In the early sixties Alex Comfort, (now of course famous for his liberally illustrated guide to moneymaking "The Joy of Sex") was an academic biologist studying senescence , with his then, trendy lengthy locks and his dishevelled stump of a right hand, which he waved as a stumpy philosophers wand, presented an exotic and anarchic figure to undergraduates.
He had published a collection of essays "Darwin and the Naked Lady" and spoke fluently, and with then, uncharacteristic good humour about sex and the sexual act in describing the Koka Shastra, circumcision, which was to feature in a later (and now forgotten book about "The Anxiety Makers" - Some curious preoccupations of the medical profession, London, Nelson, 1967
He introduced what was then (and still is) the concept of hard and soft centred thinking... which probably is now more evident in so called "evidence based" medecine, the attempt to produce scientific rigour into social debate and social issues. Remember this was the time of the creepy C.P.Snow and his preposterous ideas about "The 2 Cultures", which was so effectivelty dismissed by F.R.Leavis who was the epitome of the "hard centred" mind. It was the time when Lancelot Hogben another academic maverick in his essays "Science and Society" made the claim that "no society is safe in the hands of so few clever people" - wise ( and ignored) words of warning when economists like Stern can write drivel about the economic costs of climate change, and actuaries without understanding what the Reverend Bayes was talking about have destroyed the pension of millions.
Those chosen few the illuminati of the St. James' based Royal United Services Institute, the haunt of the shady and secretive backers, both military and financial of the quasi private standing armies of Aegis and Erinys who field more troops in Iraq than the UK Army - certainly better paid and probably much better equipped , moved their showcase to the carefully theatrical setting of HMS Albion to reveal their Commander in Chief against a backdrop of camouflage military trucks and cannon today. (Did they get the idea from St. Albion's in Private Eye?)
Those chosen few, the illuminati of RUSI, the retired military and their associated and like minded coves who wield power and influence through Hakluyt, Bilderberg, Chatham House, London City instutitions and Finance houses were allowed to peer into the mind of their delusional dumkopf, and demented, and shortly to be (?) ex-Prime Minister.
They were treated to a wide sweeping view of global conflicts of truly juvenile range which he identified as"hard" and "soft" .... and showed what Alex Comfort described as soft centred thinking. The complete text - which he offers as the basis of a debate is here
Some points amongst the mass of verbiage are worthy of attention.
After 10 years in office he tells us the Cabinet are "conducting a review into every major aspect of policy to set a unified platform and policy direction for the future."
Which some may think a little late to embark upon such an ambitiuos project when he is shortly to exit the scene - however ..
Firstly we are concerned by values and interests , which are in some magical and unexplained way antithetic, but "by furthering our values we further our interests in the modern era of globalisation and interdependence."
Secondly we have two sets of Allies, America on the one hand and Europe on the other again it appears, antithetic and opposed - no mention of the Commonwealth, Australia and the ties that bind, the rising stars of the east, Japan, China The forbidding Russian Bear , the sunlit cresecnt of the Middle East whose energy we so urgently need are also exempt from this remarkably short list.
Thirdly, this review combines, almost uniquely, “hard” and “soft” power. (we will skip over for speed the concept of an "almost unique" concept and certainly dismiss the concept that such a dichotomy is in any way novel or unique - see Alex Comfort )
"But it is fair to say that the “hard” power has been considerably more controversial than the “soft”.
(Overlooking the commencement of a sentence and a paragraph , even, with a conjuction - a solecism which would knock a few marks off the Bairian "O" level Eng.Lang. exam) this basically means either kicking the shit out of wogs or stroking them gently and winning their hearts and minds by building bridges, supplying clean water, sanitation, etc., ... which regrettably (and evidently unseen by the great seer) in the preparatory, warm up or "softening up" initial phase is destroyed by the "hard" bastards dropping laser guided bombs from 20,000 feet, Tomahawk guided missiles etc., etc.,
He then advances to his key vision of the UK's place in this disordered farctured world which we can re-order ..
"There are two types of nations similar to ours today. Those who do war fighting and peacekeeping and those who have, effectively, except in the most exceptional circumstances, retreated to the peacekeeping alone."
i.e Us and Them, (sounds familiar) Them being the (let us say) the Swiss with the Red Cross, the French with Medecin sans Frontiere, the ever present and helpful, Swedes, Finns, Norwegians and Danes, the myriad nations that make up the UN peacekeepers and nation builders who, given the chance won't support armed intervention.
"As a direct consequence of Suez, deterrence, rather than direct deployment, became the pivot of policy."
A policy which one has to say in separating the aggressors of the Cold War seems to have worked exceptionally well, but hard thought doesn't come easily to this latter day Clausewitz...
"So much of what is written distorts the truth or greatly embellishes it. "
WTF ? This one is worthy of Dubya
As he reaches his preoration he discloses a wonderful Truth , at least to the hard thinkers, but not to the soft thinkers like him....
"September 11 wasn’t the incredible action of an isolated group, a one-off strike masterminded by Osama Bin Laden. It was the product rather of a world-wide movement, with an ideology based on a misreading of Islam, whose roots were deep, which had been growing for years and with the ability to mount a radically different type of warfare requiring a radically different type of response. What we face is not a criminal conspiracy or even a fanatical but fringe terrorist organisation. We face something more akin to revolutionary Communism in its early and most militant phase. It is global. It has a narrative about the world and Islam’s place within it that has a reach into most Muslim societies and countries. "
He thinks this describes the rag, tag and bobtail of the mujahedeen with their Kalashnikovs and leather sandals ... READ IT CAREFULLY .. see the morror image ...he has carefully delineated
the Zionist , neo-con cabals that have hi-jacked, not aeroplanes, but Governments and their Armies. The role of AIPAC, NDL, AEI, the red blooded Zionist in powerful position in America, Perle, Kissinger, Wurmser (Mr & Mrs) the deputy leader of the Democcrats etc etc., Lord Levy his personal Middle East envoy and school chum of Halevy the ex (?) head of Mossad and his fnanciers who have put Blair into power abd kept him there and others out. Sat round that cabinet table when these issues post 9/11 was discussed he had a Minister , Michael Meacher who publicly supports that malign view of these bloodthirsty Zionists and their long fought vision of an apartheid non Muslim state holding sway and with Midel eastern hegemony.
"The battle will be long. "
"The frontiers of our security no longer stop at the Channel. What happens in the Middle East affects us. What happens in Pakistan; or Indonesia; or in the attenuated struggles for territory and supremacy in Africa for example, in Sudan or Somalia. The new frontiers for our security are global. "
"So my choice is for Armed forces that are prepared to engage in this difficult, tough, challenging campaign, to be warfighters as well as peacekeepers; for a British foreign policy keeps our American alliance strong and is prepared to project hard as well as soft power; and for us as a nation to be as willing to fight terrorism and pay the cost of that fight wherever it may be, as we are to be proud champions of the causes of peace in the Middle East, action against poverty, or the struggle to halt the degradation of our environment."
Finally he challenges for a debate ...
"The world has changed again. We must change with it. I have set out the choice I believe we should make. I look forward to the debate."
The man is insane. Deluded. Irrational - he calls for defence expenditure which he has starved for a decade. He calls for a war on Islam ...
"What we face is not a criminal conspiracy or even a fanatical but fringe terrorist organisation. We face something more akin to revolutionary Communism in its early and most militant phase. It is global. It has a narrative about the world and Islam’s place within it that has a reach into most Muslim societies and countries."He and his supporters, must be resisted at every step.
Lord Patel will now go and rest in a darkened, quiet room and will return to this again, and again. This nonsense must be exposed and resisted. NO stone must be left unturned to expose the daylight on the grubby people with grubby minds who support this nonsense.
The BBC reported on 13 March 2006 that Sir Ian Blair had tape recorded telephone conversations with the well known war criminal Attorney General Lord Goldsmith, a journalist and the Independent Police Complaints Commission and that he had "expressed regret" for the calls and apologised.
