The thunderheads grow darker on the horizon but no-one seems to care. The stock market powers away to new heights, and with the impeccable timing for which I am famed the length and breadth of my toilet, the majority of my money remains in savings accounts paying a steady, unspectacular 5%. As that great Cornish philosopher, Jethro, puts it, "Live every day as though it were your last because one day you'll be right!" Twelve months ago I gloomily prognosticated to the effect that with North Korea and Iran going nuclear there would be tears before bedtime. Wrong again, well, wrong for this year, anyway, but as in sex and drumming, timing is everything. I still fear the worst. A badly bruised (with self-inflicted wounds) president Bush may not have the morale to smash the Iranian nuclear effort but the Israelis have and, at least, will try! Tactically, this will not be as easy to do as it was in Iraq years ago. The Iranians have learnt the lesson and their nuclear capabilities are scattered wide and far, and very well hidden and protected. This re-enforces my belief that the Americans (and us) need to apply a different strategy in dealing with rogue states (ie, states that fail to behave the way we wish them to!). We need forces capable of being injected into an area of operations quickly, with sufficent power to achieve the removal of a government and its infrastructure; plus, the ability to be evacuated almost as quickly as they entered. Some might complain that this will leave a power vacuum into which all sorts of rogues and vagabonds might enter with impunity, but they will know, better than most, what fate awaits them if they become too stroppy. In the current situation in Iran, I'm not sure whether the Israelis have sufficiently powerful ground forces to achieve the destruction of the Iranian nuclear capability, to say nothing of the lift capacity to get them in and out. They are almost certain to try air raids but I am doubtful as to whether that will be enough.
North Korea remains 'a mystery wrapped in an enigma'. Certainly I lack any sort of detailed knowledge to make a reasoned argument for or against any particular policy. It seems to me that their strike capability limits their threat to a regional problem and therefor it should be left to China, South Korea and Japan to sort out. Unfortunately, on any given day, their respective governments are unlikely to agree on whether or not it is raining. Also, it must be borne in mind that an ICBM is not the only way to deliver a nuclear device to the heart of one's enemy. A man with a suitcase is equally unlikely, but a dedicated team with miniturised components and the benevolent but secret support of a nation-state, is certainly a possibility. Even if such an operation went off half-cock, the military and economic repurcussions of even an attempt hardly bear thinking about.
China, of course, is crucial in any consideration of Asian politics. I have long believed that as China prospers, and prospers despite rather than because of anything the central government does, then the traditional, centrifugal forces will begin to tear the country apart. How long, for example, will the rich and powerful magnates of Shanghai and Hong Kong put up with the meddling and restrictions of an outmoded political clique whose raison d' etre, Marxism, has proved to be so utterly wrong and useless. It cannot be long before the new capitalists of China begin to feel the same about the useless cyphers who cling like limpets to their petty offices, as I feel about the buffoons who run my country. The difference is that they are in a position to do something about it, such as, secession. However, Peking will see that coming and like all shaky governments will attempt to whip up a foreign crisis to re-unite the country. Taiwan is an easy pick! This will inflame Chinese nationalism and embroil the hated Yankees.
Meanwhile, as these, and other, fuses sputter their way toward the powder kegs, the poltroons who run Europe continue to behave like Randle McMurphy's collection of loonies let out for the day in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Our prime minister lays the union flag on the floor and invites sundry European nobodies to wipe their boots on it whilst simultaneously bunging them all a nice little (well, not so little, actually) earner, and then comes back to boast of it! What is depressing is that my fellow subjects are so supine and stupid that instead of burning this rascal at the stake, they just yawn and shrug. Europe, of course, continues to slide further and faster down the economic scales with everyone eager, indeed, fighting for the chance to suck at the government teat. Thus, the politicians continue their highly successful policy of bribing us with our own money, so is it any wonder that they, whilst pretending to fawn at our feet, actually treat us all with the utter contempt that we deserve whilst lining their own pockets as fast and furiously as they can? As far as this EC farrago goes, one can only rely, God help us, on 'plucky little Italy'. With a bit of luck they should go spectacularly broke this coming year and hopefully the whole Euro construct will then collapse in the general rush to the exits.
At home, what passes for our public life putrifies at an increasingly faster rate. With the exception of our Queen, a lone figure of rectitude and duty, the remainder of our so-called establishment behave like the pigs they are at heart. The prime minister gives away our interests and our money whilst his wife lines her purse as fast as she can. Ministers of the Crown lie and cheat, and are invited to return and lie and cheat all over again. The higher ranks of the civil service are corrupted with worthless baubles and patronage and their 'Rolls Royce' service is now no better than Dell-boy's 3-wheel van! The new leader of Her Majesty's opposition has just appointed a particularly stupid ex-rock 'singer', I mean stupid beyond the expected infantile vacuity one expects from rock 'singers', to help him decide how to cure poverty, for which read, how to give away and waste even more of my money. Apparently, Mr. Cameron, who wishes to lead this country of ours, hasn't a clue as to what to do. So, we can have every confidence in him, then! The senior ranks of the police force are officered by gutless, nincompoops who wouldn't know a villain if they found one climbing in their bedroom window at night. How could it be otherwise when one realises that the education service continues to pump out semi-educated morons at even higher rates year on year. The officer corps in the armed services is showing alarming signs of being equally feeble-minded. The only small gleam on the horizon is the imminent and inevitable collapse of the NHS, the "envy of the world", we are constantly told, although no-one ever copies it!
So, somewhat like Antonio, I can complain,
"In sooth I know not why I am so sad,
It wearies me, you say it wearies you;
But how I caught it, found it, or came by it,
What stuff 'tis made of, whereof it is born,
I am to learn:"
Unlike him, however, I have a very clear idea of what it is that makes me sad. What I don't know, is what to do about it - and that makes me even sadder. Er, Happy New Year, by the way.
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