Delegates to the recent Labour Party conference in the English seaside town of Brighton seemed not to notice a video playing in the main entrance. The world’s third biggest arms manufacturer, BAe Systems, supplier to Saudi Arabia, was promoting its guns, bombs, missiles, naval ships and fighter aircraft.
O dabi enipe aami apanirun ti ẹgbẹ kan ninu eyiti awọn miliọnu awọn ara ilu Britani nawo awọn ireti iṣelu wọn bayi. Ni kete ti o tọju Tony Blair, o jẹ oludari ni bayi nipasẹ Jeremy Corbyn, ẹniti iṣẹ rẹ ti yatọ pupọ ati pe o ṣọwọn ni iselu idasile Ilu Gẹẹsi.
Nigbati o n sọrọ apejọ apejọ naa, olupolongo Naomi Klein ṣapejuwe igbega Corbyn gẹgẹbi “apakan ti iṣẹlẹ agbaye kan. A rii ni ipolongo itan-akọọlẹ Bernie Sanders ni awọn alakọbẹrẹ AMẸRIKA, ti agbara nipasẹ awọn ẹgbẹrun ọdun ti o mọ pe iṣelu aarin ailewu ko fun wọn ni iru ọjọ iwaju ailewu.”
In fact, at the end of the US primary elections last year, Sanders led his followers into the arms of Hillary Clinton, a liberal warmonger from a long tradition in the Democratic Party.
As President Obama’s Secretary of State, Clinton presided over the invasion of Libya in 2011, which led to a stampede of refugees to Europe. She gloated at the gruesome murder of Libya’s president. Two years earlier, Clinton signed off on a coup that overthrew the democratically elected president of Honduras. That she has been invited to Wales on 14 October to be given an honorary doctorate by the University of Swansea because she is “synonymous with human rights” is unfathomable.
Like Clinton, Sanders is a cold-warrior and “anti-communist” obsessive with a proprietorial view of the world beyond the United States. He supported Bill Clinton’s and Tony Blair’s illegal assault on Yugoslavia in 1998 and the invasions of Afghanistan, Syria and Libya, as well as Barack Obama’s campaign of terrorism by drone. He backs the provocation of Russia and agrees that the whistleblower Edward Snowden should stand trial. He has called the late Hugo Chavez – a social democrat who won multiple elections – “a dead communist dictator”.
Lakoko ti Sanders jẹ oloselu ara ilu Amẹrika kan ti o mọmọ, Corbyn le jẹ iyalẹnu, pẹlu atilẹyin ailagbara rẹ fun awọn olufaragba ti awọn irin-ajo ijọba ijọba Amẹrika ati Ilu Gẹẹsi ati fun awọn agbeka atako olokiki.
For example, in the 1960s and 70s, the Chagos islanders were expelled from their homeland, a British colony in the Indian Ocean, by a Labour government. An entire population was kidnapped. The aim was to make way for a US military base on the main island of Diego Garcia: a secret deal for which the British were “compensated” with a discount of $14 million off the price of a Polaris nuclear submarine.
I have had much to do with the Chagos islanders and have filmed them in exile in Mauritius and the Seychelles, where they suffered and some of them “died from sadness”, as I was told. They found a political champion in a Labour Member of Parliament, Jeremy Corbyn.
So did the Palestinians. So did Iraqis terrorised by a Labour prime minister’s invasion of their country in 2003. So did others struggling to break free from the web of western power. Corbyn supported the likes of Hugo Chavez, who brought more than hope to societies subverted by the US behemoth.
And yet, now Corbyn is closer to power than he might have ever imagined, his foreign policy remains a secret.
By secret, I mean there has been rhetoric and little else. “We must put our values at the heart of our foreign policy,” he said at the Labour conference. But what are these “values”?
Since 1945, like the Tories, British Labour has been an imperial party, obsequious to Washington: a record exemplified by the crime in the Chagos islands.
What has changed? Is Corbyn saying Labour will uncouple itself from the US war machine, and the US spying apparatus and US economic blockades that scar humanity?
His shadow Foreign Secretary, Emily Thornberry, says a Corbyn government “will put human rights back at the heart of Britain’s foreign policy”. But human rights have never been at the heart of British foreign policy — only “interests”, as Lord Palmerston declared in the 19th century: the interests of those at the apex of British society.
Thornberry quoted the late Robin Cook who, as Tony Blair’s first Foreign Secretary in 1997, pledged an “ethical foreign policy” that would “make Britain once again a force for good in the world”.
Itan kii ṣe oninuure si nostalgia ijọba. Pipin ti a ṣe iranti laipẹ ti India nipasẹ ijọba Labour kan ni ọdun 1947 - pẹlu aala ti o yara ti a gbe soke nipasẹ agbẹjọro Ilu Lọndọnu kan, Gordon Radcliffe, ti ko ti lọ si India rara ti ko tun pada - yori si jijẹ ẹjẹ silẹ ni iwọn ipaeyarun kan.
Pa soke ni a adashe nla, pẹlu olopa alẹ ati ọjọ
Ṣiṣakoṣo awọn ọgba lati pa awọn apaniyan kuro,
O sọkalẹ lati ṣiṣẹ, si iṣẹ-ṣiṣe ti yanju ayanmọ
Ti milionu. Awọn maapu ti o wa ni ọwọ rẹ ko ti pẹ
Ati pe ikaniyan Pada fẹrẹẹ daju pe ko tọ,
Ṣugbọn ko si akoko lati ṣayẹwo wọn, ko si akoko lati ṣayẹwo
Awọn agbegbe idije. Oju ojo gbona tobẹru,
Àjàkálẹ̀ àrùn sì pa á mọ́ra nígbà gbogbo.
ṣugbọn in seven weeks it was done, the frontiers decided,
A continent fun dara tabi buru pin.
W.H. Auden, ‘Partition'.
It was the same Labour government (1945-51), led by Prime Minister Clement Attlee – “radical” by today’s standards — that dispatched General Douglas Gracey’s British imperial army to Saigon with orders to re-arm the defeated Japanese in order to prevent Vietnamese nationalists from liberating their own country. Thus, the longest war of the century was ignited.
O jẹ Akọwe Ajeji Ilu Iṣẹ Labour kan, Ernest Bevin, ẹniti eto imulo “ibaraẹnisọrọ” ati “ajọṣepọ” pẹlu diẹ ninu awọn ibi ibi ti o buruju julọ ni agbaye, ni pataki ni Aarin Ila-oorun, ṣe awọn ibatan ti o farada loni, nigbagbogbo npapa ati fifọ awọn ẹtọ eniyan lapapọ agbegbe ati awujo. Awọn fa wà British "anfani" - epo, agbara ati oro.
Ni awọn “radical” 1960, Akowe Aabo Labour, Denis Healey, ṣeto Ajo Awọn Titaja Aabo (DSO) pataki lati ṣe alekun iṣowo ohun ija ati ṣe owo lati ta awọn ohun ija apaniyan si agbaye. Healey sọ fun Ile-igbimọ Asofin, “Lakoko ti a ṣe pataki pataki si ilọsiwaju ni aaye ti iṣakoso ohun ija ati ihamọra, a tun gbọdọ ṣe awọn igbesẹ ti o wulo ti a le ṣe lati rii daju pe orilẹ-ede yii ko kuna lati ni aabo ipin ẹtọ ti ọja to niyelori yii. ”
The doublethink was quintessentially Labour. When I later asked Healey about this “valuable market”, he claimed his decision made no difference to the volume of military exports. In fact, it led to an almost doubling of Britain’s share of the arms market. Today, Britain is the second biggest arms dealer on earth, selling arms and fighter planes, machine guns and “riot control” vehicles, to 22 of the 30 countries on the British Government’s own list of human rights violators.
Will this stop under a Corbyn government? The preferred model – Robin Cook’s “ethical foreign policy” – is revealing. Like Jeremy Corbyn, Cook made his name as a backbencher and critic of the arms trade. “Wherever weapons are sold,” wrote Cook, “there is a tacit conspiracy to conceal the reality of war” and “it is a truism that every war for the past two decades has been fought by poor countries with weapons supplied by rich countries”.
Cook singled out the sale of British Hawk fighters to Indonesia as “particularly disturbing”. Indonesia “is not only repressive but actually at war on two fronts: in East Timor, where perhaps a sixth of the population has been slaughtered … and in West Papua, where it confronts an indigenous liberation movement”.
As Foreign Secretary, Cook promised “a thorough review of arms sales”. The then Nobel Peace Laureate, Bishop Carlos Belo of East Timor, appealed directly to Cook: “Please, I beg you, do not sustain any longer a conflict which without these arms sales could never have been pursued in the first place and not for so very long.”
He was referring to Indonesia’s bombing of East Timor with British Hawks and the slaughter of his people with British machine guns. He received no reply.
The following week Cook called journalists to the Foreign Office to announce his “mission statement” for “human rights in a new century”. This PR event included the usual private briefings for selected journalists, including the BBC, in which Foreign Office officials lied that there was “no evidence” that British Hawk aircraft were deployed in East Timor.
A few days later, the Foreign Office issued the results of Cook’s “thorough review” of arms sales policy. “It was not realistic or practical,” wrote Cook, “to revoke licences which were valid and in force at the time of Labour’s election victory”. Suharto’s Minister for Defence, Edi Sudradjat, said that talks were already under way with Britain for the purchase of 18 more Hawk fighters. “The political change in Britain will not affect our negotiations,” he said. He was right.
Loni, rọpo Indonesia pẹlu Saudi Arabia ati East Timor pẹlu Yemen. Ọkọ ofurufu ologun ti Ilu Gẹẹsi - ti a ta pẹlu ifọwọsi ti awọn ijọba Tory ati Labour mejeeji ati ti a ṣe nipasẹ ile-iṣẹ ti fidio igbega rẹ ni igberaga aaye ni apejọ ẹgbẹ 2017 Labour - n kọlu igbesi aye lati Yemen, ọkan ninu awọn orilẹ-ede talaka julọ ni agbaye, níbi tí ìdajì àwọn ọmọdé ti jẹ àìjẹunrekánú àti pé àjàkálẹ̀ àrùn ọgbẹ́ tó pọ̀ jù lọ ló wà ní àkókò òde òní.
Hospitals and schools, weddings and funerals have been attacked. In Ryadh, British military personnel are reported to be training the Saudis in selecting targets.
Ninu iwe-ifihan lọwọlọwọ Labour, Jeremy Corbyn ati awọn ẹlẹgbẹ ẹgbẹ rẹ ṣe ileri pe “Labour yoo beere ibeere pipe, ominira, iwadii ti UN si awọn irufin ẹsun… ni Yemen, pẹlu awọn ikọlu afẹfẹ lori awọn ara ilu nipasẹ iṣọpọ ti Saudi-dari. A yoo da duro lẹsẹkẹsẹ eyikeyi awọn tita ohun ija siwaju fun lilo ninu ija naa titi ti iwadii yẹn yoo fi pari. ”
Ṣugbọn ẹri ti awọn irufin Saudi Arabia ni Yemen ti jẹ akọsilẹ tẹlẹ nipasẹ Amnesty ati awọn miiran, paapaa nipasẹ ijabọ igboya ti oniroyin Ilu Gẹẹsi Iona Craig. Dossier naa jẹ iwọn didun.
Laala ko ṣe ileri lati da awọn ọja okeere si Saudi Arabia duro. Ko sọ pe Ilu Gẹẹsi yoo yọkuro atilẹyin rẹ fun awọn ijọba ti o ni iduro fun okeere ti jihadism Islamist. Ko si ifaramo lati tuka iṣowo ohun ija naa.
The manifesto describes a “special relationship [with the US] based on shared values … When the current Trump administration chooses to ignore them … we will not be afraid to disagree”.
As Jeremy Corbyn knows, dealing with the US is not about merely “disagreeing”. The US is a rapacious, rogue power that ought not to be regarded as a natural ally of any state championing human rights, irrespective of whether Trump or anyone else is President.
When Emily Thornberry , in her conference speech, linked Venezuela with the Philippines as “increasingly autocratic regimes” – slogans bereft of facts and ignoring the subversive US role in Venezuela — she was consciously playing to the enemy: a tactic with which Jeremy Corbyn will be familiar.
A Corbyn government will allow the Chagos islanders the right of return. But Labour says nothing about renegotiating the 50-year renewal agreement that Britain has just signed with the US allowing it to use the base on Diego Garcia from which it has bombed Afghanistan and Iraq.
A Corbyn government will “immediately recognise the state of Palestine”. There is silence on whether Britain will continue to arm Israel, continue to acquiesce in the illegal trade in Israel’s illegal “settlements” and treat Israel merely as a warring party, rather than as an historic oppressor given immunity by Washington and London.
On Britain’s support for Nato’s current war preparations, Labour boasts that the “last Labour government spent above the benchmark of 2 per cent of GDP” on Nato. It says, “Conservative spending cuts have put Britain’s security at risk” and promises to boost Britain’s military “obligations”.
In fact, most of the £40 billion Britain currently spends on the military is not for territorial defence of the UK but for offensive purposes to enhance British “interests” as defined by those who have tried to smear Jeremy Corbyn as unpatriotic.
If the polls are reliable, most Britons are well ahead of their politicians, Tory and Labour. They would accept higher taxes to pay for public services; they want the National Health Service restored to full health. They want decent jobs and wages and housing and schools; they do not hate foreigners but resent exploitative labour. They have no fond memory of an empire on which the sun never set.
They oppose the invasion of other countries and regard Blair as a liar. The rise of Donald Trump has reminded them what a menace the United States can be, especially with their own country in tow.
Ẹgbẹ Labour jẹ alanfani ti iṣesi yii, ṣugbọn ọpọlọpọ awọn adehun rẹ - dajudaju ninu eto imulo ajeji - jẹ oṣiṣẹ ati gbogun, ni iyanju, fun ọpọlọpọ awọn ara ilu Britani, diẹ sii ti kanna.
Jeremy Corbyn is widely and properly recognised for his integrity; he opposes the renewal of Trident nuclear weapons; the Labour Party supports it. But he has given shadow cabinet positions to pro-war MPs who support Blairism, tried to get rid of him and abused him as “unelectable”.
“We are the political mainstream now,” says Corbyn. Yes, but at what price?
ZNetwork jẹ agbateru nikan nipasẹ ilawo ti awọn oluka rẹ.
kun
1 ọrọìwòye
Mr.Pilger truth teller.