"Israel, God's (suffering) Servant" (book by Torrance and Taylor, Paternoster, 2007)

My thoughts prompted by reading this book written by two Bible believing Christians, from a Jewish/Christian/Israeli point of view

It seems to me that Palestinians are the new Jews from the way they are so unpopular with some Arabs in this century and last and, yet again, by being killed and wiped off the face of the earth by the State of Israel in even larger numbers than the Ukrainian, pro-Russian separatists who very likely shot down the Malaysian airliner.  The Palestinians are the poor and oppressed, as Jews have been at times in their history.  Our good, upstanding Brits are still manufacturing armaments to fuel the killing of mainly Palestinian civilians and, killing almost, totally, IDF soldiers in God's suffering servant, Israel.

We are more agitated by the death of 298, almost all white European or Australian, than by three times as many Palestinians or, a similar number of Iranian's that our side shot down in 1988 in that air bus massacre.  As a result, we impose sanctions/penalties on our long time enemy, Russia ("Russia's leaders deny they are providing support to the separatists." - from 'i', 17 June 2014) but turn a blind eye to Israel's war crimes and the many fewer crimes of Hamas on Israeli civilians.

No Muslim nation has ever been a superpower.  Their empires were fewer and smaller than the Christian European ones.  Their slave trade was also smaller and, probably, shorter lasting than ours.  It was not the Muslims who brought humanity 10 years of world war or WMD.

We call Israel, God's Servant yet, she is a largely secular, Western, consumerist and capitalist nation that is even included in the Eurovision Song Contest, while all her surrounding Arab nations are excluded!

God's servant is one of the most military powerful nations on earth.  Very different from our Christian Messiah, Jesus Christ who is the suffering servant, who refused to save himself by using the sword.
God's suffering servant, Israel has a tiny minority of true Christians, who are Bible believing.  Yet, we insist she, Israel is God's servant who will play the major part when God winds things up and Christ returns at the end of the age.

We would say that God has blessed her servant with riches, skills and resources that have made the desert bloom.  We say that she alone is God's Chosen Nation that, with the Christians and Muslims, are all the children of Abraham.  From getting on for three thousand years ago, they were all meant to be a blessing to all the other nations, according to God's promise in Genesis 12 v 3.  "All the families of the earth will be blessed through you (Abraham)."  Again, "I will cause you (Abraham) to become the father of a great nation." (Genesis 12 v 2)  In other words, the Jews, the Christians and the Muslims are all meant to be one great nation, according to Yahweh, who will bless all other peoples on the earth.  This promise of God has never been fulfilled.

For many years, we have called Israel, God's suffering servant.  Yet, this is the same Israel that joined forces with the UK and France to attack Egypt during the Suez Crisis.  This is the same Israel that in the name of self-defence has warred in Lebanon and in the surrounding land off and on, over the last 66 years.  For years before 1948, God's servant was using revenge and violence that, finally, ended with the three Jewish terrorist gangs succeeding in bombing and shooting their way to getting the State of Israel.  The British had had enough of their mandate to rule the unruly and departed.  We have had decades of violence through most of the 20th century by God's servant, Israel - some initiated by her and some in revenge for Arab/British violence.

If we call Israel God's servant what do we call the USA?  She regards herself as the exceptional nation in being, uniquely, blessed by God.  It is sometimes called manifest destiny, I understand.

Is Israel, God's suffering servant, really behaving like God's true servant in the Gospels?  For me, Israel is far from Paradise and is nothing like the Kingdom of God from the teachings of Christ.

Nuclear weapons stopped the Cuban missile crisis ending in nuclear holocaust

Such was the thought from a friend.  The problem is, however, that the very nations who have the most nuclear weapons to wipe humanity off the face of the earth the greatest number of times, are the very ones who cause the most wars, viz: USA/UK/Israel, Soviet Union/Russia.  Their possession of WMD is no brake on their extremist tendency for warfare and, in this century and last, for killing the greatest number of people ever seen in the history of humanity.  Nukes are no deterrent to aggression and violence.

The enormous stockpile of WMD was no disincentive for the USA to put Jupiter missiles in Turkey near to the border with USSR, nor was it a discouragement to the USSR in their bid to put missiles (ICBMs) near to the USA landmass.  It was this one-sided, aggressive policy of the West that caused the Cuban missile crisis in the first place.

The truth is, these nukes are so destructive, with the blowback of radiation on the attacker, too that they are just too impractical to be of any use in a crisis or no crisis; in time of war or in time of peace.  Therefore, they are not deterrent.  Why have them when they have to remain unused white elephants, stuck in their underground silos for ever or, having to be moved around the subterranean depths of the world's oceans in a cigar shaped metal tin?

Could these nukes simply bring the thought to these imperious states in the nuclear club that they can throw their weight around in the world?  That they can strut around like self-important, gilded peacocks to use coercion, force, aggression and violence to get their way whenever they want?

Violence gets the world's attention but Palestine must try non-violence

Last week, I heard on BBC Radio 4's 'Today' programme a Palestinian MP and former Presidential candidate, mention the word, 'non-violence' half a dozen times.  He said that he had been urging non-violent resistance on his fellow compatriots for many years but that it had fallen on deaf ears, so far.  He said Hamas had, quietly, already changed its position over Israel.  What was his name?

Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jnr commanded the moral high ground, as did the Indians who also chose non-violence during the Amritsar massacre by the British Army.  Eventually, India gained its independence from the British Empire.

In Northern Ireland, the sectarian men of violence (including the British Army), eventually, tried non-violence.  Ceasefires led to the peace process of talks, compromise, consensus, give and take and, a large drop in the numbers of killings.  Could Israel not talk and act on wanting a similar peace process, once more?

Could Israel not join with that Palestinian MP and, at least, talk non-violence, to begin with?  Israel's policy over 66 years has not worked in giving them peace and security and friendship with its Palestinian neighbours.

Could Israel not make use of the UN's General Secretary or, make use of the knowledge and experiences of both sides in Northern Ireland?

Could Israel consult with Angela Merkel to get her ideas and help to, eventually, get a resolution?  Or Desmond Tutu?

Violence gets the world's attention but Palestine must try non-violence and top level talks with world leaders - followed by Israel coming to the table, too.

Both sides might try a cycle of non-violence, compromise and constraint and never revenge to improve their prospects.

Britain set a bad example - the sad evidence

This, I think, is a corrective to much prejudice in favour of Britain by Brits and how the West is best - but, minus me!

1. Britain was the first with concentration camps in the Boer War that killed over 20,000 women and children.
2. Our scorched earth policy in that war was not noble and the war itself was nothing about protecting these British islands of ours.
3. Next, Churchill turned our warships from being fueled by coal to being driven by oil.  He then saw the domination of the Middle East for oil as the prize to gain world mastery.  Not Hitler, after world mastery but our own beloved Churchill actually did it and used those two words of intent when Hitler was still a boy!  (Source: 'The Prize' by Daniel Yergin)
4. In 1914, Churchill turned a friend into an enemy; he then persuaded the War Cabinet to initiate an attack on that Ottoman Empire and, after months of bloody war, lost catastrophically.
5. According to Admiral Lord West, in his Radio 4 series, 'Britain at Sea', we Brits attacked Russia from 1917, after their defeat/withdrawal in the world war.  This was to gain their re-entry on our side against Germany so that German troops would have to be moved from fighting us to fighting the Russians on the eastern front, once more!  After the November armistice of 11 Nov 1918, we carried on our war with Russia because of their Bolshevik government - totally unacceptable to us fine British folk!
6. Our premature entry into the 1914 World War before we were attacked or about to be attacked was wrong.  It was simply unethical and contrary to all normal standards of decency, especially at that time of far greater church-going and Christian belief.  We should have known better.  Our declaration of war on the 4 August was not self defence.  Our security was not threatened.  It was really all about not wanting to see the status quo, the balance of power, changed on the mainland of Europe.  The war was sold to the public as us gallant Brits coming to the defence of poor, trampled all over, Belgium and teaching the wicked Germans a lesson.  Yet, we had a history of keeping to alliances and treaties only when it suited us at the time.  On 4 August 1914, we over-reacted to an assassination 37 days earlier and, then, on the side of the assassin against the wronged party, Austria-Hungary!  That doubly wrong decision by Asquith, Churchill and Grey, et al had the unfortunate effect of leading to 'Britain's 100 years of War' (see 9, below).  Then and now, we just could not resist keeping our noses out of other countries businesses.  Well, we did know what was best for them, after all, just as we do now over the need for EU reform.
7. Throughout the mad month of July 1914, our government did absolutely nothing to bang heads together on the mainland of Europe to prevent a continental war.  Our very stupid and far too early entry into the war turned it into a worldwide conflagration by virtue of our huge empire.
8. We controlled/dominated 30% of the world with the largest empire in the history of humanity.  This is not something to be proud of.
9. Nor, was our untold riches gleaned from the abominable trade in our fellow members of the human family - the slave trade.  More pernicious deaths in the human family of which we were responsible.  Still no reparations paid.  We pocketed the immoral earnings from our filthy trade and have no intention of returning even a penny to a single African nation.
10. Britain was as anti-Semitic as many other European countries were for centuries.  Germany took it to a new and disgusting level between 1933 and 1945 yet, we did nothing officially to save the Jews and the many other minorities in Germany.  There were a handful of very brave people who did all they could, throughout the war, to shelter Jews.  Our government did nothing.  Yet, Churchill at least, it seems, knew what was going on from before war was declared.
11. Our total war, our saturation fire bombing of German towns, cities and other settlements in the closing months of the war, when our victory was assured, was a war crime.  No regret has ever been whispered by us upstanding Brits, despite our fine British values of high morality!
12. Our armed forces ended up slaughtering many more Germans than they did of our people.
13. 'Britain's 100 years of War' - the four page spread in the Guardian, 12 Feb 2014, of proof and shameful evidence of aggression and killing of foreigners in every single year since the 4 August 1914, if not earlier, to the present.
14. Germany's non-aggressive foreign policy has been excellent and exemplary since 1945 (somewhat undone by its membership of NATO!).  The Germans are, rightly, the respected leaders of the EU.  Their energy and transport policy is also superb and sensible.  We Brits could learn much from them.  Instead, we want out - and the sooner the better.

Churchill let the side down decades before Dresden!

In 1914, Churchill turned a friend (the Ottoman Empire) into an enemy by withholding two British built, Ottoman battleships that were about to be handed over to Turkey.  The cost had been raised by Turkish public subscription.  He next initiated an attack on that new enemy in the Dardanelles, in 1915, against advice and without, to begin with, the support of Minister of War Kitchener, lost catastrophically with the foolish Gallipoli campaign.

What incompetence by Churchill.  An incompetent murderer of his own armed forces!  What an idiot.

This kind of British values/patriotism is totally unnaceptable

Even with the wisdom of hindsight, after 100 years, and with the knowledge that 20 million humans were killed horrifically (perhaps, a total 100 million casualties) to stop Germany controlling Europe, we still all think, it was well worth it to be on the 'winning' side!!  Even, when it was a Pyrrhic victory, too leading onto the 1939 European and global war.

Skinny Africa; bloated West

A new version of the skewed map of the world
Why economic growth is a dead end, yet it is what almost everyone votes for!  Our 'Christian', white man's slave trade and the European empires scrambling for Africa in the 19th century resulted in Africa being stripped of their people and resources to make us bloated and the Africans as thin as a rake.  Yet, not a hint of guilt or sorrow from us lot.  Just self congratulation at how well we did with coming up with wonderful Wilberforce!

World mastery by - not Hitler - but Churchill; exactly what he, Churchill, was after!

Quotes from Radio 4, 'Britain at Sea' presented by Admiral Lord West.  Transcript of a small part of the programme:

Churchill's decision to go for oil had huge implications internationally.  Britain needed a secure supply and unlike coal, we did not have oil on our mainland.  Churchill's eyes turned towards the Middle East.

Daniel Yergin has written a definitive history of oil, called 'The Prize: the epic quest for oil, money and power', commented Lord West. In the programme, 'Britain at Sea', Jurgen said,

"The momentous decision meant that oil entered into strategic decisions.  ... Oil became the fuel of national power. ... In converting the Royal Navy from coal to oil and proceeding to ensure an oil supply Churchill said, 'The prize of the venture was world mastery itself' ... That captured what it was all about.  Once the decision was made it meant that Britain was no longer dependent on Welsh coal for its Royal Navy but rather upon oil supplies and they happened to come from this distant country, Persia (Iran) raising all sorts of questions about security and reliability of supply.  It did mean a pivot towards the Middle East and, coming out of the First World War, it really confirmed Churchill's understanding of the strategic importance of oil.  That was when countries started to focus on the Middle East and its resources and that was the beginning of the Middle East role that it has today as such a central source of oil on which the world depends."

Without the relentless application of naval power, we could never have won (1st WW). From the RN's perspective, arguably the most important meeting of the 1WW came not in 1914 but three years earlier on the 23 August 1911 ... That was when Britain moved away from a maritime to a continental strategy

Believe the Bible, act militarily and get most of the ME for yourself. Simple!

The Bible says in Joshua ch1 v4 that Yahweh gave the land from the Mediterranean to the Tigris and Euphrates; from the cedars of Lebanon to the deserts of Sinai - ALL to Israel.

Should there not be another smart, quick, 6 Day War to claim this territory, as well?  After all, Israel/USA/UK is the biggest military alliance and power bloc in the world. WE rule the world.  And, we have three lots of magical nuclear weapons to use, too.  Just nuke the nations that get in our way.  How could we possibly lose?

Truly believe the Bible, claim its promises and get blessed with more land and oil fields and untold riches!

• Thomas

  June 24, 2014 
  9:36 am

  Unfortunate proof that this one, like fanatics of any persuasion, has left his sanity and humanity behind.

  REPLY
• Ron

  June 24, 2014 
  10:20 am

  There are some problems with your suggestion, Tim.

  Firstly, a country should only go to war as last resort, when diplomacy has failed and all other options are closed and the country’s freedom and survival is at stake. It is easy to bang the war drum, especially for politicians who don’t have to do the fighting. Short war or long war, people die and get hurt in war, as any soldier knows. Before the UK went into Afghan, a Scottish MP reckoned we might go in and out of Afghan “without a shot being fired”. At the time I said to myself, Is this idiot for real? Has he not studied the history of that country? Would he be so eager if he had to be the first onto the battlefield? Has he got a clear objective and does he understand the nature of the people we would be dealing with?

  Secondly, it is still the Wests’s policy that they will never be the first to instigate a nuclear attack. Our “nukes” are a deterrent, only to be deployed in self defence. Fortunately we control our nuclear arsenal responsibly. The principle of mutually assured destruction kept us from the brink during the Cold War. Even the Communist leaders were not that crazy. However if Iran gets nuclear weapons is there any doubt that the fanatically religious ayatollahs would use them – definately against Israel, and very probably against the USA, for starters?

  Thirdly, the likelihood of a joint tripartite military operation between the USA/UK/Israel is pretty low, if not non-existant. Despite his public assertions Obama does not “have Israel’s back”. He has lied consistently to US citizens over many scandals, he has purged the US military of senior officers who do not toe his political line, and he has supported the Muslim Brotherhood & other jihadist groups since day one of taking office. In fact, if you go back to the Suez Crisis in 1956, the Israeli/UK /France operation was scuppered by the US, who forced them to withdraw.

  When the Yom Kippur War broke out in 1973 the UK immediately froze all ammunition and spare parts deliveries for Israel’s tanks, which then were mostly British second hand Centurion tanks, at precisely the moment when they would be needed. That vulnerability was the catalyst for General Tal to be given the project to develop Israel’s own MBT, the Merkava. In the long Israel can only count on itself.

  Israel would get lip service for a military operation from the US & UK politicians but probably not much else. Robert Spencer & Pamela Geller, who are human rights champions, were banned from the UK not because their presence “would not be conducive to the public good” as Theresa May claimed in her banning letter, but as it turns out from Foreign & Commonwealth Office documents released to them for their legal appeal against the ban, because they were too supportive of Israel.

  War is sometimes a necessary evil, but there is always a price to be paid and we should never glibly propose it if we are not the ones who would have to fight it.

  REPLY
• Mareli

  June 24, 2014 
  5:22 pm

  Tim Weller, dare I hope you are being sarcastic?

  REPLY
• Jonah

  June 25, 2014 
  9:56 pm

  You’re absolutely right about Joshua. Your enemy reads the Torah, too. That’s one of the reasons they want to kill all of you, so their will not be a second party to that covenant.

  REPLY

Was Hitler, uniquely, the epitomy of evil?

Was Hitler the most evil, demagogic, psychopathic leader of any nation that there has ever been?

Was he after world domination of every single country in the world?

Or, did he want Germany to be the new superpower of the 1940s to take over from the British Empire and to rival the USA?

Or, like Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1914 who, it seems, wanted German hegemony in Europe, is that what Hitler also wanted?

Was he wanting revenge for the surprise defeat of Germany in 1918?  A Germany that had come close to victory in the World War 1914-18, more than once and, that had defeated Russia in 1917.

Was he wanting Germany to become a Great Military Power, like France, UK and like USA, as AJP Taylor argued in 'The Origins of the Second World War'?

We now use Hitler as the benchmark to measure if any other of our present day enemies measure up to his pure evil.  For example, the Prince of Wales in May 2014 after Putin had taken back Crimea that had been given by Khrushchev to Ukraine, in 1954.  Saddam Hussein was also likened to Hitler to justify his removal from power by the West in 2003.

Yet, it was the British who were the first to use concentration camps and not Hitler.  Over 20,000 Boer women and children were killed by neglect and/or deliberate policy by the British in concentration camps.  And this was well before even the 1914-18 war in Europe.

It was the British who killed many more Germans than they did us, it seems, between 1939 and 1945.  Although, as we know, they killed millions of Jews, gypsies and other minorities in Germany.  Yet we, the Christian, democratic West after our success in 1945, carried on with the killing of unknown numbers but perhaps millions in far off countries of which we knew little.  Justified as fighting Communism, then militant, extremist Muslims to this day.

It was Churchill who knew about the concentration camps of the Germany of the 1930s and 40s. Yet, even when he was Prime Minister, he failed to order the precision targeting of the rail lines to the camps. Precision targeting of dams; yes. Revenge, saturation, fire bombing of people's homes in the closing months of the war; yes. Saving the millions in the minority groups of Germans; no.

According to the 'Guardian' spread in February 2014, it was us Brits who waged war for every single year over the last one hundred years in many countries around the world.  Finally, in 2015, we may be content to lay down our weapons for the first time since 1914.  Nearly 17,000 of our men and women in the armed forces were killed since 1945 but, that number must be multiplied by an unknown figure to get the numbers they killed around the world.

If Hitler was the most evil leader of any nation in the history of the world, then we have to say that all individual Germans were just as evil in carrying out his orders from 1933 to 1945.  Perhaps, that was how we justified the indiscriminate mass slaughter of German civilians and children in the closing months of the war, even when our victory was assured.  Revenge is sweet for Christians, Muslims and Jews - and, for us all.  We called our enemies evil then and, in recent years and today, we call them Communists, terrorists and Muslim radicals and extremists.

Since then, peace followed by co-operation and union between the countries of Europe has seen less desire to participate in the wars of the UK and the USA.  Only, perhaps, have those European countries membership of NATO compelled them to send troops in this century's Middle Eastern wars that had been started by the United States of Aggression, seconded by the UK ( UK = united killers with the USA?).

"Remember, all tips are included"

Booking Reference: 0813/23065

"Remember, all tips are included"

At first, I thought how great.  But then, when I saw the age and apparent wealth of the 99% white passengers and compared them with the largely non British born crew, I wondered how fair this was.  On my return from the excellent cruise, I went on the website and saw that you can get a seven night cruise for under £300, if you can go at a moment's notice.  This is far too cheap for the clientele that the crew are serving in kitchen's, cabins and restaurants.  Modern day serving/servitude/slavery?  I do wonder!

I had breakfast last Saturday morning in Compass Rose and saw the large wooden box for us wealthy passengers to give a service charge for ten days of exemplary service.  I put in a ten pound note that, since then, I now feel was too little.  I should have given ten pounds for each of our excellent stewards, Ann and Ida and waiters, Sely and Sheldon.  I would still be delighted to do so if you can guarantee them receiving my tip and give me sort code and account number.

I came back to BBC Radio 4 on Saturday and heard about cheap immigrant labour.  Therefore, were  our delightful Compass Rose waiters and our two cabin stewards, on the UK's minimum wage?  Who qualifies for the minimum wage on Thomson Cruises?

With the ship based in Turkey from next year, does this mean you can keep wages lower for the lower paid crew?

Do all cruise companies operate a no tipping policy to entice the public on board?

Another quick point for feedback for you!

I did feel that your Daily Mail digest each day is not independent or responsible reporting.  Nor does it follow the BBC guidance over impartiality.  I am particularly thinking of the UK biased and sensational reporting of the Prince of Wales comment in likening Putin to Hitler.  Later, Putin's response was restrained and statesmanlike.  In sharp contrast to the misguided, extremist comment from Charles.

Please consider using 'The Independent' for your cruise daily digest.

Trying to understand the origins of the 20th century world war

I would have thought that you don't attack another nation until they attack you or, when it's obvious, they are about to attack you.  Was the latter  the case with Israel when they launched their war in 1967?

We broke that principle when we declared war on Germany in 1914 and 1939 but, on both occasions, an obedient German people, unthinkingly, followed two leaders who were out of control and somewhat deranged.  Therefore, both the Kaiser and Hitler had to be stopped.

In the case of 1914, however, our army was small with only seven divisions; we had not let Germany know that we had been in secret talks with France since 1906 that we would come to her aid if she was attacked by Germany; and, on the 4 August 1914, island Britain was not on the German list to be attacked when we attacked her on that date.  (sources: BBC History magazine Feb 2014, BBC documentaries)

Who has done the most subjugating?

Mr/s B Parsons believes that the EU is subjugating the UK.  We entered into it voluntarily after a referendum and send representatives to its Parliament every five years.
Over hundreds of years, the UK acquired domination and control over fifty countries by force of arms and kept them subjugated by military power.  We also controlled all the major sea lanes of the world.
All this set a very bad example to Germany that was very late in the game of conquering or claiming nations to build an empire.  Yet, remarkably, those fifty countries still fought for us to stop Germany taking our world control off us in 1914 and 1939 (better the devil you know than the devil you don't know).  To this day, the US/UK, with NATO, remain as the world's dominant power bloc.  Germany is the dominant partner in the EU and Angela Merkel of Germany is the highly respected senior partner in the EU - but, by constraint and not coercion.

Such a pity but worth it when we didn't have to die!

We rushed to war on 4 August 1914.
Our intervention was premature, our army too small and, certainly, war was unnecessary when Germany had no intention of attacking Britain - until we attacked them.
The Cabinet knew it would fall, then lose power at the General Election, if it did not declare war on Germany - according to historian, Niall Ferguson.
Our war, much of its prosecution and the way it was resolved in 1919 was utterly stupid, especially the reparations and all the blame laid on Germany alone.
Germany nearly won in 1914, 1916 and, once more in 1918.  The beat Russia in 1917.
Violence, domination and control breeds more of all three, as we have seen off and on in Ireland for 800 years, in Israel/Palestine for 70 years - and, with the UK with our mighty victory minus magnanimity in 1919 that led to the second half of the European/Christian World War - in 1939, according to a former Conservative leader, Ian Duncan Smith.
UK has been engaged in warfare, somewhere in the world, for every single year for the last 100 years. Finally, in 2015 it seems, we may, finally live in peace and non-violence with all our neighbours in the world.
Even with the knowledge that 10 to 20 million people died horrific deaths in 4 years, nearly all Brits today still maintain this was such a pity but very necessary to stop Germany taking over some of our world control in 1914.  In 1914, a Germany far more democratic than the UK, too.
This is not a good example to set to the Muslim extremists/radicals of this day.
Ours is not a fine record.

Brewers' refuge from the stormy blast

I'm taking refuge in the Brewers Fayre pub/restaurant in Fort William today with gale force winds and rain, hail, snow continuing over the Western Highlands but with calmer conditions for the rest of the week.  I've met up with a 69 year old guy, Nigel from New Mills near Stockport who is also summiting Corbetts (and much else!).  He has a most comfortable motorhome while I'm content with the super efficient, large enough, Polo Blue Motion for my luxury motorhome!  We had a pleasant eve in his vehicle talking yesterday.

Nigel's company and the better weather made our climb to my finest mountain I have visited.  It turned out to be an enticing rock summit that was in view after one obstacle after another was got round or got over.  Finally, after lunch, we got to the base of the last steep climb and left our rucsacs at the foot.  An easy but careful scramble took us to the small summit and cairn with views of the highest Munros in cloud.

I came north on Mon and visited one Corbett in the eastern, rough and rocky Knoydart wilderness yesterday.  The mt bike took me along the forest roads before I had to leave it and take to two feet.  I'm back to Glen Dessarry this aft/eve.  It has a 16 mile single track road on its N side that limits you to 2nd and 3rd gear.  Yet, huge articulated timber lorries regularly use this same rough, road to take their harvest of huge logs out.

I had better weather two weeks ago when I visited 7 Corbetts and two Corbett Tops in a dry week in Moidart and a superb car camping spot that I found next to a sea loch, Loch Ailort, west of Glenfinnan and W of Fort William.  This week's cloud is good navigation training!

The Very Necessary War

For me, a very necessary war because:

1. We were the superpower of the day and, therefore, had to intervene as the policeman, judge and jury of the world.
2. In 1914, UK had seen centuries of warfare on the mainland of Europe, anyway.  More war there would not seem unusual.
3. Britain had a culture and tradition of war and, war first and foremost.  Churchill's magnanimity in victory and jaw, jaw came much later.
4. Patriotism, militarism and nationalism were also the norm.
5. Every citizen knew Britain was right and on the side of upholding civilised values throughout the world.
6. It had always been unheard of not to do your patriotic duty to King and Country.
7. Throughout every country in Europe and Russia, every subject of these monarchs believed their kaisers, czars and kings were God's representatives on earth and, therefore, knew best.  When they wanted war, war it had to be.
8. It was widely believed in the readership of the penny dreadfuls and the ever so popular 'Daily Mail' that the Germans were less than human - Gerhuns not Germans.  They were evil and had to be fought when they invaded our fellow industrialised and colonial power of Belgium.
9. We had to honour our alliance with France and Russia.  We always honoured our treaty obligations and we were always men and women of our word.  "Perfidious Albion" was a disgraceful slur on our nation.
10. Better to die gloriously as a hero with your name engraved in stone for ever, than risk being ruled by Germany.
11. Violence was the done thing; non-violence was non-existent in European thinking and absent from the English vocabulary (still to this day)

FOOTNOTE:

Ten million combatants and a further ten million non-combatants were killed in the industrial slaughter that was the 1 WW of four and a quarter years.  This was the price that Max Hastings (in the one hour long documentary on BBC2, 'The Necessary War') and everyone of his interviewees agreed was worth paying and that made this war necessary to stop German hegemony in Europe and to maintain the British Empire.  In addition, each side believed God was on their side.   The poor, deluded Empire soldiers were killing and being killed for the noble and glorious cause of God, King and Country - and to avoid any chance of coming under Berlin's control.  Why God should ever want to have anything to do with such a stupid creation does make me doubt the wisdom of such an all powerful and all knowing God of justice.

Dear Mr Weller,

Thank you for this. 

I agree with some but by no means all of your views. Ultimately, Britain fought the First World War because Germany posed a threat to its security.

Best wishes

Gary Sheffield

Sent from my iPhone

Dear Prof Gary

Thanks so much for reading my piece, that was partly tongue in cheek - and for having the decency to reply.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, I know but, could Britain not have waited until it was obvious that Germany was moving to invade our shores and then launched a pre-emptive attack of self defence?  Our island location should have given us a tremendous advantage in being the last to be invaded (if we ever were) by the Germany of 100 years ago.  Was not Kaiser Bill pre-occupied with conquering certain countries on the European mainland?

Thankfully, that bloodbath and this century's attacks on weak Iraq and Afghanistan have given us such a bloody nose that we have not gone in, with all guns blazing, in Syria or Crimea.

I think, as has the SNP, the UK as a whole would be wise to learn from Norway as regards both energy (North Sea oil and gas) policy and peacemaking.

Best wishes

Coercion, force, violence is ...

... hardwired, I believe into Britain and the West; into Church and State; into both society and the individual psyche.  Therefore, we have had for every single year for, at least the last one hundred years, the killing of foreigners and, in their own lands, too; and by us good, decent, heroic Brits, too!

The 20th century saw more killings by the West of our fellow human beings than in all the previous years of humanity added together.  What sheer aggression, violence and pure evil in us upright and so, oh so democratic and freedom loving peoples!

The ever so Great Britain had the greatest empire the world had ever seen in 1914.  Kitchener had led the more recent colonial wars.  Therefore, it was the normal done thing to go to war.  It was the obvious thing to do when an upstart European country was wanting to rival the Great Empire of Britain and to acquire some nations for itself.  33,000 enlisted on one day alone in September 1914 and over one million men had volunteered by Christmas.  "They volunteered out of a sense of patriotic duty", Jeremy Paxman said on 'Britain's Great War'.  "It was a massive rush to arms", before it was all over by Christmas.

The European Union came out of centuries of European nations fighting wars with each other and around the globe; wars ordered and taxed by their representatives of God on earth - the divinely appointed and approved royal monarchs.  The grand climax of the West's World War in two parts, finally shook the war mongering Europeans into economic and some political union to have, at last, permanent peace with each other, at least.

The least you and I can do is to give to the British Red Cross and the Disasters Emergency Committee.  And, of course, avoid employment in armaments and the armed forces.

Using God as a fire extinguisher

USING GOD AS A FIRE EXTINGUISHER - for emergency use only

Christianity is not an insurance policy against death and misfortune.  In fact, it’s the exact opposite, for the sun rises on the righteous and the unrighteous; the rain falls on the just and the unjust.  When Les, Christ-like, God fearing, what you see is what you get, the genuine article, Les Hardwick loses his beloved wife so prematurely, it does destroy my faith in a loving and just God.  It also shook his faith, from what he told me.  God cannot possibly be a God of love, justice and who is able to protect His own.  Les should have been the very last person whom the Lord should have allowed to lose his wife in 2000.

Therefore, as I see it, we have 
           the problem of Christians suffering.  Indicating a God who does not care, even about His own people.

           the problem of the Bible - favouritism for one tribe, only, for one set of peoples, only.  God promised that their ancestors would bless the rest of humanity but the Jews, the Christians and the Muslims, the children of Abraham, have most certainly not been a blessing to everyone else.  In fact, they have been at each others throats and the Christians have, for centuries, been somewhat domineering around the world - to put it mildly.  This, contrary to what their founder flatly rejected in one of the three temptations in the wilderness of Judea.
          the problem of human ecocide - very short-lived human species when compared with very long-lived dinosaurs.
          the problem of human intolerance of each other and their inability to live in peace one with the other.
the problem of the vast majority of the best Christians - the Bible believing, born again ones - being quite content with having employment in the arms industry, the armed forces and voting for the war parties. Coercion, force and aggression is acceptable for the most virtuous, sanctified and holy of people.
the problem of abortion and voluntary euthanasia being more evil than killing the born in time of war.
          the problem of human stupidity - especially over foreign, military, transport, economic and energy policy - not much left after than list. But, actually, we humans are homo sapiens - "wise man" - so we can't be that stupid!
          the problem of the infinite, immensities of space, of nothingness yet the existence of earth created by the human construct of ‘God’.
          the problem of how God came about, if He was not thought up by humans.

          the problem of religion being pre-scientific.  It was, quite naturally, an outcome of humans needing to keep in with Nature - the sun, wind and rain, for their very survival and comfort.  Not surprisingly, it developed and grew as humans grew in size and in dominance of all other livings things on earth.  Now, an over dominance that is likely to be our own undoing.

Is it universal human nature to be warlike and to kill their own for the sake of domination?

The 1st World War, that the Western ‘Christian’ nations were responsible for, was the bloodiest war the world has ever seen.  It was slaughter on an industrial scale and started over Belgian neutrality. 1m British lives. alone, were wiped out.

Is it the white man’s nature to fight, to dominate and to kill any old human, especially black foreigners in other lands?  Or, would the black man be just as bad if given half the chance?  If the American Indians had discovered the vast resources that the white supplanters/settlers discovered would they have turned out exactly like the Americans - the world’s Emperor nation?  Or, is there something innate in the black man’s tribal ancestry, in his DNA, that makes him less keen to conquer nature, to dominate people, to kill and to be top dog?

The wise words from Chief Seattle indicate that certainly, originally, their view of their place on the earth was totally different from that of the 'Christian' white man. They saw their existence as part of the web of life; the Christian nations saw their place on the earth as, "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him for ever." (Westminster Confessional). The biblical perspective is certainly not part of Nature but a cut above Nature. The American Indians, the Maoris and the Aborigines all saw themselves belonging to the earth. The white man, with his arrival on every continent, brought the Bible and the belief that the earth belonged to them and they could do exactly what they liked, as often as they liked with never any repercussions from the earth's life support systems. After all, we are a cut above the rest of Creation; we are made a little lower than the angels; and, certainly we are not the human animal.

In addition, the Muslims or the Arabs have had decades of vast oil wealth but have not turned out like the rampaging, destructive, warlike white man of the Christian West.  Our lot killed millions of humans between 1914 and 2014 and very nearly brought about nuclear holocaust eg the Cuban Missile Crisis.  The other lot did not.  The closest were the evil Communists whose killings we like to exaggerate to make us feel better and to justify our killing of them in SE Asia.  And all this war on the godless Communists from 1945 to 1975 after they had, perhaps, ensured the defeat of Hitler with Stalin’s rearguard action, to begin with as the Communists fought to protect their homeland from the Nazis! No public and frequent acknowledgement that they, the Communists had been decisive in winning the war, in defeating Hitler. Only condemnation for not being democratic and for being so jealous to keep the eastern European nations under their sway as a buffer from the western European nations frequent wars and expansionism.

A true hero of our times - NOT the soldiers who do our killing

Deviantinc

31 August 2011 9:47am

Thank you Mr Chomsky - you are a hero of our times; speaking softly words with a razor edge. You are a voice of reason and sense and a beacon to those of us fed up with endless war.

I am not 'Deviantinc' (just deviant!) but I agree with his/her sentiments, above. Dad

Me (TW) writing: We are responsible for the atrocities and human rights abuses of our own governments whom we vote for and, not for the Arab, Russian and Chinese misbehaviour.  It is always right to look to ourselves and our own wrongs and to stop or much reduce the finger pointing at everyone else but ourselves. "Judgement begins in the House of the Lord" - and should end there, in my opinion, to leave all the finger wagging at the judgement seat of Christ. We should stop taking the law into our own hands around the world, and only do war when the UN authorises it.