That Old Dunkirk Spirit - you just can't ignore it......
Posted by John Monro on May 21, 2024, 2:56 am
.... though it might be worth reminding Ukrainians that Dunkirk represents a massive loss and retreat for the UK expeditionary force and required a "miracle" to retrieve the situation. Ukraine, you'll need to get your very own Orthodox Church to pray for you.
(The article describes how ULEZ non compliant vans are being forwarded to Ukraine for medical and humanitarian purposes.)
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I am reading Glen Diesen's book on the origin of the Ukraine war which describes in forensic details all the ways that the West has deliberately provoked Russia over the years, and then deliberately stopped negotiations with Russia when the invasion had started. Many you will be aware of, but there are countless others that I didn't't know, it is an extensive catalogue of shame and murderous cynicism. You may see Glen Diesen at times on The Duran. I am sure all these charitable workers are good people but the sheer culpable naivety - they are, ,like everyone else, being abused and manipulated.
The report on the tainted blood scandal spells out in forensic detail the capacity of the state to lie, obfuscate, confuse, cover up, act incompetently and act actually cruelly and criminally, not just over one government, but over successive governments for forty years - the capacity of the "state" itself to sustain its own narratives and fail the population it's supposed to be looking after. The Guardian's front page doesn't even mention the Sir Brian Langstaff report, except near the bottom of the front page, John Crace has an article.
Perhaps in forty year times, if we are still alive and not incinerated in a nuclear war, or the world has heated up to such a degree that civilisation has collapsed, there may be a similar report about the UK's role in the Ukraine war, and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and the destruction of its country. The narrative is not dissimilar. The state is the thing. Its as if the "state" has its own AI which subsumes every other consideration .
The John Crace article on the Brian Langstaff report ends this way
Sunak ended with the inevitable. “We must make sure nothing like this ever happens again.” Except it will. It’s all too easy for politicians to apologise for the guilt of their predecessors. But it’s odds on there’s another scandal bubbling below the surface right now in which the state is implicated. And in 10 or 20 years’ time, the prime minister of the day will be saying sorry.
Perhaps Ukraine then? But John's probably right, there'll probably be a several scandals simmering along that we don't even know about presently.
on May 21, 2024, 2:56 am