And still it goes on...

Sickened by the coverage of the 'glorious dead' recently. Came across this in the library this afternoon with the kids...

"Let him who thinks War is a glorious, golden thing, who loves to roll forth stirring words of exhortation, invoking Honour and Praise and Valour and Love of Country ... let him but look at a little pile of sodden grey rags that cover half a skull and a shin-bone and what might have been its ribs, or at this skeleton lying on its side, resting half crouching as it fell, perfect but that it is headless, and with the tattered clothing still draped round it; and let him realise how grand and glorious a thing it is to have distilled all Youth and Joy and Life into a foetid heap of hideous putrescence! Who is there who has known and seen who can say that Victory is worth the death of even one of these?"

Roland Leighton serving on the Western Front, to his Sweetheart, Vera Brittain. (Roland Leighton was killed in action in December 1915).

HMS Cant and Poppycock

"It is easy to lose sight of the fact that one of the core businesses of Government is the defence of the country and of national interests, and that is every bit as true during difficult financial times as during more settled ones. The thinking of easier times (when public spending on health, education and social security was increased by much more than that on defence) must not be allowed to continue into these troubled times. The defence of our country must be maintained whatever the circumstances". Defence Select Committee, 4th report, 10 Feb 2010

Strong words from the Defence Select Committee yesterday. Except time and again,(most recently in the Defence Green Paper published just last week), the government has acknowledged that "there is no external direct threat to the territorial integrity of the UK"

So all this huff and puff about "defence of our country" is poppycock. By all means try to make the argument that we need to have sufficient armed force to invade other countries to enforce regime change so that the West's economic and political interests are served, but please do not dress this up as "defence of our country".

I think we are all going to need strong stomachs over the the next few months as there will be a lot of cant spoken about 'defence' as the strategic defence review gears up.

Tory Defence Review? Not so much

Dr Fox (no, not the DJ, the Tory Shadow Defence Secretary) laid out the Tories thinking on the proposed defence review yesterday at RUSI. Whilst paying lip service to the idea of needing to make cuts, he made an absolute commitment to maintaining Trident and dismissed the idea of any merger between the three armed 'services'.

The primary focus of the Tory review would appear not to be on how best to maintain and develop national and global security for the people of Britain, nor how to bring 'freedom and democracy to those suffering under oppression and dictatorship' (the current in vogue reasons for war in Iraq and Afghanistan) but to keep the UK as a "first division" global power. "We are at a tipping point in Britain" said the former DJ (oops! sorry, Tory leader) "We need to decide if we want to stay in the first division or slide into the second division," "I choose the former."

Telegraph lauds sniper killing nine in revenge attack

Its hard to shock The Pushy Pacifist these days but the barely concealed glee in this report of a British sniper

at work from the Daily Telegraph turned my stomach. The Telegraph was delighted with the fact that the sniper had killed nine people - including shooting one through the throat - in vengeance for the death of his friend.

Whilst the Telegraph boys in their London offices rubbed their hands in glee, the sniper was not so sure: "Night tines is the worst because you cannot get the images out of your head especially what happened to the young lad I hit in the throat" he said....

BAE pays its way out of bribery charges....

BAE admits guilt over corruption charges.

The pushy pacifist is speechless....