on the success of its May campaign and look forward to a time when the English will once again assume their rightful position - if only by population numbers - in the British Isles. FREEDOM!
I have never been to Scotland, although once attached to the Pembroke Yeomanry I did fire field-guns live across the border but without any malice.
Today I see that Tony Blair has laid the groundwork for Scottish independence, and it is not altogether surprising that our predominantly Scottish government should hanker after independence. Perhaps they cannot tell us but this was part of New Labour policy all along!
I have had many Scots colleagues over the years all over the world and very able they proved to be. They do often seem to have edged out the English, which is surprising when one considers what a small population Scotland has.
So we must congratulate the SNP in advance on the success of its May campaign and look forward to a time when the English will once again assume their rightful position - if only by population numbers - in the British Isles. FREEDOM!
Saturday, March 17, 2007
Manuelita Saenz
My last and final play called "Manuelita" on Venezuela was never published as I ran out of funds after my other plays ("Sibylla", "Titus and the Gates of Syon", and "My last Farewell") found few buyers. I received some advice that I should be writing novels, and that at any rate historical plays did not have much of a global market these days. That has left "Manuelita" on the stocks, perhaps never to see the light of day. Someone may in 300 years time come across a dusty copy and reflect it mirrors 21st Century attitudes. Who knows? It might also form the basis for a spectacular South American movie!
From my years in Venezuela, I became rather fond of Manuelita, and indeed of the support that the British Legion gave for the liberation of South America from Spain! British governments these days lack imagination and don't much support freedom fighters!
Manuela was the mistress of Simon Bolivar, the Liberator of South America. As a young girl, she had a rather dubious reputation, and her father could only find an English doctor to marry her. The English often seem to be quite flexible in such intimate matters when a Latin family would have put her beyond the pale. They may have been right, but poor English Dr Thorne would have taken her back years later through all the scandals. They had no children and that may have been the root cause of what happened. Manuela was barren.
After the battle on the slopes of Mt Pinchincha in Ecuador, Manuela - Mrs Thorne - attended a ball in honour of the victory and Simon Bolivar attended, even though the battle was won by his able Venezuelan lieutenant - Jose Antonio Sucre. Simon and Manuela danced all night and eventually disappeared together into the dawn.
It was scandal, but Manuelita remained faithful to Simon Bolivar for the remaining years of his and indeed her life, and looked after his papers and his legacy.
She was disgraced by the politicians of Great Colombia and Venezuela after his death in Santa Marta on the coast of Colombia eight years later. She was sent into exile and eventually died some 30 years later of diptheria, an exile in Paita on the Peruvian cost. To live she sold cigars and sweetmeats from a small shop to the American Pacific whaling fleets, but for those who had known her in the glory years of the South American fight for freedom she remained a special friend. She is special still today! Sadly all her valuable papers were burnt after her death as diptheria was a contagious.
In 2007, I am not sure that I entirely approve of Hugo Chavez socialist policies in Venezuela, but Hugo does at least inherit this idea from Simon Bolivar that freedom is worth fighting for however you wish to define it. British troops still are entitled to march through the streets of Caracas with fixed bayonets for without the British Legion the liberty of South America might not have ever been achieved. I at least have not forgotten that, nor the Venezulan fight for freedom nor indeed Manuelita herself! It is after all only 180 years ago.
From my years in Venezuela, I became rather fond of Manuelita, and indeed of the support that the British Legion gave for the liberation of South America from Spain! British governments these days lack imagination and don't much support freedom fighters!
Manuela was the mistress of Simon Bolivar, the Liberator of South America. As a young girl, she had a rather dubious reputation, and her father could only find an English doctor to marry her. The English often seem to be quite flexible in such intimate matters when a Latin family would have put her beyond the pale. They may have been right, but poor English Dr Thorne would have taken her back years later through all the scandals. They had no children and that may have been the root cause of what happened. Manuela was barren.
After the battle on the slopes of Mt Pinchincha in Ecuador, Manuela - Mrs Thorne - attended a ball in honour of the victory and Simon Bolivar attended, even though the battle was won by his able Venezuelan lieutenant - Jose Antonio Sucre. Simon and Manuela danced all night and eventually disappeared together into the dawn.
It was scandal, but Manuelita remained faithful to Simon Bolivar for the remaining years of his and indeed her life, and looked after his papers and his legacy.
She was disgraced by the politicians of Great Colombia and Venezuela after his death in Santa Marta on the coast of Colombia eight years later. She was sent into exile and eventually died some 30 years later of diptheria, an exile in Paita on the Peruvian cost. To live she sold cigars and sweetmeats from a small shop to the American Pacific whaling fleets, but for those who had known her in the glory years of the South American fight for freedom she remained a special friend. She is special still today! Sadly all her valuable papers were burnt after her death as diptheria was a contagious.
In 2007, I am not sure that I entirely approve of Hugo Chavez socialist policies in Venezuela, but Hugo does at least inherit this idea from Simon Bolivar that freedom is worth fighting for however you wish to define it. British troops still are entitled to march through the streets of Caracas with fixed bayonets for without the British Legion the liberty of South America might not have ever been achieved. I at least have not forgotten that, nor the Venezulan fight for freedom nor indeed Manuelita herself! It is after all only 180 years ago.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Education and Competition
Society at least in the Uk seems confused! Today it was said said that children of those who have university degrees will in future be put at the bottom of the list in selection of new undergraduates. What fun! Someone somewhere is assuming that it is university education that bestows advantage and not family back ground and early fascination with life. I am beginning to think that my grandchildren before they get to the age of 5 already have a tremendous advantage in life. Perhaps babies should be removed from family control and put into a state creche to level the playing field. I am not even sure that a university degree makes much difference, and it would be something of a paradox if in 2027 most pampered university graduates were failures, while the middle class was wildly successful have been freed from the chains of conventional education. Graduate grandsons (such as myself) of Welsh peasant boys who never went to University find this all very intriguing! What exactly is the message to the children of recent graduates? I suspect the ruling classes in the UK will in future be educated in Australia and the USA. Try and stop that!
But I also thought that we tried to promote people on merit. What do we do to the unfortunates who pass entry exams and then get disqualified because of an accident of birth? Like me they become international outlaws (after only one generation of university education), not so bad for them but perhaps not good for the UK in the long run.
This then brings me to another thing that I find confusing. How far in our society can you go in wanting to win in politics or business while at the same time avoiding using one's innate education or character to tread down the competition. I do not think Tony Blair has got to the top by playing down his advantages (public school and university) but by a rather single-minded ruthlessness for the main chance. Come to think of it, it is a good idea - Children of politicians should not be allowed to go to university for two generations after reaching political power! There's method in their madness after all!
A free market system cannot operate if we tinker with underlying social trends. Clearly anyone who fights his way to the top ought to be hindered as much as possible in this brave new world. AS always who is going to do the hindering - Tony Blair, the most ruthless of all.
But I also thought that we tried to promote people on merit. What do we do to the unfortunates who pass entry exams and then get disqualified because of an accident of birth? Like me they become international outlaws (after only one generation of university education), not so bad for them but perhaps not good for the UK in the long run.
This then brings me to another thing that I find confusing. How far in our society can you go in wanting to win in politics or business while at the same time avoiding using one's innate education or character to tread down the competition. I do not think Tony Blair has got to the top by playing down his advantages (public school and university) but by a rather single-minded ruthlessness for the main chance. Come to think of it, it is a good idea - Children of politicians should not be allowed to go to university for two generations after reaching political power! There's method in their madness after all!
A free market system cannot operate if we tinker with underlying social trends. Clearly anyone who fights his way to the top ought to be hindered as much as possible in this brave new world. AS always who is going to do the hindering - Tony Blair, the most ruthless of all.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Carrying Arms
I was an expert in weapons and explosives in the UK from about the age of 15 to the time I left the Royal Artillery in 1960; perhaps I still am. I have often wondered why revolutionaries do not use more heavy artillery in their coups! However, I always felt that for me to carry arms implied I would use them if I had to. That did not seem right or Christian, so in about 1956 I sent back my last .303 Lee-Enfield rifle and some ammunition to school, and have never carried an arm since anywhere in the world. I did not keep any artillery at home! It seemed the civilised thing to do and avoided my using a weapon, rather than logic, to win an argument. I still think at the age of 72 I could take out most of the armed policement and soldiers I meet if I had to. They do not generally seem very well trained! I am also told how wonderful special forces are, and no doubt they are in good physical condition, but I am not entirely convinced they help very much from a strategic point-of-view. Anyway I suspect that being unarmed, people are nicer to me! This point-of-view perhaps also comes from an old idea in the UK that the police should not be armed, except for a truncheon, a very civilised way of running any society. Recently governments have been changing the rules on the use of violence and 'habeas corpus', and I cannot help worry that weapons training may after all be coming back as a means of self-defence.
All the above applies to the UK, but I have observed my American cousins from afar for many years and never quite understood the logic of the National Rifle Association. It may seem to protect the ordinary citizen, but also suggests Americans can be gunned down by foreigners more easily because that's what the rules say is allowed!
But of course, the rules in the USA do not say that all citizens can carry weapons, and I have never understood how Americans can argue based on the Constitution for the use of weapons by untrained ordinary citizens. I seem to remember in my own weapon training it was openly admitted that most bullets (especially from revolvers) did not hit their target!
The American Constitution actually says and I quote "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed." I would agree with that preamble " a well-regulated militia", and indeed recollect that I too was an officer in the Yeomanry for six years - undoubtedly a UK militia.
So my worry today might be that it is not wise for me to be pursauded to carry arms by governments, but that seems to be the drift of the argument at present - rough justice is better than the law. I do not like the argument that says I can use force to win, perhaps because I would be very good at it!
All the above applies to the UK, but I have observed my American cousins from afar for many years and never quite understood the logic of the National Rifle Association. It may seem to protect the ordinary citizen, but also suggests Americans can be gunned down by foreigners more easily because that's what the rules say is allowed!
But of course, the rules in the USA do not say that all citizens can carry weapons, and I have never understood how Americans can argue based on the Constitution for the use of weapons by untrained ordinary citizens. I seem to remember in my own weapon training it was openly admitted that most bullets (especially from revolvers) did not hit their target!
The American Constitution actually says and I quote "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed." I would agree with that preamble " a well-regulated militia", and indeed recollect that I too was an officer in the Yeomanry for six years - undoubtedly a UK militia.
So my worry today might be that it is not wise for me to be pursauded to carry arms by governments, but that seems to be the drift of the argument at present - rough justice is better than the law. I do not like the argument that says I can use force to win, perhaps because I would be very good at it!
Monday, March 12, 2007
Computer Instructions
At the age of 72, I am of course not expected to understand what is happening in the technical world of the computer. I am ashamed I cannot program. I am always worried when my younger friends often seem at a loss to answer my questions when an unexpected collapse occurs! I always suppose it is all my fault and sometimes spend hours going through my laptop to see where I made a mistake. This week I had some frights:
My laptop would not project my powerpoint slides. This seems to be the fault of the projector, but I am not sure as the technician was quite silent on the matter. He took away the laptop and returned it. Then my wifi would not work! I assume WiFi has always been'ON', but on this occasion I had to find how to switch on my wifi. Depress Fn and F1! But why should I know this when this is the first time I have ever done it! Why did he switch off my wifi without telling me?
Then suddenly I got a Hotmail message "Account closed/ Access denied"! What about all my recent work? Anyway I filled in a form and 24 hours later everything was restored without much explanation. I am still mystified!
With all this activity, as usual thinking it was my fault, I did a "system restore" without losing my info, and it all worked wonderfully and the laptop is so fast now. But I seem to be in a 2005 limbo where I am getting free 2005 offers, almost as if the programmers of 2005 and never foresaw a situation where anyone would go back to 2005!
I seem to be receiving free offers from Norton 2005. I am not quite sure what this means! I in fact discontinued Norton a year ago because I ordered some $18 update from the USA and could never load it as I got message saying "you are on the wrong circuit". This suggested that my laptop, bought in the UK and used in the Philippines is somehow 'persona non grata' in the uSA. I never got my $18 back. I could not find a way of communicating in writing with Norton even after many hours of trying.
I now suspect that I understand computers very well but that there others who do not! But I cannot program!
My laptop would not project my powerpoint slides. This seems to be the fault of the projector, but I am not sure as the technician was quite silent on the matter. He took away the laptop and returned it. Then my wifi would not work! I assume WiFi has always been'ON', but on this occasion I had to find how to switch on my wifi. Depress Fn and F1! But why should I know this when this is the first time I have ever done it! Why did he switch off my wifi without telling me?
Then suddenly I got a Hotmail message "Account closed/ Access denied"! What about all my recent work? Anyway I filled in a form and 24 hours later everything was restored without much explanation. I am still mystified!
With all this activity, as usual thinking it was my fault, I did a "system restore" without losing my info, and it all worked wonderfully and the laptop is so fast now. But I seem to be in a 2005 limbo where I am getting free 2005 offers, almost as if the programmers of 2005 and never foresaw a situation where anyone would go back to 2005!
I seem to be receiving free offers from Norton 2005. I am not quite sure what this means! I in fact discontinued Norton a year ago because I ordered some $18 update from the USA and could never load it as I got message saying "you are on the wrong circuit". This suggested that my laptop, bought in the UK and used in the Philippines is somehow 'persona non grata' in the uSA. I never got my $18 back. I could not find a way of communicating in writing with Norton even after many hours of trying.
I now suspect that I understand computers very well but that there others who do not! But I cannot program!
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