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Posts Tagged ‘britain’

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A strange and dismal trip

Posted by Richard on April 7, 2007

In his new Townhall column, Dean Barnett compared a random collection of civilians unexpectedly facing death aboard an airliner to a group of British sailors and marines conducting military operations on a warship. The limeys don't fare so well in the comparison:

On 9/11, the passengers aboard United Flight 93 had an option – they could rely on the good intentions of their captors or they could fight back. When presented with this Hobson's choice, they responded with the words "Let's roll." Their ensuing actions were the very definition of heroism.

A few weeks ago, 15 British seamen and marines, soldiers of the Royal Navy, found themselves in a similar quandary. Belligerent Iranians had surrounded them and threatened them with both words and actions. Just as the passengers on Flight 93 had a choice, so too did the British seamen who ultimately spent a couple of weeks as hostages of the Iranian regime. Why did these soldiers, the products of military training and representatives of Her Majesty's flag, make the decision to surrender themselves? Because, according to their Captain at a Friday press conference, "Fighting back was simply not an option."

What a strange and dismal trip it has been for the Western world, going from "Let's Roll" to "Fighting Back Was Not An Option" in scarcely more than five years. One can only hope that when the history of our era is written, the former will turn out to be the immortal quote, not the latter.

Barnett acknowledged that he, as a "keyboard warrior," has slight status for criticizing those who were in harm's way. But he found strong support for his reaction from Medal of Honor recipient Jack Jacobs. Read the whole thing. Allahpundit has the relevant video clips, along with the dispiriting news that the British Navy has ceased inspecting cargo ships bound for Iraq.

Like Barnett, I'm hesitant to criticize those in uniform from the comfort of my civilian chair. But this whole incident leaves a bad taste in my mouth — especially with the culmination that Iran is now free to smuggle its sophisticated explosives and weapons into Iraq. How is this not an abject surrender by Britain and an undeserved victory for Iran?

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About Iran’s latest hostages

Posted by Richard on April 2, 2007

Does anybody do this sort of thing better than Scrappleface? I don't think so:

(2007-04-01) — In a fresh, un-coerced video communiqué released today by the Iranian government, 15 British sailors and marines held captive for eight days, said they would seek asylum in Iran, “the only country that really seems to want us.”

The hostages said they have already begun the paperwork to become Iranian citizens, and have started classes to prepare them for conversion to Islam.

“Whatever else you might think about President Ahmadinejad,” said one British sailor under no duress, “at least he took risks to get us, and genuinely desires to keep us in his country; which is more than we can say for Prime Minister [Tony] Blair."

On a more serious note, here's Newt Gingrich's brilliantly simple suggestion for an effective response to the hostage-taking:

 

Mark Steyn heaped appropriate scorn on the British (and European, and American) alternative plan:

The British ambassador to the U.N. had wanted the Security Council to pass a resolution "deploring" Iran's conduct. But the Russians objected to all this hotheaded inflammatory lingo about "deploring," and so the Security Council instead expressed its "grave concern" about the situation. That and $4.95 will get you a decaf latte. Ask the folks in Darfur what they've got to show for years of the U.N.'s "grave concerns" — heavy on the graves, less so on the concern.
…

The U.N. will do nothing for men seized on a U.N.-sanctioned mission. The European Union will do nothing for its "European citizens." But if liberal transnationalism is a post-modern joke, it's not the only school of transnationalism out there. Iran's Islamic Revolution has been explicitly extraterritorial since the beginning: It has created and funded murderous proxies in Hezbollah, Hamas and both Shia and Sunni factions of the Iraq "insurgency." It has spent a fortune in the stans of Central Asia radicalizing previously somnolent Muslim populations. When Ayatollah Khomeini announced the fatwa against Salman Rushdie, it was not Iranians but British, Indian, Turkish, European, Asian and American Muslims who called for his death, firebombed bookstores, shot his publisher, fatally stabbed his translator and murdered anybody who got in their way.

So we live today in a world of one-way sovereignty: American, British and Iraqi forces in Iraq respect the Syrian and Iranian borders; the Syrians and Iranians do not respect the Iraqi border. Patrolling the Shatt al-Arab at a time of war, the Royal Navy operates under rules of engagement designed by distant fainthearts with an eye to the polite fictions of "international law": If you're in a "warship," you can't wage war. If you're in a "destroyer," don't destroy anything. If you're in a "frigate," you're frigging done for.

Needless to say, it's Mark Steyn, so you should read the whole thing.

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Teaching life skills

Posted by Richard on March 30, 2007

Britain has a teachers' union called the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL). Like America's teachers' unions — like unions of all kinds, really — it no doubt devotes a lot of energy toward maximizing its members' pay and benefits while minimizing the quantity and difficulty of the work they're expected to do.

But Britain's ATL seems to be pursuing work minimization with a vengeance. They've proposed discarding the current curriculum because it teaches "academics," and they say that's not fair to kids who aren't good at knowing things. They want the schools to focus on "life skills" such as — well, the ATL leadership has some ideas (emphasis added):

Speaking earlier this week, the acting deputy general secretary of the ATL, Martin Johnson, said: "There's a lot to learn about how to walk. If you were going out for a Sunday afternoon stroll you might walk one way. If you're trying to catch a train you might walk in another way and if you are doing a cliff walk you might walk in another way.

"If you are carrying a pack, there's a technique in that. We need a nation of people who understand their bodies and can use their bodies effectively."

His comments came as the union called for major changes to the education system that included the abolition of national examinations for pupils. The ATL would prefer a system where children were assessed by teachers.

By all means, have the kids assessed by people who think learning how to walk properly is more important than learning reading, writing, and math. And who find it much more agreeable to teach the former. 

Mr Johnson branded the national curriculum "totalitarian" because it prioritised academic education over other types of knowledge.
…

The union suggested that instead of the current national curriculum, which focuses on core subjects such as maths, English and science, teachers should have the freedom to adapt lessons to reflect a curriculum that concentrated on life skills.

The new curriculum could include lessons in physical co-ordination, personal skills, thinking skills and ethics, he suggested.

The same phrase comes to mind that occurred to me when the Iranians took the Brits hostage: WWMTD — What Would Margaret Thatcher Do?

Actually, I'm confused by ATL's emphasis on teaching walking. If the schools take over this function, what's to become of the Ministry of Silly Walks?
 

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Dame Helen, the Queen, and the Beeb

Posted by Richard on March 19, 2007

Gerard Baker is U.S. Editor and Assistant Editor of The Times of London. While back in Britain recently, he happened upon a BBC interview with Oscar-winning actress Helen Mirren. The interviewer asked her about the difficulty of playing a character as "unsympathetic" as the Queen. To her credit, Mirren rejected the premise.

Baker was struck by this precisely because it was merely about an actress, not Iraq or politics, and he proceeded to unload on the Beeb most marvelously (emphasis added):

It betrayed an absolutely rock-solid assumption that the Queen is fundamentally unsympathetic, and that anyone who might still harbour some respect for the monarch – or indeed for that matter, the military or the Church, or the countryside or the joint stock company or any of the great English bequests to the world – must be some reactionary old buffer out in the sticks who has not had the benefit of the London media's cultural enlightenment.

More than that, the question – all fawning and fraternal and friendly – contained within it an assumption that, of course, every thoughtful person shares the same view.

You really do have to leave the country to appreciate fully how pernicious the BBC's grasp of the nation's cultural and political soul has become. The groupthink and assumptions implicit in almost everything broadcast by BBC News … lie like a suffocating blanket over the national consciousness.

This is the mindset that sees the effortless superiority, at every turn, of benign collectivism over selfish individualism, exploited worker over unscrupulous capitalist, enlightened European over brutish American, thoughtful atheist over dumb believer, persecuted Arab over callous Israeli; and that believes the West is the perpetrator of just about every ill that has ever befallen the world – from colonialism to global warming.

I'm often told, when I take on like this, that I'm ignoring the quality of BBC output. But I spent almost a decade in the employ of the BBC and I can say, without demeaning my gifted colleagues at The Times, that it has probably one of the highest concentrations of talent of any institution in the world. But that, of course, is the problem. It perpetuates its power by attracting and retaining an educated elite that is distinguished by its unstinting devotion to collectivist values. I've no doubt it does what it does very well. It is what it does I object to.

Bravo. In today's world of cable and satellite channels, lots of Americans who consider themselves educated and sophisticated speak of BBC News in glowing terms — admiring the Beeb even more than NPR or MacNeil-Lehrer. It's a sentiment not confined to those who are philosophically aligned with the collectivists at the Beeb, and it's something I don't understand. The Beeb reports on its own postmodernist alternate universe that bears little resemblance to the reality in which I reside. Their purpose is evil and the result is pernicious. Why should I admire them for doing it well?

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