The road to defeat

Four military deaths in southern Iraq in 48 hours, reports Reuters, two of them Irish Guards in the early hours of yesterday, killed by an IED when their convoy was hit near the Rumaila oil fields, west of Basra. Two other soldiers were seriously injured.

One member of the RAF Regiment was shot dead during a foot patrol on Tuesday, a patrol mounted to deter indirect fire on Basra Air Station. Another soldier was shot while driving a Warrior on Monday night, the gunman apparently shooting him as he sat exposed, with his hatch open.

Says Reuters, simply repeating what was widely predicted, "British-patrolled southern Iraq has become more dangerous for British troops since the government announced in February that London would cut back its force during the course of 2007."

In the April-July period, it adds, 30 British soldiers died in Iraq, making it the deadliest period since the 2003 invasion when Britain had nine times as many troops as the 5,500-strong contingent it has deployed now. We are told that this is in part due to Shi'ite militants stepping up attacks to create the impression they are pushing the British out.

In our view, the rot started when the Army let itself be run out of Camp Abu Naji in al Amarah, just short of a year ago, after sustaining continuous mortar and rocket attacks from local militias.

This has been compounded by the failure then to deal robustly with indirect fire attacks on bases at Shaiba, the Old State Building and the Shatt al Arab Hotel. All of these bases have since been abandoned, adding to the carefully cultivated militia legend that, if they intensify their attacks, the British will run away.

We commented on this in November last year, before that (follow the links on that post), in particular chronicling the humiliating withdrawal of civilian staff from the Basra Palace complex, after sustained attacks on the base.

Time and again, we have pointed out that the weapons, technology and tactics are available to defeat these attacks, most recently in late July, but with our seminal post last November, in which we set what was needed to defeat the attacks on our bases.

Furthermore, the issue has been raised repeatedly in Parliament, and through direct and indirect lobbying - but to little avail.

Although belatedly the MoD has improved defences, and more is planned, it is proving too little, too late. Shortly, under the increasing weight of indirect fire attacks, the British Army is to evacuate Basra Palace, under conditions which will offer the militias the perfect opportunity to take the propaganda high ground, claiming, once again, that they have run the British out of town.

Yet, as late as last October, we had the delusional Mrs Beckett claiming that the Army was close to reaching the "tipping point" in defeating the insurgents but, no matter what self-serving tripe that now comes out of Whitehall and Downing street, the retreat from Basra Palace will be seen on the "arab street" as a defeat of the British.

Even the Americans, who have hitherto been diplomatically silent on our performance, are now openly saying that, "The British have basically been defeated in the south."

As to the most recent deaths, we note that the MoD has not specified the vehicle type in the patrol hit by an IED. Was it another Snatch Land Rover? If not, why isn't the MoD telling us? It quite often does give details, but not this time.

Then there is the unfortunate Warrior driver. He is by no means the first Warrior crew to be murdered by gunman yet, as we noted in a long, ruminating post at the end of last year, the Warrior type of vehicle is entirely unsuitable for counter-insurgency operations – an issue we were to rehearse again and again.

Built for the wide-open spaces of the conventional battlefields of Northern Europe, it lacks visibility for the type of fighting currently undertaken when closed down.

Perforce, the driver (and commander) must fight from open hatches, when they are highly vulnerable to direct fire. And, if they are closed down for any length in the sweltering heat of the Iraqi summer, lacking air conditioning, the crews would suffer massive discomfort, to the point of heat exhaustion.

The alternative, of course, is the mine and blast protected vehicle, such as the Mastiff, which affords the driver good visibility from behind bullet-proof glass, in the comfort of a well-protected, air conditioned vehicle.

This rather points up one of the major problems affecting not only the Iraqi but the Afghanistani campaigns – the chronic lack of adequate equipment. Despite the obvious need for specialist vehicles for counter-insurgency operations, there are too few in theatre, yet the Army persists with its dreams for vehicles designed for high-end warfare, then adapting them for purposes from which they were never designed.

This tendency, of course, is not confined to the Army. Only yesterday, we read in The Telegraph a puff for the RAF's latest and most expensive "toy", the £80 million Eurofighter, which is being converted from an air superiority fighter to a ground attack aircraft for use in Afghanistan.

We are told that, "being able to achieve speeds of more than 1,500mph and carrying a probable payload of two 1,000lb, laser guided Paveway bombs," these aircraft "will be able to deliver devastating firepower".

Less than two weeks ago, however, we were reading reports of the effects of that "devastating firepower" on the civilian population in Afghanistan. The last thing we need is yet more fast jets screaming into combat dropping huge bombs on the innocent. We are using these aircraft, built for another war, simply because we have them. And, because we have these grotesquely expensive hi-tech "toys", we cannot afford the equipment we really need.

Nevertheless, Wing Commander Gavin Parker, officer commanding XI Squadron, which has taken delivery of the latest aircraft, gushes that the Eurofighter, "…is already an exceptional air-to-air fighter and is demonstrating excellent potential in the air-to-surface role. It will make it a fantastic close air support machine."

There is the problem in a nutshell, and one that seems unsolvable – one of many – and which prompted my post of 1 July when I got from a senior officer that the Services cannot afford to focus on the current wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as that would leave them unprepared to fight future wars. The effort in our current theatres must, therefore – I was told - be tempered by the need to maintain balanced forces, capable of dealing with future (unknown) commitments.

So it is that men (and women) must die, sent into danger with inadequate equipment, poor tactics and insufficient numbers. In Iraq, they will soon be hunkered down in their last remaining redoubt at Basra Air Base, where they will provide unending target practice for the militias until, at last, the public pressure becomes politically unsustainable, and Brown is forced to bring them home.

That day cannot be far away as the latest deaths bring the total number of British service personnel who have died in the Iraq since the 2003 invasion to 168. In the grisly arithmetic of media reporting, there are 32 more deaths needed to reach the "magic" figure of 200, when we can expect an orgy of recriminations.

At the current rate of deaths, this could well be sometime in the autumn, at the height of the political season when it will have maximum impact on Brown. Under the sustained weight of political and media pressure, it could well be that he will be unable to resist calls to pull the troops out.

On the road to defeat, there will be many views on what went wrong. But, in the final analysis, it will not have been any one thing. At the very top, is a lack of political will to see the job through. But we also have a failure of the opposition and even the Army brass cannot escape some blame.

But, with a hostile media, an indifferent population and a general anti-militaristic climate – compounded by the increasing rejection of "Bush's war" – it was perhaps inevitable that, when the going got tough, this nation of ours was never going to rise to the challenge. The defeat, however – when it is finally recognised – will diminish us all, and the political effects will be profound. The only question is – how many more troops are going to have to die before we do recognise that we have allowed ourselves to be defeated?

UPDATE: Since writing this post last night (and making some amendments to it this morning), I listened to the BBC Radio 4 Today programme. Colonel Bob Stewart - styled as "former UN commander of British troops in Bosnia" - was interviewed. Paraphrased, his view was that the reason why we are taking the casualties is because we "cannot dominate the ground". The options, he said, were to retake and dominate the ground, or abandon it.

Clearly, since there is no political will - or capability - to do the former, the logical conclusion is that we must do the latter.

The Telegraph, incidentally, ran the casualty story on its front page, with two full pages further into the "book", printing mug shots of all the recent casualties. All the national papers are running the story "big" - a harbinger for the "perfect storm" that is going to erupt when the deaths reach that magic number of 200.

COMMENT THREAD

Put out all the flags

All is well. The battle is as good as won. Stephen Glover that great member of the dead tree media has noticed and actually written an article about the fact that Lord Malloch-Brown might not be quite the sort of chap we want in the government and it has only taken him several weeks and one story that is ten months old. So, hip-hurrah, put out all the flags and celebrate.

The article is not bad, though a bit silly, particularly in his ever so clever-clever jests about the British constitution. (Anyone would think that every other country directly elected its Prime Ministers and had no appointed Ministers, all of which is perfectly acceptable, since it is the party that gets the mandate in Britain. Duh!)

Mr Glover also finds it hard to believe that anyone could possibly have heard of Mark Malloch Brown now Lord Malloch-Brown. Well, anyone who followed the painful saga of the oil-for-food scam knows who the man is but not many British journalists did until the name of George Galloway came up.

Anyone who pays the slightest attention to the UNDP and its shenanigans in North Korea would have come across the name but that is of little interest to British journalists who prefer to write laborious articles about Big Brother and its significance.

In fact, Mr Glover prefers not to mention any of the above and casually refers to Malloch-Brown's anti-Americanism, which is completely out of order for a UN official though Mr Glover vaguely agrees with it. Nor does he mention Lord Malloch-Brown's close links with George Soros, another subject that might have been of some interest to a British hack.

What is exercising Mr Glover is, of course, the statement made by the then Sir Mark Malloch Brown about Britain eventually surrendering her seat on the UN Security Council to an EU representative.

This, apparently, indicates that the man is really a Europhile and belies Gordon Brown's reputation as a closet eurosceptic. I love it when journalists believe their own hype to the extent of being stunned when it is disproved.

Libya admits to torture

An update on the story of the Bulgarian nurses and Palestinian doctors released from Libyan prison in response to European bribery soft power.

It seems that Dr Ashraf Alhajouj is, after all, filing a complaint against Libya before a UN "human rights panel". If that means the Human Rights Council, I do not expect very much will come of that.

Still, Libya responded in the shape of another interview with Colonel Gaddafi's son, Saif al-Islam (yes, him again). According to an article on Al-Jazeera, which refers back to the interview in Newsweek, Gaddafi Junior cheerfully admitted that torture had been used on the medics but it was not nearly as bad as Dr Alhajouj makes out. Really, the man is such a wimp.

In an interview on Wednesday, Saif al-Islam said: "Yes, they were tortured by electricity and they were threatened that their family members would be targeted. But a lot of what the Palestinian doctor has claimed are merely lies."

He also expressed doubts about Libya being held responsible for that very mild torture and in that he was probably right. I can't imagine who will hold them responsible. The European Union perchance?

Anyway it was all the Europeans' fault.

He said the process was initiated by the Europeans.

Saif al-Islam told Newsweek magazine on Wednesday: "Yeah, it's an immoral game, but they set the rules of the game, the Europeans, and now they are paying the price ... Everyone tries to play with this card to advance his own interest back home."

In the interview to Al Jazeera, Saif al-Islam vouched for the innocence of the medics, but said that conflicting reports implicating them had been submitted to the Libyan courts.

The courts had relied on these documents, he said.

Hard to tell what he really meant or why he is always being pushed out to make statements of this kind.

A useful website

By and large I tend to be easygoing about media appearances. If they ask and I have time I do it, if I have no time or it is inconvenient, I do not. Similarly, I spend little time worrying about how the programme may have gone, having learnt a long time ago that nobody every remembers what they heard on radio or seen on TV (or their internet provider) even if they react to a face they recognize. That, I fear, is life. All one can hope for is that one or two points one has made were picked up by somebody somewhere.

Recently, though, I came out of a 30 minute discussion about Gordon Brown's foreign policy demanding the return of the previous hour of my life. A discussion of foreign policy with people whose ideas were culled almost exclusively from headlines is not my idea of fun or of usefulness.

I do recall starting a sentence - mostly to prevent one of my co-panellists from rabbiting on about global warming and policies needed to ... well, I am not sure to do what - with the words: "If Gordon Brown were to ask me for advice on foreign aid .... ". I reckon I was pretty safe on that.

As it happens, I was going to suggest that he stopped talking to rock stars and NGOs like Oxfam who have a vested interest in not changing the situation too much or, even, at all but set up meetings with African analysts, writers, and economists. I can give him e-mail addresses if he wants some.

Except that I do not have to. Because the International Policy Network (IPN) has set up and extremely useful website, called Critical Opinion, which is full of the most useful and interesting articles on subjects such as trade and aid, environment and health. None of them seem to have much time for NGOs and, I suspect, that means that our tranzi-loving Prime Minister will not read them. Nor will he ask me for advice.

It don't mean nuffink

The Economist blog is at pains to tell us that, according to "the legal analysis of the British government's own lawyers", the new treaty "leaves the status of the European Council unchanged."

So, the treaty takes the European Council, an intergovernmental body which is not formally an institution of the European Union. It then formally incorporates it as a supranational institution, subject to the rules set out in the new treaty. By this means, the European Council is obliged to promote the Union's values, advance its objectives, and serve its interests, effectively becoming part of the supreme government of Europe.

And that leaves its status unchanged?

This is very much becoming the standard Europhile defence: the treaty doesn't mean what it says. It is merely words on paper: it don't mean nuffink.

The funny thing is that there is one thing that neither the Economist nor any other of the Euro-groupies can explain. If the treaty has no meaning, at least in respect of the European Council - and its status is indeed unchanged - why include any reference to it in the new treaty at all?

It the words don't change anything, why change the words?

COMMENT THREAD

The real threat

Tory MEP Syed Kamall has a letter in today's Telegraph on the vexed question of our seat on the United Nations Security Council.

He is responding to the non-story of Malloch-Brown's pronouncement that the UK should lose its seat. In so doing, he completely misses the point and thus fails to understand the real nature of the threat.

According to Kamall, the replacement of our seat on the UN Security Council with a single EU seat, "would seriously hamper our ability to form alliances with other non-EU nations or take unilateral action to defend British interests." We could, he adds, "even find ourselves engaging in a conflict opposed by our own Security Council representatives. Recent conflicts have shown that EU governments often have conflicting views on security issues."

But, as we pointed out when this issue arose in late July in respect of the EU's constitution reform treaty, this is not on the agenda. It will simply not happen in the foreseeable future.

What we are seeing is an extension of the current procedure. When the EU has a "common position" on an issue before the Security Council, it will be presented by the EU's High Representative speaking from his own "seat" on the Security Council, rather than have (or in addition to having) the case presented by either or both the British or French representatives.

The actual point is that, if this was the only change in the treaty, on all other matters the French and British would be able to continue to present their own positions at the Security Council.

And, as was the case in the run-up to the 2003 Iraqi war, the British position was very much at odds with that of France and other major players in the EU, with France actively undermining Britain's attempts to get UN support for the war.

But, if Kamall is wrong in detail he is right in substance. If the "reform" treaty goes ahead, we will find it much more difficult to maintain an independent position in the Security Council, but this has nothing to do with the seating arrangements.

The real threat is as set out in our previous piece, whereby support for the United Nations is built into the EU's objectives (another provision lifted directly from the EU constitution).

The crucial points here are that there are explicit requirements in the new treaty for the European Council and the member states, respectively to "advance the Union's objectives" and "refrain from any measure which could jeopardise the attainment of the Union's objectives."

Add to that the ability of the Union – through the person of the High Representative – to make its own deals with the United Nations and that enables the EU to stitch up positions with the UN, restricting the UK's ability to act independently.

It is difficult to speculate as to precisely how this will work but, as we know from John Bolton, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office runs its own show in the UN. Officials, he said – especially during the Iraq crisis - worked to undermine Tony Blair's pro-American policies at the United Nations because they had been "infected" by French and German (i.e., EU) views.

The inclusion of the new provisions in the "reform" treaty allows for carefully crafted deals, hatched in the couloirs of Manhattan and Brussels which, over term, can be used to lock the UK further into the maw of multilateralism and restrict our freedom of action.

Nothing will be that obvious and nothing will be overt. But that is the way the "colleagues" and their tranzie friends in the UN work: deals within deals, the nature of which only become apparent when you try to do something they would rather you did not.

Now, this blog does not raise these issues lightly. The procedural wrangling over who has what seat in the Security Council is important, but it is the lesser of the threats.

Focusing on the chimera of our losing our seat in the Security Council diverts attention from the greater threat. And, in that there is actually no prospect in the immediate future of that happening, emphasis on that point actually plays into the hands of the government, which can so easily rebut claims that our seat is at risk.

At this stage, therefore, it is vital that we properly understand what is happening and what is proposed. The real threat is as stated here, and we ignore it at our peril.

COMMENT THREAD

A minor hiccup

The EU commission faces an uphill battle to overturn a ruling from the EU's second-highest court that awarded Schneider Electric compensatory damages following the blocking of its merger with Legrand SA more than five years ago.

This is Alec Burnside, an antitrust lawyer and partner at Linklaters' Brussels office, speaking to Thomson Financial News, remarking on a story that emerged in July, when Scheider was setting out to claim an eye-watering €1.6 billion from the commission for getting it wrong, making "egregious errors" when it illegally blocked the group bid for a merger.

Burnside's comment marked the start, yesterday of the commission's appeal hearing against the ECJ ruling that it should pay compensation. The estimate now is that the electrical firm stands only to gain a maximum of €400 million. Nevertheless, that would still qualify as the largest award ever imposed by the EU courts on the commission.

On the other hand, Burnside thinks it could "well be less" as the commission has already won on the most important aspect of the case - that they cannot be held liable for making a faulty economic assessment, on which action was originally taken.

Even then, if the larger sum has to be paid, it is "not huge" compared with the burgeoning income the EU is imposing as cartel fines. It would be interesting to know quite how much the commission is pulling in, as the sums must be substantial by now, especially if a tidy sum like €400 million is, in essence, only regarded as a minor hiccup.

COMMENT THREAD

Joined at the hip

Already to close for the comfort of many, the "partnership" between the European Union and the United Nations is about to get considerably closer if the new constitution reform treaty comes into force.

This is through – again – a series of apparently unrelated amendments to the treaty which, used together, will allow the EU independently to make agreements with the UN which will then become legally binding on the member states.

The closeness between the EU and UN was reaffirmed as recently as March when the UN deputy secretary general gave a speech to the EU parliament in Strasbourg. He then acknowledged that the EU was "one of the great supporters of the United Nations and a believer in the strength of multilateralism", declaring that "the European Union and its institutions are superb partners of the United Nations".

The "closer union" is facilitated by the the new treaty, which gives a legal personality to the EU. This allows the Union specifically (Point 42) to conclude formal agreements with the bodies such as United Nations.

These agreements, within the framework of the new treaty, must normally be approved unanimously by the European Council and the Foreign Affairs Council acting unanimously (Point 34), the latter chaired by the "High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy", who will also be responsible for relations between the EU and the UN.

Although the requirement for unanimity would normally prevent any member state being forced into accepting an agreement – which would be negotiated by the High Representative – further changes to the treaty will make refusal very difficult indeed, and possibly open to legal challenge in the European Court of Justice.

The first of these changes comes in the new statement of the Union's objectives (Article 3), which require the Union to "contribute to … the strict observance and the development of international law, including respect for the principles of the United Nations Charter."

Secondly, the European Council and the Council will be bound by the treaty to advance the Union's objectives and serve its interests (Article 9) and, thirdly, the Member States are required under a new amendment to Article 4 to "facilitate the achievement of the Union's tasks and refrain from any measure which could jeopardise the attainment of the Union's objectives."

These three provisions taken together with the new statement of objectives, effectively puts support of the United Nations on a mandatory basis. They place a treaty obligation on member states and their representatives to approve any agreements made by the EU with the UN, if they are couched in terms of advancing the Union's objectives and serving its interests.

Effectively, by virtue of Article 4, member states could even be in breach of the treaty if their representatives exercised their rights, under the unanimity provisions, to veto an agreement, this Article specifically prohibiting member states from taking any measures "which could jeopardise the attainment of the Union's objectives".

This is an anomalous situation with two parts of the treaty contradicting each other but, unless Article 4 and the other provisions really are merely words on paper, then they pave the way for enormous pressure to be directed at any dissident member states to conform.

Clearly, though, the long-term survival of this inherent contradiction is unsustainable. Fortunately for the "colleagues" though, there is a mechanism in the treaty to resolve it, the so-called "passerelle" or "ratchet" clause.

This will allow the unanimity requirement to be removed, the case for which will be unarguable as the use of a veto quite obviously contravenes the Union's objectives and its desire to strengthen its partnership with the United Nations. Then, both de facto and de jure, the EU and the UN will be joined at the hip.

This will lock us more solidly into the "multilateral" paradigm, limiting still further our ability to act unilaterally on foreign policy issues. That may have some considerable implications for our relations with the US and future attempts to work with them on issues outside the ambit of the UN.

The photograph shows EU Ambassadors to the UN in New York.

COMMENT THREAD

Soft hypocrisy

What we say is if you cannot get anywhere with soft power and have to use ordinary bribery by way of funds and defence contracts, try soft hypocrisy. Spanish Prime Minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, seems to agree with us.

Via Pajamas Media we get the story of Señor Zapatero going to Mexico and attacking the United States for constructing a fence along the Mexican border to keep out illegal immigrants. The question of illegal immigration into the United States and what to do about it is an internal American one and we would not presume to comment on it. Why bother, anyway? There are hundreds of American blogs that write about it at great length and very interesting it is, too.

However, several things can be mentioned even on this side of the Pond. One is that immigrants, legal and especially illegal, do not have immediate and unargued rights in the country which they enter. Secondly, many of those who argue against illegal immigration over the American-Mexican border are, in fact, legal immigrants from that or other Central and South American countries. This is very understandable and we see similar developments in Britain.

Thirdly, it is hard for me to grasp why a country like Mexico, which is potentially rich enough to have its entire population living well, should have leaders who have supposed friends in Spain or wherever, who consider that it is absolutely right that the height of any Mexican’s ambition should be to leave and it is shockingly unfair of the United States not to go along with it.

Why not concentrate on making it possible for people “to build a better life” in their own country? Not building it for the people – no government could do that and whenever they do try everything becomes much worse – but create a political structure in which people can do so for themselves.

Fourthly and most importantly we are particularly taken with Señor Zapatero’s hypocrisy. Let’s face it, one of the European Union’s preoccupations, rightly or wrongly, is how to keep immigrants from Africa out of the member states.

Spain has been in the forefront of that fight and, as Soeren Kern, the author of the PJM article reminds us, has not been using particularly pleasant methods. Spain has been criticized by the New York based Human Rights Watch. It is possible that Zapatero is a tad miffed at not being invited to the White House because of his pro-Castro stance over Cuba, a stance that even the European Parliament has disagreed with.

As it happens the debate as to whether Muslims are more assimilated in America than in the various European countries is not quite as one sided as Soeren Kern makes out. There are many indicators on both sides.

But there can be no debate about one aspect of Spanish policy and that is Ceuta, one of two Spanish-held enclaves in Morocco, which remain so for no apparent reason. And, as we have pointed out before, there is a socking big fence around Ceuta to prevent any immigrant from entering what is regarded as Spanish territory. Errm, what about their desire for a better life, often blighted by the EU and its trade and fishing policies?

COMMENT THREAD

Nine months to force a referendum

William Hague, according to The Daily Mail is warning that once MPs return from Parliament's summer recess they will have only nine working days to debate the treaty before it is signed off by Brown in October.

The number of times this treaty has been "signed off" is really quite remarkable: by far the bulk of the media was convinced that this was to happen back in June. But, of course, Brown is no more going to sign a treaty in October than did Blair did in June.

What happens in October is that, if all goes well for the "colleagues", Brown and the representatives from the other 26 member states will agree in principle a final text. But the formal signing will not be until December and then the treaty must be ratified, a process which will take many months.

Thus, while Hague's "warning" is being taken as a signal that there are only nine days to force a referendum – redolent his disastrous 2001 general election strategy when he declared that there were "seven days to save the pound" – the reality is very different.

For a start, even the nine working days in parliament before Brown goes to the IGC summit is of little relevance. Traditionally, only one day is made over for a debate prior to such events, usually the week of the summit, a debate which, incidentally, is very often sparsely attended. Thus, as long as the tradition is observed, there is nothing untoward in there being only nine days of parliamentary time.

Then, Brown will give a report to the Commons when he returns, giving another opportunity for a debate. Following that, there will be plenty of chances to hold debates before the treaty is signed in December, not forgetting prime minister's questions.

Once the treaty is signed, of course, a Bill is laid before Parliament to amend the ECA thereby ratifying the treaty, the progress of which through both Houses will take at least six months. During that process there will be dozens of debates. And it is during that process that the opposition can - and most likely will, in the Lords - raise an amendment making the enactment of the Bill conditional on a referendum. It is then that there will be the big fight, if there is one at all.

What that says is that there is a 8-10 month "window" to campaign for a referendum. The game is not over until or unless a Lords amendment has been tabled and then rejected by both Houses. The more accurate time frame, therefore, is that we have not nine days but nine months to force a referendum.

COMMENT THREAD

End game

Regular followers of this blog will know that we have carved our something of a niche on defence issues, especially in the procurement field - and we have also followed closely the fate of our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Our attention to these issues have puzzled some readers, who note the incongruity between the blog title and the subject matter. In response, we point to our strap line, which reads: "To discuss issues related to the UK's position in Europe and the world."

One the one hand, however, there is a direct link, in that European defence integration has had a profound effect on the structures and capabilities of our forces, and we have been posting a running commentary on this issue – more so since neither the MSM nor the bulk of our politicians seem to be aware of what is happening here.

That aside, there are nevertheless, few more pressing issues "related to the UK's position in Europe and the world," we believe, than the conduct of our armed forces, their equipment and their successes and failure in those troubled overseas theatres of Iraq and Afghanistan. Whatever views one might have of the validity of sending our forces there in the first place, it was always important that they succeeded, with minimum loss of life.

Yet, despite our keen interest in these issues, our regular followers will also have noted a significant fall-off in our coverage of defence affairs. Part of the reason for that is self-evident.

We have a new EU treaty in the offing and we must give out attention to that. The Iraqis and Afghanis may be fighting for their freedom but we too now have our own battles to fight, for our own freedom. And, while it is not (yet) a shooting war in which we are engaged, a successful outcome is just as important.

But the marked tail-off followed a despairing piece I wrote on 1 July, when it finally dawned on me that this government, and our military brass, were never going to take counter-insurgency seriously, and equip our forces with the means necessary to prevail in the campaigns we are fighting.

Furthermore, as we have seen no end of quite insane procurement decisions, we were coming to the view that the MoD, even if it was willing to prosecute the wars effectively, simply is so incompetent (or corrupt) that it is not capable of so doing.

Thus, I wrote, under the heading, "Let's be done with it", there is little point any longer, it seems to me, in our fighting a battle to ensure that our troops are properly equipped to fight real wars. Our hearts are not in it. Let's be done with it. Bring them home, to where the fight for our own sovereignty is the task we must now face.

I made a brief sojourn back into the field last Sunday, when I commented, once again, on what I believe to be the criminal stupidity of deploying dangerously vulnerable Pinzgauer Vectors in Afghanistan, an issue which the military is only too keen to conceal, and thus let troops continue to die unnecessarily.

My intervention then perhaps reflected my continued but entirely irrational hope that things could still get better, but with the publication of a story in The Telegraph today, based on one in The Washington Post, it seems that even that forlorn hope was unduly optimistic.

According to these stories, the British occupation in Basra is now being regarded as a failure, with a senior U.S. intelligence official having recently said that, "The British have basically been defeated in the south." The narrative continues:

They are abandoning their former headquarters at Basra Palace, where a recent official visitor from London described them as "surrounded like cowboys and Indians" by militia fighters. An airport base outside the city, where a regional U.S. Embassy office and Britain's remaining 5,500 troops are barricaded behind building-high sandbags, has been attacked with mortars or rockets nearly 600 times over the past four months.

No doubt the MoD will try to spin their way out of this report, as they have done so often in the past, but the facts now look pretty clear. Without the political will to equip our troops properly, to deploy sufficient numbers, and to develop effective tactics to deal with the militias that are attacking our forces so often, it does seem to me that we are wasting our time in that theatre, doing little more than putting our troops lives at risk.

For political reasons, of course, the Americans need us there, but there is no political will in the British government to do what is needed to keep our troops from providing target practice for the militias.

In any event, it is hard to reconcile Gordon Brown's apparent commitment to assist the Iraqi people in their fight for independence and self-determination, when he seems so willing to give away our independence and right to self-determination to that alien power which is the EU.

Thus, it seems that, in many respects, we are approaching the end game in disparate and widely separated areas – in Iraq and the UK. In both "theatres" we appear to be losing the war, the one under the force of arms, the other voluntarily, on a surge of lies and deception.

At least a rapid withdrawal from Iraq might save some of the lives of our own troops (but probably cost the lives of many more Iraqis). A withdrawal from the EU, unfortunately, is still not on the agenda and that puts us in a position little different in principle from those Iraqis who wish for and have failed so far to achieve true independence.

And, since our government is unwilling or unable to assist them in that uneven battle, and is immune to whatever pressure we have been able to apply, we perhaps need to marshal our own resources for our own battle. We, like the Iraqis, are going to have to save ourselves. And before we can care about the independence of others, we need to restore our own.

COMMENT THREAD

Of course, they are bluffing

Stepping away just for a moment from the Constitutional Reform Treaty and the shenanigans around it, let us have another look at the big world within which we, on this blog, would like to see Britain take an important role. (No, I don’t think the Commonwealth can be made functional but that is for another posting.)

It is always worth looking at what Russia is up to and I speak as someone who never stopped saying that even when it looked as if that country might become a friendly, western, democratic power.

However, as I have pointed out once or twice (or maybe more times) it is worth thinking about what Russia and its leaders are up to a little more carefully than the average talking head or journalist seems to do. Just as it became obvious very soon after Putin’s ascent to power (using the bodies of all those Russians and Chechnyans who have been killed since the resumption of the war) that this man was not going to lead the country to freedom and real prosperity so there is little point in exaggerating how strong and powerful Russia has become under his rule.

I am not even talking about the notion that no country is really strong unless its people are free because many would disagree with that; nor am I making the obvious point that no country is really rich unless its people are free from real poverty (not 60 per cent of the median income as the cut-off line) because, relatively speaking Russians are better off now. I mean the very straightforward idea that I have put forward several times that Putin has failed in his attempt, whether real or pretend, to make the country into a new frightening superpower.

That does not mean that we should not watch carefully what he does and what his successor (if any) will do. At some point they might get it right from their point of view. But much of that over-hyped new political and economic power is bluff. This does not play well with analysts and commentators.

However, I am happy to say that at least one other commentator is saying the same things in greater detail. Douglas Hanson, the National Security Correspondent of the American Thinker, has posted an article entitled “Is Russia’s Power on the Decline?” and it is well worth reading.

The piece in many ways is a catalogue of retreats forced on Putin, mostly as a result of his attempts to impose Russia’s control or to stymie other countries’ attempts to achieve things internationally. A good deal of what may be regarded as humiliation for Russia need not have happened.

There are one or two other points that Mr Hanson does not mention. There is the claim, hotly denied by Russia today that there was another attack on Georgia by Russian missiles this morning; there is the fact that Russia will not be able to use the UN to hold up settlement in Kosovo though her representative is still, grudgingly, part of the Contact Group and of the mediating "troika"; and there is the lack of success in bullying neighbours into submission through the use and abuse of energy supplies.

None of the recent problems were inevitable and most could have been settled without Putin’s hectoring and bullying. The question remains, therefore, why is he behaving in this way? My own answer, for what it’s worth, has always been that he is playing to the domestic audience, whipping up the people’s fears and understanding of Russia as a country that is surrounded by enemies, whose agents have penetrated its very essence. While immediately gratifying, this is not an attitude that will help Russia to develop anywhere.

COMMENT THREAD

Passing off?

Click on the link that tells you that you can read "the EU treaty – in plain English" and you find yourself with a copy of a slender, four-page brochure produced by the Conservative Party. If a commercial firm did that, it would be called "passing off" and Trading Standards would be very interested.

However, this is all part of the brave new venture by the Conservatives who, by their own account, "have stepped up the pressure on Gordon Brown to stage a referendum on the new EU Treaty", they claim, "by publishing a translated version of the treaty 'in plain English'".

There is a second link, which tells you to "click here to read the EU constitution by another name" but, when you do, all you get (at the time of writing) is the message illustrated below – sort of appropriate for that Party. Never mind, you can pick up your English copy from the EU Council website, where it has been available for just over a week.


Nevertheless, the effort is applauded by Tory Diary as "excellent work by the party", which goes to suggest either that they are rather easily pleased, or desperate to show that their beloved party is actually doing something.

Of the leaflet itself, it follows down the well-worn path that Brown and his FCO chums will have seen coming from miles (or kilometers). And, equally predictably, the payoff line is: "The British people were promised a referendum. That promise must be kept. It is a matter of trust."

Needless to say, there is no mention of the new status of the European Council or any of the issues raised by Booker in his Daily Mail piece today. As we have observed, Hague has fixed the narrative, and nothing must be allowed to change that.

COMMENT THREAD

A threat nearer home

Speculation about the motives of the Tories in last night's piece becomes certainty with the leak to EU Referendum of a passage from a highly confidential briefing document prepared for William Hague by Open Europe, which sets out the strategy on the referendum campaign.

"Rather than focus on 'people need to have a say' arguments," the document states, "we need more tough anti-politics messages – crystalising public distrust and cynicism about contemporary politics."

Open Europe strategists, therefore, are advising the Tories cynically to exploit voters' concerns about the EU constitution as a way of attacking Brown, and only that. They suggest the campaign should be kept exclusively as a "trust issue", contrasting the prime minister with David Cameron. The expectation is that opposition leader will benefit from the "halo effect" of being associated with the demands for a referendum.

This advice has been well received by Hague, who is known to be very close with Open Europe, so much so that it is widely being regarded as his personal "think tank". Furthermore, any other input to the Hague team is being rejected or ignored.

And, as Matthew d'Ancona let slip in the Sunday Telegraph last weekend, the Tories have already decided not to engage with the European Union issue. The is no commitment to winning the fight for a referendum. As long as "Dave" comes out of the battle looking good, the strategy will have worked.

In fact, some Party strategists believe that losing the referendum fight could be beneficial to the Tory cause. In a general election campaign, the totemic value of Gordon Brown's signature on the new treaty could be used as a powerful weapon, to remind voters of how untrustworthy the Labour leader is.

And, with the treaty already in the bag, Cameron can complain about "what might have been" without being put to the test, not having had to oppose the treaty from a position of power.

The message will be, "If I had been prime minister, I would not have signed the treaty," but calls for a new Conservative government to abrogate the treaty will be rejected as "impractical". Instead, voters will be told to look to the future, relying on Cameron to "look after Britain's interests", rescuing them from Brown's mess - reinforcing the "trust" message.

Thus, as Booker writes in the Daily Mail today that our democracy is under threat from the new EU treaty, it faces another threat nearer home, from the cynical opportunism of unprincipled politicians - for whom power (and personal advancement) is more important than national interest.

COMMENT THREAD

Is this really news?

There has been a certain amount of heat generated in the MSM and, I am sorry to say, some of the blogosphere about Lord Malloch-Brown making inappropriate comments about Britain losing her permanent seat on the UN Security Council and being replaced by the EU. (By the way, what is to happen to France’s permanent seat?)

Now, as our readers know, I am always happy to have a go at Lord Malloch-Brown, George Soros’s bestest friend and interference runner for former SecGen Kofi (son of Kojo) Annan. I read the articles with interest. There was one in the Times, one in the Sun, one in the Daily Mail and one in the International Herald Tribune.

One could not help noticing a certain sameness about them. Presumably, they all mostly used AP’s report, referred to an interview on EUObserver and quoted extensively Wee William Hague, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, who seems to have made this topic his very own, as my colleague has pointed out, adding that Wee Willie does not seem to have understood the issue.

What perplexed me rather was that when I tried to follow the story back to EUObserver, I could not find it. There was no interview with Lord Malloch-Brown. I tried the search engine of the site and found that this article was published last October, that is ten months ago, when Sir Mark Malloch Brown, as he then was, produced those musings about the UN Security Council and who should have seats on it, for the benefit of diplomats in Brussels.

A quick check forward showed that it was, indeed, that story that was being rehashed. The IHT dutifully mentioned that these comments were made last year, even though the Conservative response has appeared today.

EPolitix.com was actually quite rude about it:

The Foreign Office minister made the comments, which have been unearthed by the Conservatives, in Brussels last October.

As it happens, he was not Foreign Office minister at the time but still an exalted employee of the United Nations.

Presumably the rush to produce this non-story was triggered off by Wee William huffing and puffing and demanding explanations. It might be better for the lad if he got down to some serious work in politics (or leave the Front Bench) and read the new Constitutional Reform Treaty. There is plenty there about the common foreign policy though nothing about permanent seats on the Security Council.

He might ponder over the fact that it is the Security Council that decides who can and who cannot have a permanent seat and there are countries that have been clamouring for some time: Brazil, India, Japan, to name but three. Therefore, spending some time on the treaty might be a better idea than raising bogeymen of this kind, even assuming that permanent seat was worth anything.

Mr Hague might also like to ask himself (or somebody else) how a junior member of the British government who is not the British representative at the UN is going to affect a reform in that organization?

Lord Malloch-Brown was given Africa, Asia and the UN as a portfolio with Gordon Brown who appears to be regretting the appointment already, trying to proclaim his tranzi credentials. For some reason, this has now been assumed to include UN reform, something that Lord Malloch-Brown would not be able to influence in any case.

Asking the man who ignored all warning about the UNDP in North Korea and ran interference for Kofi Annan (among other things) to deal with UN reform, even if he were in position to do so, is akin to handing a hen-house over to a particularly smarmy fox.

Throwing the match?

On the new EU treaty, Hague has fixed his narrative. "Our case is simple: this is the EU constitution in all but name, the British people were promised a referendum on it, so let them have that vote."

That is what he writes in The Times today and he is not going to deviate from it. That is the Tory message to the voters, and that is as good as it gets.

We know this because that is the title of his piece: "A definitive guide to why you must have a vote on Europe". Definitive means final, fixed, unchanging. The Tory message is: all MPs were elected on manifestos promising the British people the final say on the constitution in a referendum. Mr Brown has no mandate to sign up to it.

Booker, on the other hand, in The Daily Mail today, tells us in some detail exactly why this is a very dangerous treaty. The title to his piece is: "If Gordon Brown forces this EU treaty on us, you can kiss goodbye to democracy".

The two pieces thus exemplify entirely different approaches to fighting the treaty constitution. Hague offers little detail and relies on attacking Brown on an "issue of trust". Booker treats his readers as adults, and tells them why a referendum is necessary.

It would be foolish to say that either approach is enough – we need both. So why is Hague closing down his case so early, relying on such slender arguments? Why is he not prepared to address the detail of the treaty constitution and tell us what is wrong with it? And why are the big hitters in the Tory blogosphere opting out of the fight?

Has a deal been done with the dinosaurs? Have the Tories agreed to put up the appearance of a fight – just enough to keep the faithful happy - but not to put enough into winning it? Is Hague preparing to throw the match?

COMMENT THREAD

They doth protest too much

Joining in the chorus of disapproval directed at the Booker column is the Economist blog which rejoices under the title, "Certain ideas of Europe".

In typical Europhile form, it cannot take a straight thesis and argue it through, but has to dismiss it as "hysteria", resorting to a combination of sneering, hyperbole, ridicule in order to get its point over.

"It is tempting to turn away from his arguments in exhaustion," says the blog, "but no, this stuff matters, because not everyone in Britain is aware of the in-joke that they are not supposed to take seriously what they read in Sunday newspapers."

And so does the Economist take very seriously Booker's (and this blog's) view on Article 9 of the draft treaty which proposes to turn the European Council into a Union institution. But what is so very interesting its counter relies on exactly the same points that were made by Robert Jackson. One also wonders if there is a "duty Europhile" hidden away in some secret garret who writes up "the line to take" when anything dangerous is written about the "project".

Anyhow, the "line" is the Mr Booker "falls into the wood-for-trees trap of so many Eurosceptics, of seizing on some arcane detail of wording, and assuming that it has legal force of a nature to trump the political realities of Europe."

So, as does Jackson dismiss the draft treaty as mere "words on paper", The Economist wants to tell us that these self same words are merely "arcane detail" which cannot "trump the political realities of Europe".

Then comes the (attempt at) ridicule. To believe that the treaty text means what it says,

…you have to believe seriously that the likes of Mr Sarkozy, Mrs Merkel, the new British PM, Gordon Brown, the Polish twins, the Czechs and the Dutch are all going to abandon their national interests at the first summit governed by the new treaty.

Since various heads of government – and especially British prime ministers – have been abandoning their national interests for decades, this hardly seems remarkable, but the Economist tries to cement in the argument with a dose of "straw dog". Instead, it says,

… they will shrug their shoulders helplessly, and tell their officials: "what can I do, I may be the head of my government, but the new treaty says I have to advance the objectives of the EU, so I no longer have any mandate to represent our nation."

In fact, it is more likely to be the other way round – as it so often is – with the officials telling their ministers, "you can't do this," or "you must do that" - it is in the treaty. Furthermore, there is the moral or psychological pressure in the European Council itself.

We have had endless accounts of the hothouse atmosphere of these affairs, where enormous pressures are imposed on the members to conform or, in Eurospeak, to achieve "consensus". And this is an additional pressure: "You have signed the treaty, M'sieur – you have agreed to put the interests of the Union first". How, under those circumstances, can a prime minister turn round and say, "no, I must put my national interest first"?

And, if that fails, there is always the "get out of jail free" card, in Article 4, which states: "The Member States shall facilitate the achievement of the Union's tasks and refrain from any measure which could jeopardise the attainment of the Union's objectives."

Nevertheless, the "straw dog" ploy is enough for The Economist to feel confident enough to put the boot in. "There are serious things to say about the new treaty," it says. "This is not one of them." It then concludes:

Feeding British voters unserious nonsense about coups d'état only serves to whip people up into a hysteria - and that makes other Europeans look at British voters and call them hysterical. It is hard to see how that is in Britain's national interests.

Ho! The final ploy – the great Economist appeals to the "national interest".

But there is one issue it does not address – and neither does Jackson. If turning the European Council into a Union institution is so meaningless and will have no practical effect, why are they so keen to have this provision in the treaty? Why not just strike it out?

Of course, we know the answer. The treaty is more than mere words. It is, as the "colleagues" love to remind us, a "binding obligation". The words mean what they say, and they say what they mean. And this is why the "colleagues" doth protest too much – it looks like we've actually laid a glove on them.

COMMENT THREAD

"Those are words on paper…"

If the Tory Party and their little groupies have not understood the significance of the changes to the European Council proposed in the new treaty, sucking it into the maw of the Union as a fully fledged institution, to become part of the supreme government of Europe, the "colleagues" certainly have.

They must, therefore, have been wetting themselves over Booker's outing of their scheme in his column yesterday, so much so that they had the BBC Radio 4 Today programme rushing in this morning with a damage limitation exercise, attempting to minimise the impact of the Booker analysis.

To do so, they enlisted the ever-willing Sarah Montague who, in the typical fashion of the BBC, used the two-handed interview in the attempt. First up was Gisela Stuart, "a Labour MP who was part of the group that drew up the European constitution." She was followed by Robert Jackson, a Tory renegade who joined Labour "because of the Tories' opposition to Europe" - and husband of Caroline Jackson, Tory MEP.

I have posted the full transcript of the interview on our page two, under the heading, "Damage limitation".

Needless to say, even though Booker has been the only journalist to write about this issue, the Today programme does not mention the column, much less this blog, which has made the running (they could not possibly soil their elegant little tongues with such a mention). Instead, as Sarah Montague tells us that the European Council is to become one of the Union's formal institutions, all she will concede is that, "Some are saying it's a huge change that will dramatically shift the balance of power."

Gisela Stuart then does a very creditable job explaining the issues, telling us that the treaty:

…makes them now part of it, the way like, for example, a federal state like Germany would have a directly elected parliament but there'd be another institution which represents the federal component. We in the UK, we have Parliament and the Lords, the two chambers. What this new structure does, is that body where heads of state meet, they become subordinate to the Union's interests, become part of that working and they will now have a duty to represent the interests of the Union, the interest of the member states. And the third and much more interesting element is that the constitutional treaty will potentially allow for that president of that body also to be the same person as the president of the commission. Therefore it's a consolidation of the way the Union works into a structure that is much more like a government.

This is but a foil for Robert Jackson, who then, in a torrent of unmitigated tosh, proceeds in an attempt to demolish the case, entirely unchallenged by Montague. In the sneering tone so often adopted by Europhiles, he actually has the gall to tell us that the treaty is consolidating intergovernmentalism.

Very few listeners, of course, would have had the first idea of what Jackson was talking about so the absurdity of his position would not have been apparent to them.

The point about the European Council is that, as long as it was not formally incorporated into the Union as an institution, has been an intergovernmental organisation. But the very fact that it becomes a formal institution, subject to the rules and procedures of the Union, now means that it becomes a fully-fledged supranational body. Jackson is arguing black is white.

The half-witted Montague, of course laps this up, allowing Jackson further to confuse the issue, setting up a huge smokescreen by claiming that "this draft treaty is a final consolidation of the development to an intergovernmental system based on the member states."

This gives Montague the cue to put to Gisela Stuart that it is difficult to believe that the heads of government of the member states "they suddenly leave their responsibilities for acting for their own countries at the door and suddenly start thinking, acting for the EU".

Gisela, rightly, starts talking about the "dynamics of power" but her point is far too complex to be argued through properly in the short time allowed her. But it is the whole conditioning process of the European Council “experience” which conditions its members and whips them into line.

Perhaps, one day, a learned academic psychiatrist will write a paper on precisely how it is that heads of government do indeed "suddenly leave their responsibilities for acting for their own countries at the door and suddenly start thinking, acting for the EU" – as they did when they agreed the treaty "mandate".

But, with that point far from made, Jackson is allowed the last word, coming up with the classic line of the mendacious Europhile. "Gisela's point about legal duties to further the interests of the Union," he says, "those are words on paper."

This is the classic line. The very legal framework of the Union, its treaties on which the "colleagues" so much rely to force member states into positions they would rather not accept, Jackson dismisses as "words on paper". This is the way these liars work. Black is white and, when it suits them, treaties are simply "words on paper" – until, of course, they are in force when they become "solemn treaty obligations".

However, such is the speed with which the "colleagues" have reacted to Booker that it is obvious that we have touched a raw nerve. And, since no longer is the BBC dominating the agenda – in fact, they are reacting to ours - this is obviously the issue to push as hard as we can.

COMMENT THREAD

Going through the motions

"Like it or not, professional political life is for intellectuals now: it is a battle of ideas," writes Janet Daley in today's Telegraph op-ed.

If ever there was a statement of the bleedin' obvious, that is it. Politics has always been a battle of ideas – that is, essentially, the very nature of politics. And it is when the politicians retreat from articulating their ideas, and rely on the woolly comfort zone of focus groups, that politics atrophy,

Anyhow, Daley seems to think that Gordon Brown is a man of ideas – even if she does not agree with any of them – and thus gets the feeling that she could engage in genuine debate with him. "Where there are ideas and convictions there is also the tacit presence of their opposites: the possibility of persuasion, of reaching different conclusions," she writes.

On the other hand, she says, "there is no arguing with Tory politicians who greet an idea or a policy proposal with the flat assertion, 'No, we can't say that. It would make us look too Right-wing (or backward looking, or nasty).'" And, it is a fatal mistake, she adds:

…to think that this elevation of appearances over arguments is only a sore point with rather cerebral commentators. Real people out there in the country notice it. They sense the absence, not only of conviction in the emotive sense, but of persuasive disputation: of reasoned justification for why they should accept the Conservative analysis of their problems.

There, Daley does have a real point. Looking to the issue of most concern to this blog, one can ask whether the Tories (or, at least, the Party hierarchy) is opposing the EU treaty and demanding a referendum out of conviction or simply, as Matthew d'Ancona asserts, because there is political advantage in so doing.

In a sense, that does not really matter, as long as the Tories are opposing the treaty – better they oppose than support it. But it does make a difference in how they go about the task, as to whether they are committed to winning the argument or see it merely as a means of scoring political brownie points, and are indifferent as to the outcome.

So far, the indications are of the latter, hence Blair's all too accurate jibe that Cameron is simply "going through the motions" – an attitude which seems to be shared by the rest of his team.

It is this which explains the lack of engagement by the likes of Hague who offers just enough of an argument against the treaty to satisfy the faithful, but no real clinical analysis or passion. Similarly, the comfortable 9-5, five day-a-week operation that is Open Europe offers enough to generate some self serving headlines, but falls short of identifying more precise reasons as to why this treaty must be stopped at all costs.

Fortunately, what we might call the "fringe" blogosphere is taking up the slack. We identified no less than ten blogs writing on EU referendum issues yesterday – many of them commenting on the Booker piece – as against 18 in the whole of last week. And that is where the growth will occur as real people, outside the "bubble", look for information which is not available elsewhere.

To facilitate this process, we are opening up a specific section of our forum, where readers and blog owners can post links to pieces written on the issue, which we will collect together for our weekly review. If the Tory hierarchy, their groupies and wannabes, can't be bothered to address this issue seriously, there seem to be plenty of people with real conviction who are ready to take up the slack.

COMMENT THREAD

Dousing the flames of integration

While the UK has suffered a miserable summer, with torrential rain, floods and unseasonable chills, southern Europe has had an ever worse time with scorching heat and a rash of uncontrollable forest fires.

Latest has been the conflagration in El Tanque on the Canary island of Tenerife, Spain, where some 11,000 people had to be evacuated while, in Gran Canaria island, a four-day-old fire burnt out nearly 25,000 acres of woodland. There, some 5,200 people, including some tourists, had to be evacuated. In Tenerife, it was 6,000 people on the move, when 10,000 acres wnet up in flames.

Elsewhere, in Slovenian and Macedonian, fires have been ravaging the landscape, with army helicopters drafted in from Croatia, Turkey, Slovenia and Germany to help beat the flames.

Greece has also been particularly badly hit, the most recent fires affecting the southern Greek town of Aegio 100 miles west of Athens on Friday, with the worst fires near the northern borders with Albania and Macedonia, while Italy has had its fair share of fires as well.

Never one to miss an opportunity to exploit others' misfortunes, the European Union has been right there, seeking to capitalise on yet another "beneficial crisis" by offering to set up a pan-European fire-fighting service.

Such moves are often applauded by the European media but not, it seems this time. Deutsche Welle, for instance, greets this latest piece of opportunism with a very downbeat report, headlining it: "EU Considers Smothering Fires in Paperwork".

Furthermore, it notes that national fire departments are opposing the plan, noting that the problem in Greece, in particular, is lack of coordination. There is only one fire department control station in Athens in charge of the entire coordination, with a hugely cumbersome system for drafting in extra resources.

In order to "ease organisation," says Deutsche Welle - with more than a hint of sarcasm - "officials in Brussels have come up with a way to put the fires out quickly by adding paper to them."

Leading the way is EU Environment Commissar Stavros Dimas who burbles that, "Extinguishing all the fires can only be accomplished with the help of European partners … It is time to improve the mechanism, so we can be more efficient in the future."

Dimas has revived the idea from his former French colleague Michel Barnier, who suggested an EU fire department for forest fires in 2006, when the south of France was badly hit. The idea is that all member states should contribute to a central fund to support the EU fire-fighting force.

Predictably, this is supported by Sarkozy and the Greek prime minister Kostas Karamanlis, but other member states see the idea as an attempt to put an unnecessary monetary burden on the whole community. Many do not see the point of keeping an intervention force on stand-by all year.

And, if the arrangements for drawing down resources in Greece are cumbersome, the fear if that deploying a Euro-fire department would be just as awkward.

It seems that member states are getting a little wise to the ways of the EU but, in any event, they are not impressed by this latest gimmick – not least because they are quite able to arrange mutual aid without the intervention of Brussels. Somehow, this is not the response that the "colleagues" might have expected, with the beneficent "mother Europe" rushing to the aid of her children, but they will, of course, keep trying.

However, such lack of enthusiasm is rather dousing the flames of integration.

COMMENT THREAD

Herding cats

In a long speculative piece on the possibility of Gordon Brown going for an early election, The Sunday Times cites an unnamed Labour minister ruling out an early poll “because of the bubbling row over whether the government should concede a referendum on the EU constitution”.

The (female) minister is citing as saying: "Gordon will want some time between the potential row over Europe and the general election … Otherwise the election will become a referendum on the treaty and play right into the Tories' hands."

This makes a telling counterpoint to the leader in The Sunday Telegraph which counsels tells the Conservative Party:

Target Number One must be the Labour Party's manifesto pledge to call a referendum on the new EU constitution (or "Treaty" as they would have us believe it is). Mr Brown is squirming out of this promise. If Mr Cameron were to lead a decisive attack on the Prime Minister on this issue, he would find that he was leading an army not just of card-carrying Conservatives. And an army on the advance would find its numbers increasing rapidly.

However, the problem with that strategy is that, should he go for an early election, Brown will do so on a new manifesto – his own - which would not include a pledge to offer a referendum, in which case such a narrowly focused attack would have a limited effect. To make a mark, Cameron would have to offer a referendum and then condemn the treaty constitution directly, in order to justify his stance.

What price therefore, the advice from Matthew d'Ancona, who approves of Cameron fighting the issue but suggests he should "barely mention Europe itself." Instead, he writes, the campaign should "be all about trust and consultation." He continues:

Do Mr Brown and his Europe Minister, Jim Murphy, seriously expect the public to believe that the new treaty and its predecessor are, as Mr Murphy said last week, "entirely different" when almost every other protagonist in the deliberations across Europe declares that they are almost identical? And how does the PM reconcile his new taste for consultation, citizens' juries, a "national conversation" and what he described at the UN last week as "people power", with the decision to deny the public a say on this EU treaty?

To ask such questions, Mr Cameron does not have to wrap himself in the Union flag, or resort to the sort of blood-curdling Eurosceptic language that landed William Hague in such trouble when he was leader. He simply needs to press Mr Brown to live up to his own declared standards. There is, as one Labour Privy Councillor admitted to me, "still huge emotion waiting to be tapped on the referendum issue". It only needs to be tapped correctly. Nor will Mr Cameron necessarily get his way: the harrying is all, the relentless campaign to persuade the public that something fishy is going on.

This advice seems inconsistent, even in its own terms. How can a campaign "to persuade the public that something fishy is going on" succeed if the dreaded E-word is barely mentioned? Surely Cameron would have to admit that he was contesting an EU treaty, and have to discuss some of its contents?

What d'Ancona does, though, is demonstrate the view taken of the treaty constitution by some Tories – the faction which sees in the fight only tactical advantage, without any commitment to win: “The harrying is all”, says d'Ancona.

That other Tories are in the fight to win, while others are actively opposed to Cameron fighting at all, points up the range of divisions within just the Conservative Party on this issue. And that rather confounds Paul Sykes who is reported in The Telegraph as calling for "unity in EU referendum fight". He wants all parties to unite in a campaign to force Gordon Brown to hold a referendum.

Sykes stresses that, "Back in the Nineties most of the various anti-EU groups united to form a common front against a common enemy - the single currency." He recalls that the campaign was deliberately non-party-political, it used some of the biggest names in showbusiness to get the message across to the public and it forced the issue to the top of the media agenda.

Thus Sykes wants all Eurosceptic groups, including Open Europe to join with politicians from all parties and captains of industry. "We need to put our petty divisions to one side and to put the great theological debates on hold. What unites us is much, much more than that which divides us," he says.

But, if the Tories themselves are not united, it is hard to see how they can form a united front with others. Then, in practical terms, you have to ask whether the Tories would work with UKIP (and vice versa). Would the Freedom Association, to name but one organisation, follow the Tory Lead? Would UKIP work with BNP (which is a formidable force in certain areas of the country)?

Altogether, this is a nice idea but, I suspect, like ruling the Conservative Party, trying to get Eurosceptics to work together is like trying to herd cats. In fact, pussies are relatively tame compared with that lot.

COMMENT THREAD