Do not despair. There may be politicians who have abandoned any genuine intent to gain Scottish Independence, but the path is still open. It is a question of nerve and will.
I think we should lift our eyes beyond the current SNP leadership contest – although I shall in future be commenting on its incredible revelations – and look at the much bigger picture. So here we are.
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The US will never allow us to have Independence.
Surely, the clusterwhatever in The Ukraine has shown that?
You can’t be serious.
He is very much serious. Evil scum in charge of USA plainly shown that they will stop at nothing, including installing blatantly nazi-like regime committing genocide (both of Russian speaking population in Donbass and of their own, sending conscripts picked up in brutal manhunts by press up gangs with 3 days of training to Bachmut just to force Russians to waste some ammunition on them) to control their puppets. If Scotland wants real independence, first order of things is ban NATO, entry of foreign troops/agents, and eternal neutrality written into constitution. Of course anyone who says this will be smeared as Putin’s puppet by deafening howls of real, not imaginary puppets of evil regime, one to the west of Scotland (and their bootlicker colleagues to the south of Scotland, too)…
Mr V. that is a reasonable summation. Thank you.
The US will be the only country to benefit from independence. Their aim is to divide Britain and make it weaker, as they’ve done with all their allies.
Merkin Scot.
The US will be first to welcome us once we obtain independence first and foremost because we sit at the bottom of the Atlantic Arc and Iceland sits at the top of it, its a defensive position against Russia.
We need Ash Regan to be the next SNP leader she has big ideas on independence, and if she’s elected she say we’ll be free of this union in 2026 when Scots vote in a majority of indy minded MSPs.
No. Pandering to the wants/needs of the US MiC is not true Independence.
The US interfered in 2014 precisely because of, among other things, Faslane.
David Cameron did shove a note into Barrack Obama’s hand when he was giving a speech to ask the Scottish people to remain in the union, however we’ve had an indy majority of MSPs at Holyrood for a few years, Ash Regan will use this indy majority to declare independence, every election will be treated as a indy election, but only if Ash Regan wins the leadership contest.
David Cameron also reached out to EU countries to ask them to tell the Scottish government that they wouldn’t recognise a indy Scotland, if I recall correctly most told him to take a hike.
I’m sure, Ash Regan will give the Americans a few years to move their nuclear warhead out of Faslane, when the time comes.
They want us to throw in the towel, to think there is no hope , to accept colonial rule and the laws of the usurper. I say no danger I want my right of democracy, free from the trininy of colonial rule and a twisted corupt parictical Union. I reject imperialism, the scraps from the master table that are mine, the carpetbagging of privatisation . We need change , brothers and Sisters it’s coming.
That’s 56 mins of my life that I’ll never get back. For around 35 mins, Craig waffled the usual stuff, 90% of which most people would agree with. However, once he moved on to how we are going to gain independence, he paid brief lip service to the idea of declaring independence, by quoting examples such as Slovenia, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, and how “they” stood up to the Russian union and the Yugoslav union.
What he skips completely, are the numbers…….
88%, 74.9%, 90.4% and 78.4%. These were the percentages of Slovenians, Latvians, Lithuanians, and Estonians who voted for independence.
Craig talks about the possibility of Westminster using violence against Scots standing for independence. That IS a possibility, but there is a MUCH greater chance of violence from fellow Scots, who want to remain in the U.K. – especially if we haven’t held some kind of plebiscite.
Make no mistake. Craig is NOT a democrat. If the plebiscite is in the form of a UK election, Craig and his pals would declare independence if the Yes parties get more seats than the unionist parties – even if this were achieved with 45% of the vote. And the same goes for a plebiscite in the form of a Holyrood election.
Once a plebiscite on Scottish independence produces a majority of 50% +1, then let’s declare independence.
If that plebiscite results in 50% -1, then on whose behalf would Craig and his pals be declaring independence?
I do believe in Scottish independence, and I do NOT believe that Westminster has the right to annul Scotland’s right of self determination. That right belongs to the Scottish people and nobody else. However, it does NOT belong to Scottish people who are willing to ride roughshod over the wishes of the MAJORITY, like Craig and his chums. He talks blithely about the majority of nations becoming independent during his lifetime, with very few of them holding referendums in their journey to independence, but how many of those nations had populations split right down the middle on the subject of independence?
Craig and his henchmen are dangerous people. Every yes voter should turn away from Craig’s blandishments, and concentrate on persuading our neighbours. Once the majority is achieved in a form that the UN will recognise, THEN we can declare independence. Craig talks about independence only being recognised if the nation can control its territory. How can ANY nation control its territory without having a majority in agreement.
I’m all for independence, but I’m also all for protecting my 21 grandchildren from the possibility of the kind of violence that Craig skips over as though it had no consequence.
“If that plebiscite results in 50% -1, then on whose behalf would Craig and his pals be declaring independence?”
A stupid sentence, on behalf of the MAJORITY of Scots, who else do you think it is.
Read it again. 50%-1 is a minority of Scots. Craig would be declaring independence on behalf of a minority.
@Alex Birnie, “What he skips completely, are the numbers…….88%, 74.9%, 90.4% and 78.4%. These were the percentages of Slovenians, Latvians, Lithuanians, and Estonians who voted for independence.”
What he also skips completely is Taiwan. Taiwan meets all the criteria for self declared independence of the sort Craig recognises.
They have a functioning state apparatus. An entity with functioning banks, civil service, education service, military etc.. Yet the rules based international order threw them under the bus when Nixon and Mao agreed to do so.
Now there is a power struggle as to who is the world based international order. The end game of that tussle will ensure lots of tears if we don’t tread wisely…_
Have the Taiwanese voted for independence? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought it was a non-independence party that won the last election.
@Laguerre, Taiwan is the home of what is left of the Chinese Republic. As far as they are concerned they are the legitimate government of all China. Don’t forget, the Chinese Civil War has never officially ended, so they still claim they are independent.
It’s a complex history, but not overly complicated. Their seat at the UN was then transferred to Communist China as part of the Nixon, Mao deal.
If the USA had not been head honcho in the rules based international order, it wouldn’t have happened.
So much for anti Communism eh? There’s those commie bastards, then there’s our commie bastards…_
I.e. you admit that I was right. The Taiwanese have not voted to create an independent state. So the case is not like the others you mention.
Thank you also for mansplaining what everyone already knows.
“What he skips completely, are the numbers…….88%, 74.9%, 90.4% and 78.4%. These were the percentages of Slovenians, Latvians, Lithuanians, and Estonians who voted for independence.”
Were any of these percentages achieved for Brexit, yet Brexit went ahead, 50+1% is still a majority, Alex Salmond built up the number on indy support from around 23% to 45% Sturgeon did everything in her powers to destroy that 45% persecuting and in some cases imprisoning indy supporters, imagine what the figure would have been now if she has focused on building on the 45% instead of trying to destroy it.
Brexit? You’re using Brexit as an example? Seriously? The fact is that Brexit has caused huge damage to the UK economy, and the U.K. will, at some point rejoin the EU.
Even so, Brexit was legal, because the vote was 52/48. In addition the premise you are putting forward is flawed.
When Alex Salmond became FM, the polls stood at 32%, not 23%. That’s not to decry Salmond’s achievements, but why exaggerate?
I don’t accept your characterisation of Sturgeon. That is your opinion, probably based on the writings of Craig, Barrhead Boy, Stu Campbell and the other professional anti-SNP bloggers, whose biased writings are every bit as bad as any of the unionist journalists like Daisley.
In my opinion, caution was what Sturgeon displayed during her term as FM. Now, we can argue whether her caution was too extreme, (presumably, you’d be in that camp), but I think her caution was justified. In my opinion, if she had called a referendum at any time between 2014 and 2021, we’d have probably lost, and ended up like Quebec.
Those who condemn Sturgeon in the way you have, are no better than the folk who declared Salmond guilty before his trial (some still do). Some folk believe that Craig deserved to be jailed. That is just as nonsensical (IMO) as declaring Sturgeon to be a MI5 stool pigeon.
We are now close to the winning post, no matter how much Craig pontificates about the UK “never letting us go”. This is arrant nonsense. Once a majority for independence has been demonstrated (hopefully at the next GE), the independence will be inevitable.
Much as I despise the UK establishment, which has a truly awful history of colonialisation, in this modern world, they will be as powerless to prevent us leaving as they were to prevent any secession from British rule that has happened in the last few decades. There are many countries which became independent from the U.K. In more recent history, and the UK, lacking gunboats, had to accept the will of the people seceding.
There will be no need for violence or precipitous action. Sturgeon and the rest of the SNP leadership are (IMO) using the absolutely correct tactics, and Salmond, Craig and the rest of the Alba folk are misguided …… and possibly dangerous.
“When Alex Salmond became FM, the polls stood at 32%, not 23%. That’s not to decry Salmond’s achievements, but why exaggerate?”
Alex Birnie.
I’m not.
“Published on Monday, the annual study by the Scottish Centre for Social Research found that nearly a third, 32%, of Scots supported independence this year compared with just 23% last year – a rise likely to be closely linked to Salmond’s landslide victory in May’s elections for the devolved parliament.”
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fuk%2F2011%2Fdec%2F05%2Fscottish-back-independence-price-survey
“Even so, Brexit was legal, because the vote was 52/48. In addition the premise you are putting forward is flawed.”
It’s not flawed: the ballot box is the way forward, especially after Sturgeon allowed the UKSC to end indyrefs. Brexit wasn’t legal – it cut clear across the sovereignty of the Scottish people Ex-Welsh FM Carwyn Jones pointed this out in a speech at the time, but Sturgeon ignored it.
“I don’t accept your characterisation of Sturgeon. That is your opinion, probably based on the writings of Craig, Barrhead Boy, Stu Campbell and the other professional anti-SNP bloggers, whose biased writings are every bit as bad as any of the unionist journalists like Daisley.”
You obviously haven’t been paying attention. This might help clear a few things up for you:
https://robinmcalpine.org/but-why-would-anyone-be-suspicious-of-snp-hq/
“We are now close to the winning post, no matter how much Craig pontificates about the UK “never letting us go”. This is arrant nonsense. Once a majority for independence has been demonstrated (hopefully at the next GE), the independence will be inevitable.”
We’ll only get close to the winning post if Ash Regan is elected FM. Craig is spot on Westminster is desperate to hold onto Scotland.
“Salmond, Craig and the rest of the Alba folk are misguided …… and possibly dangerous.”
Delusional would be an understatement to describe the nonsense above, I doubt very much that you are a Scottish independence supporter.
“What he skips completely, are the numbers…….
88%, 74.9%, 90.4% and 78.4%. These were the percentages of Slovenians, Latvians, Lithuanians, and Estonians who voted for independence.”
That’s interesting, as when similar numbers of people in the four oblasts voted to join the Russian Federation, Craig said that the high percentages showed that the votes were rigged. Whether an election or a referendum is “free and fair” increasingly depends, it seems, on it producing the “right” result.
@ Bayard,
Craig still claims that Russias ‘Special Military Operation’ is illegal under international law. That can only hold water if you don’t accept the areas of Ukraine who voted to leave Ukraine, had the same right that Craig demands for Scotland, was granted to Kosovo and is ignored with Taiwan…_
Agreed, but whether or not Russia’s SMO was illegal under international law has nothing to do with whether the subsequent referendums were rigged or not. It may be that, under international law, referendums enabled by an illegal act are themselves illegal, but that still doesn’t necessarily mean that they are not free and fair.
Not true at all Digger. As I state quite clearly, the ICJ judgment on Kosovo says very clearly that territorial integrity only applies with regard to other states. So Ukraine’s right to territorial integrity does apply vis a vis Russia.
The referenda under military occupation were of course a nonsense anyway. But if those territories were occupied by a different people wishing to become an Independent state, they might well have a right to self determination. They don’t have a “right” to agree Russian annexation, that isn’t self determination.
As you well know Mr. Murray, international law only works when those under those laws stick to those laws. Judgements, good or bad, are the privilege of the victors or the all powerful.
In the east of Ukraine there was a clear time line, short I agree, were Luhansk and Donbas ceded from Ukraine and then Russian boots officially went in as an SMO to defend the two Oblasts.
Let’s not forget the civil war after 2014, described as an anti terrorist operation by Kyiev, had claimed 15000 dead. A civil war I have no doubt had Russian supplies in the war zone.
In Crimea the Russian boots went in first, and Crimea ceded from Ukraine afterwards. Yes, it was under military annexation, but I see little evidence, then or since, of hostility to Russians in Crimea. The argument that the votes were coerced doesn’t appear to have a great deal in support. It is a stronger argument that those in Crimea voted to endorse what had happened.
The Russians turned the water supply back on don’t forget, unlike Kyiev who had turned it off.
Crimeans have a right to agree to whatever they want, to date they seem content. Including support for what could easily be described as ‘show elections’. The referenda was nonsense to you, but made sense to those on the ground.
There again, it’s not the only historical election result you have dismissed, is it…_
The Donbas loyalists didn’t secede from Ukraine, the US-Ukronazi putschists seceded from the Ukrainian state. The Donbas republics subscribed to the legitimate, democratic Ukrainian republic that followed the dissolution of the USSR. When the putschists started the civil war in 2014 the loyalists in Donbas defended themselves and made a good job of it.
Alex Birnie , what you miss is that these Baltic countries did not allow Russians a vote in their independence independence referendums , Scotland does not have to allow English people a vote in a Scottish independence referendum but chose to do so in 2014 , it was shown that in 2014 a majority of Scottish people voted YES to Scottish independence and I think it is indisputable that the number of Scottish people in favour of Scottish independence has increased since 2014 .
The question is has the number of English people moving to Scotland increased by a higher number than new Scottish yes votes and if it has , should we offer votes to English people again in the next Scottish independence referendum, personally i dont think we should , English people have their own country if they don’t like Scottish independence they can always move back to England I have no such choice my country is controlled by England .
The franchise in the Baltic nation indyrefs included all residents, as did the referendums in Quebec and Catalunia.
Except Russians. These borderline fascist states refuse to grant citizenship to anyone not of their ‘ein volk’ ideology, even to Russians whose families roots there trace back to 1600s. Imagine Scotland refusing citizenship to anyone who doesn’t speak Celtic language, renounce all ties to England, including familial ones, changes name to purely Scottish one, and exhibits rabid Anglophobia to the point it’s even more vile than most forms of Antisemitism – and you will have these three apartheid banana republics (except that is too generous because they are incapable of even producing bananas)…
Terence Callahan, I’m not going down that rabbit hole with you. Every person resident in Scotland is Scottish, whether (like me) you can trace your Scottish ancestry back to the ninth century, or you recently moved here and registered to vote.
Alex Salmond himself said he was proud of the civic nationalism that was on display at the last referendum.
No, regardless of what anyone says, every citizen in Scotland who is registered to vote in general elections will vote in the upcoming U.K. election, which (I hope) will be THE plebiscite on independence. There is no reasonable mechanism in place to differentiate between “proper Scots” (as you would call them), and recent immigrants to Scotland, which I am very glad about.
“Blood and bone” nationalism has no place in the YES movement. Let’s leave that to the EDL skinheads….
“I’m all for independence”
Context: Alex Birnie supports Daily Record favourite Humza Yousaf, completely unperturbed that Humza is supported by an arch Unionist propaganda sheet.
Since You have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA how I voted Mr Orr, you are talking through your arse. After the first few hustings, I said that Yousaf had impressed me the most, but that I’d be perfectly happy with any of the three candidates, all of whom are head and shoulders above DRoss, Sarwar and Wee Willie Rennie.
I have now voted, but you will never know how i voted, because my loyalty to whoever wins won’t tell you.
Unlike you Mr Orr, my loyalty to the Yes movement is not conditional.
If you voted for Humza you have no loyalty whatsoever to the Yes movement. You have loyalty to the devolution settlement, which is quite a different thing.
“If you voted for Humza, you have no loyalty whatsoever to the Yes movement”.
As I said, you will never know how I voted, because unlike you, Mr Murray my loyalty to the cause of independence is not conditional. I shouldn’t judge you, because, unlike you, I’ve never applied to be a SNP candidate, and been rejected.
The Yes movement has one mission. Persuading our fellow Scots of the case for independence. As we try and accomplish this task, we are surrounded by enemies, some with clear motives, some whose motives are more opaque, and some, like you and your fellow anti-SNP blogger pals, who make a nice living (thanks very much), by being “controversial” and by making outrageous baseless slurs on people whose boots you aren’t fit to lick. You are no better than the poisonous gossips who found Salmond guilty before he went to court. You rejoice (as I do) that he was found not guilty, yet you find Sturgeon, Murrell, and any of the SNP leadership who don’t agree with your nonsense, guilty of unproven allegations, 100% of which come from the poisonous cabal of professional anti-SNP bloggers. You, along with Campbell et al are a disgrace.
You were rejected as a candidate. Stop being a bloody child and get over it…..
As usual, my temper has gotten the better of me. I apologise for reacting to Craig’s assertion that anyone who voted for Yousaf is pro-devolution. No greater insult could be levelled at a dedicated Yes supporter and I retaliated.
I was wrong to do so, no matter how insulting Craig’s comment was. There is now a high level of ugliness in certain isolated corners of the Yes movement, and I’m desperate to get the plebiscite behind us, so that we can ignore the ugliness, and move on to declaring independence.
Alex
You posted on a previous blog that Humza was your man even though you knew the Daily Record was running front page propaganda for him. Forgive me for not treating your commitment to independence with a scintilla of seriousness.
Jules Orr,
As is typical of Alba supporters, you feel the need to exaggerate, or just downright lie (I have little idea why this tendency to lie is so prevalent in the Alba ranks).
What I actually said was that I’d probably vote for Yousaf, because at that point, he seemed to me to be the most able candidate. I’ve now voted, but you will never know how I voted, because, regardless of who finally wins, my support for the winner will be total. My loyalty to the Yes movement and to the SNP (the ONLY viable political vehicle available to Yes voters) isn’t conditional, as yours seems to be.
No, I won’t forgive you for impugning my commitment to independence. You Sir, can stick your opinion up yer arse. There is a really ugly current running right through the Alba party, whereby anyone who dares to question the policies and tactics of Alba followers, is accused of not being a yes supporter. To be fair, those of us in the SNP know SNP members and supporters who have similar poison running through their veins, but the numbers of those folk are minuscule. With Alba supporters, this arrogance, and narrow mindedness is almost universal, (Vide Craig’s comment about anyone who votes for Yousaf is pro-devolution).
We hear lots of Alba supporters calling for “unity”. How the hell is anyone on the SNP side of the argument supposed to engage with an arsehole who declares “If you don’t agree with me, then you’re a unionist, or (at best) a pro-devolutionist?!?
I really can’t wait for the next SNP leader to declare that the next GE will be a plebiscite on independence, and then we can finally ignore the poisonous growth that is the Alba party.
A pox on all your houses!!!
Alex is your typical Sturgeon unionist. He supports Independence provided we don’t ever actually become Independenct.
Thanks for that Craig, but I really don’t care about your opinion of me. I think that you are a danger to my grandchildren with all your talk of blood, and while I was initially puzzled as to why your application to be a SNP candidate was rejected, your asinine opinions and dangerous contempt for democracy that you have since been exposed.
Thank Christ you were turned down! I respect your opinions on just about every other issue on current affairs, but your bitterness at being rejected has clouded your views on Scottish independence, IMO.
Do check numbers in kangaroo pseudo-referendum about “independence” in Montenegro. They fell well short of even very low, enforced by USA at bombpoint threshold, yet somehow, in their rabid rush to obliterate Serbia, that narrow margin that only existed because NATO threatened to continue bombing of Montenegro if they say ‘no’ was instantly recognized, made binding and Serbia was threatened with annihilation if they point out it was illegal according to rules NATO themselves set up. There, have most recent European precedent, Scottish independence based on what Craig proposes will be million times more legit and democratic than this…
Thanks for taking the trouble to educate those of us who don’t know the ins and outs of the international road back to independence. It was an eye opener. I wish it had come from the SNP government years ago but they kept their gobs shut.
It’s galling that Scotland, a wealthy country, has been kept in relative poverty whilst all our wealth has been grabbed by London and the SNP stood aside and let it happen.
Scotland can’t afford to continue with these people in charge. There needs to be a complete clear out of the comfy slippered ********.
Agree with you entirely Craig, my thought processes almost exactly. A few wee tiny, immaterial really, quibbles here and there but feel free to ignore them below.
That Kosovo declared WITHOUT a referendum would have been worth a mention as would the fact that it was Serbia who took the case to the UN in the mistaken belief that the UN would find in its favour based on the dinosaur territorial integrity argument; it didn’t.
The judgement of the ICJ was that Kosovo had done nothing illegal in UDI-ing. Also worth a mention that the UK immediately recognised Kosovo the next day way before the ICJ proceedings. On the slightly negative side it should be pointed out that although the majority of UN Nation States have recognised Kosovo, the number still does not exceed the super majority required for UN membership. OTOH on the more positive side the EU have been working with Kosovo to attain its required entry acquis. It is already a defacto member of many EU institutions with access, for instance to the ECB. EU membership acceptance law is or has been ammended so that not all EU member states are required to agree to accession. Membership of the UN will be dropped from the EU acquis if they need to and Kosovo is on the pending membership list. Kosovo will become a member of the EU soon.
I do still harbour feelings that such is the need for London to hold on to Scotland that they might be willing to go the whole hog: i.e. pull out of the ECHR, the ICCPR, the Security Council and even UN membership to do so. I know that sounds mad, because it is, but I base that possible willingness on their part – to become a fully swivel-eyed, rogue, pariah state rather than let Scotland go – on the (admittedly paranoid) feeling that there is in addition to simply wanting to hold on to Scotland’s immense resources a vestigial psychological need in the London ruling elite to have someone to bully: i.e. us.
That was an inspiring informative talk Craig. You have set out the path beautifully. We just have to start believing in ourselves and not so much in our politicians, especially the one that have led us up this blind alley.
Excellent synopsis. It was obvious the SNP was compromised when they refused Craig as a candidate to stand in elections. Craig’s experience and diplomatic knowledge is infinitely superior to anyone in the SNP Westminster group or Holyrood. I very much hope his expertise will be prioritised by Alba.
Just one point. In the event of Scotland withdrawing from the UK union alliance there would be no ‘United Kingdom’, only England and Scotland as distinct states.
Wouldn’t the UK (ex-Scotland) become The United Kingdom of Southern Britain & Northern Ireland, Prof?
The term ‘United Kingdom’ (singular) was always a misnomer as there are two kingdoms still in existence, as conditioned by the ToU and CoR. England can call itself whatever it wants, though the two other ‘UK’ territories it took by force are arguably never likely to be truly ‘united’ with it. Once Scotland and/or the north of Ireland exits, the deflated imperial baw is burst. England will just become England again, or should. Does England really want to be ‘united’ with any other ‘peoples’ anyway?
Don’t forget the Welsh !
Everybody always forgets the Welsh 🙁
Thanks for your reply Prof. If Northern Ireland leaves the UK along with Scotland, I’d imagine that the Welsh won’t be too happy with the residual UK referring to itself as England, so it will probably be officially known as The United Kingdom & Principality of England & Wales (UK for short). By the way, plenty of Scots were involved in the colonisation of Ulster in the 17th century.
Enjoy the rest of the weekend.
“The term ‘United Kingdom’ (singular) was always a misnomer as there are two kingdoms still in existence, as conditioned by the ToU and CoR. ”
The union in the “United Kingdom” is between Great Britain, a state formed by the union of Scotland and England (which at the time included Wales), and Ireland. Scotland leaving won’t make any difference to the “United Kingdom” part of the name.
Ireland is for the most part an independent country. There is no ‘United Kingdom’ once Scotland exits. Its all a charade anyway given that Scotland is considered a possession, the Treaty of Union repeatedly violated and worthless.
https://salvo-cor.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/THEORETICAL+CASE+FOR+SCOTTISH+INDEPENDENCE.pdf
“There is no ‘United Kingdom’ once Scotland exits.”
It would help if you paid attention to history. The union between England and Scotland produced Great Britain, not the United Kingdom. If Scotland becomes independent, but Northern Ireland remains part of the United Kingdom, it will still be the United Kingdom of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It’s Great Britain that will cease to exist.
The UK is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The UK bit will remain after we leave.
The smell of a rat was so bad then that I noticed it in Hull.
International law has a sibling, that sibling is the rules based international order. Whichever home has the biggest armed body, with the strongest economy, gets to make the rules and give the orders. Justice, fairness, right and wrong are far distant, exiled and sanctioned cousin’s.
In Scotland you have one sibling who is a nationalist, one who is a unionist and the other doesn’t care one way or the other. Asking Scots to rise up and take power is a call to civil war, the dirtiest of all wars. Ukraines civil war is what you are calling for, nice call Mr. Murray.
It seems you will take on the role of the ultra reactionary nationalist in that conflict. If that isn’t what you would like, then what is the reasoning behind you proposing that current ministers and civil servants be forced to prioritise a nationalist independence agenda and take an oath of loyalty.
So much for the freedom to choose…_
The lack of ‘freedom to choose’ is becoming more apparent thanks to the work of Salvo and Liberation Scot. Of which much more to follow………….
If you elect good, smart people into parliament, and put smart, competent, high-calibre people in charge of treasury, education, law, healthcare, industry and even ‘culture’ I guess, then you will have independence.
Independence is first of all a state of mind.
There are absolutely enough brilliant Scots capable of filling these positions, some of them scattered around the world.
As long as we continue to give power to clowns, crooks and muppets, there will never be independence.
We have to put our own house in order before the people will empathise ( yes) with the idea of independence.
-and the number is 2/3. It has to be decisive and rock-solid.
Don’t forget that colonialism imposes a ‘mediocre meritocracy’ on a people (Memmi), their territory primarily exploited to serve and protect the interest of the ‘mother country’. That imposed meritocratic elite and cultural hegemony is quite distinct from the nationalist political elite, tho the latter is invariably compromised, hence the rupture we see in the independence movement. Much of what is happening in Scotland occurred in numerous former colonies around the world, which tells us we should not place all our problems only at the feet of a deceitful political elite, leaving institutions installed by the colonizer to maintain ‘the racket’. Craig is well onto this point.
In the film “The Wind that Shakes the Barley”, one of the characters says, about Irish independence, “All that will change will be the accents of our masters”. What is by far the most probable outcome for Scottish independence is that Scotland will go from being part of an oligarchy to being its own oligarchy, with slightly different and more Scottish oligarchs. Those oligarchs will make damn sure that no “smart, competent, high-calibre people” are put in charge of anything unless they are working for the oligarchs.
Yes but the message of that movie is not that it was an error to depart English rule. Quite the opposite. A hundred years on you will not find a single Irish person of any political stripe who believes gaining independence from England was a mistake. Other of course than the great vanguardist Sir Bob Geldof. The same is true across the globe in every other nation once ruled from London.
“Yes but the message of that movie is not that it was an error to depart English rule. ”
Agreed, the Irish rejected the socialist Sinn Fein and ended up with Irish oligarchs ruling from Dublin instead of English oligarchs ruling from London, which was an improvement, however slight. That doesn’t mean, however, that the Irish couldn’t have had a country where the common people got a much better deal, had they not muffed it.
Independence is well and truly back in the picture which can only be a good thing since the Scottish public needs to be reminded of it every day. Unionism depends on the shrugging shoulders of despondency. The bigger the bourach the better. Clearing out the unionists from the SNP is the top priority.
Craig, in part of your talk, you highlight the scarcity of preparation, please therefore be aware that an initiative under the title “The Declaration of a Sovereign Scot” was started in early 2021.
The Declaration of an individual Sovereign Scot – its purpose – to regain the independence of Scotland.
Two extracts:
Exercising my Claim Of Right as a Sovereign Scot, I declare:
I do not consent to the terms of, nor the continuation of, the Treaty of Union established through the Acts of Union in 1707.
I do not consent to the terms of, nor the continuation of, the Scotland Act 1998, and all subsequent relevant Acts of like nature and purpose.
At every rally and many other events across the length and breadth of Scotland since 2021, individuals who have accepted the open invitation to do so, have signed their individual Declaration, and in batch after batch these have been lodged with the Secretary General of the United Nations at the UN HQ in New York for safekeeping, and so that they are available for scrutiny – in due course – by all Members of the UN. (Scanned copies of each individual Declaration have been retained and will be eventually combined together as a historical document. (Mirroring the Declaration of Arbroath.)
As each batch is isssued to the UN, a letter is also sent addressing specific issues that arise within the UN’s jurisdiction and established principles. The UN Charter itself is perhaps an obvious starting point, but the research which was carried out preparatory to the launch of this initiative indicates that it is insufficient in and of itself, and each letter therefore identifies separate relevant issues, upon which the Members of the UN have themselves resolved as relevant, and to be adhered to by Members.
The initiative is being deliberately established in Stages, and those letters, listing those individual aspects, will prove important in a subsequent Stage.
We have met via Zoom, when as part of a series called “The Twa Auld Heids” you took part in one of the shows.
I would be happy to meet again and discuss why and how I believe the “Declaration” initiative has a part to play in regaining Scotland’s independence – by preparing the way – well in advance – for what is required in gaining ultimate international recognition.
Well argued. You’re right of course, there will not be another referendum. The English will never again take that risk. Surely a greater obstacle to independence though is these very odd, incredibly numerous ducks .. Scottish unionists. I’d love to hear your assessment of the mentality of these people, because from the outside they appear to lack all dignity. What do they think for example when they look across the sea to the Republic of Ireland? (To anywhere in fact, but especially just next door to Ireland). Do they know that any Irish person in RoI desiring to be ruled from London by posh Englishmen or be a subject of English ‘royals’ would be regarded as a straightforward freak, a completely unserious person. (They cannot consider unionists in the north their equivalents because the Orange attachment to English rule is based on a colonisers’ hatred of native Irish Catholics).
Why should Scottish unionists be regarded as any less ridiculous than a citizen of a state formerly ruled by the English who desires to return to that subject status. I don’t accept the mentality is simply a product of media propaganda because newspapers and TV cannot hide from their eyes how the rest of the world is flourishing free from English rule. It just seems a very specific Scottish character flaw, one powerfully immune to overwhelming evidence or rational argument. I doubt there is any appeal you can make to them by this stage that they haven’t already heard a million times before. It seems they will fight you to the death to remain ruled by their betters, the Sir Keirs or Sir Tonys, and be proud subjects of Charles or whoever.
No despair here Craig. We need the truth out, all of it. Hopefully Forbes and Regan will hold their nerve and continue on their current path then clean out the mess that will necessarily be created by it. Then we move forward again. The punters won’t know who the deceivers are until the truth comes out. Sturgeon Murrell and others need to be explaining themselves in front of a judge.
How would Scottish sovereignty relate to China’s Global Civilization Initiative, the expanding Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and BRICS+?
TL:DW Audio-visually ‘illiterate’; fails to use the medium to any useful effect or with any degree or competence. I say that as blunt but intendedly-constructive criticism; and as someone who has spent over forty years of my life producing audio-visual material for education, business and broadcast. Claqueurs, sycophants and wannabees will rave of course; but this won’t have the impact you think it will Craig. – This isn’t a competent presentation.
‘Webcam licking’ (think; ‘window licking’) is one term used to describe demented audio-visually-illiterate drooling into webcams for hours on end; droning on and on about some or other thing they are obsessed by; normally cheered on by an equally-demented claque whose unhinged biases are being nicely confirmed for them. – A habit (and format) mostly-beloved of demented conspiracy theorists.
– Very common, very ‘popular’ among the unhinged. It’s what ‘Rab C’ ranting at the buses is to giving a worthwhile presentation or lecture; and we all know anybody can give an hour-long lecture with ease; don’t we? Ask any Taxi Driver!
The (calculated) 10,000 or so words you’ve squandered here would have been better-spread as two or three entries on a blog which cries for financial support; but seems to struggle to provide the frequency of content that justifies that support. ‘Subscribe’ it says! ‘To what?’ many may wonder!
Like many others – I’m simply not going to invest an hour of my time ‘pinned down’ to a screen watching this (there is nothing to see). If you want/need to engage an audience for that long, there are particular techniques for doing so. Like the written word, video has it’s ‘grammar’ – a system of rules that facilitate individual elements to combine in order to convey meaning; it also (depending on vernacular) has its own forms of ‘punctuation’ – the visual part of the medium needs to be used to good (or at least some) useful effect. – If you cannot do it well – or even to a basically competent degree – then the best advice is just don’t!
…You’re NOT (for example) looking anyone in the eye here; quite the opposite. Therefore failing in that objective. It’s also impossible to hold anyone’s gaze for an hour anyway; and even if you could, it would come across as disturbing; this is one reason why visual grammars and punctuation emerged.
Whoever told you this ‘ere podcasting/YouTube thingie would get you down with the kids etc. is a dumplin! It’s just not that easy.
Whenever I see this sort of thing I’m reminded of Pedro Carolino’s “English As She Is Spoke (1884)”; and of a jolly jape some years ago played by one of the Lecturers at Glasgow School of Art. – There are some railings on West Graham Street at Dalhousie St (in Glasgow), to which they’d cable-tied a piece of brown corrugated cardboard torn from a box; upon which were written (in inky) the words:
“Sign writter – lowest prises in Scotland!” – followed by a mobile ‘phone number. Allegedly (or so legend has it) this did generate enquiries! – Though the quality of potential clientele might have been on the level of an old cardboard box tied to some railings!
The comedy in both examples (the latter being deliberate of course) being in the confidence with which a not-understood medium was misused; producing results which were certainly not the intention of the author. Play to the claque and only the claque if you like… but if you don’t want to be further lumped in with the ‘conspiretard community’ and have serious purpose (which I think you do), avoid this sort of thing!
…And no; I’m not looking for a job. As Carolino put it; “He make to weep the room. He was fighted in duel. They fight one’s selfs together. He do want to fall.” – I’ll look forward to the written ‘executive summary’ with interest.
TL:DR
Perhaps the yoof of today have become so used to watching things on their ‘phones that they are functionally illiterate and so video has to be the medium of the future, but it does have one serious drawback, which is that you can read a lot faster than you can speak. If a video is an hour long, you know that is going to be an hour out of your life. The length of time to read the same can be a lot less. Also, if you read something in two goes, you can refresh your memory of what went before by skim-reading it, which you can’t do with a video. I didn’t listen to this, but I would have read it if it had been a blog post. I can’t be the only one.
It’s even worse if you need subtitles to follow what is said on a video because you are (as I am) too deaf to hear it. And, oh, for radio with subtitles.
I don’t feel the slightest need to pay heed to the critique of somebody who states they could not be bothered to watch the video.
Paradox alert, Craig!
click the 3 dot button below the video on the right hand side, click “show transcript”, click on transcript, select all, and paste to a text file 🙂
Firyir Aingood
Now that you had your rant on what does and does not constitute a perfect video presentation, have you got any substantual ideas as to the facts, be it the steps to take to achieve a recognised rekindling of what is already a fact of history, or the weeding out of slippery unionist from an Independent civil service, police and or judiciary?
This crying into your hanky was childish.
I suppose you will wriggle around the written word as much as the English eel you come across as.
@nevermind, when you wrote “the weeding out of slippery unionist (sic) from an Independent civil service, police and or judiciary” what exactly was going through your thinking.
This is the kind of policy pursued by every tuppeny tyrant since tuppeny tyrants were invented. Those organisations need to be free of political influences for our freedoms to stand any chance.
You need look no further than the pantomime from Holyrood to see the truth about the dangers I see here.
What kind of extremist right wing nationalism is being proposed here…. are yours and Craig’s rhyming rhetoric a current theme amongst those advocating independence for Scotland? If it is , trust me, I’m on the other side to you pair…_
Politicisation of the Courts and the Police and the Prosecution Service is not a good thing.
I would have thought that four months of first hand experience of consequences of such politicisisation would have taught Craig Murray that lesson.
“We’re from The Salmond Squad” (not said to CM but to others) was a chilling intro to that stuff.
you might prefer going back to tribal times, Digger United Kingdom, but you can’t stop the fact that sovereign Scotland has been accepted by everyone south and north.
Don’t the slipperyunionists need to be weeded out for the scottish civil service to be free of political influences? A slippery unionist is a political influence.
Looks like Mr Alex Salmond and Mr Donald Trump are both involved in ‘draining that swamp’ Exciting times to be alive.
Thank you
No sovereignty? No democracy. Simple as that.
Salmond has gone remarkably quiet in the aftermath of Mr & Mrs Ceausescu’s downfall.
He’s hanging on to a thick stack of documents which he was not allowed to disclose to the parliamentary Inquiry. He can prove who was involved in orchestrating the attempted stitchup of himself.
What is needed now is a DE-politicisation of the office of the Lord Advocate. Exactly the opposite of what Craig Murray is proposing.
We also need to revert to the original local democracy of local Constabularies with localised democratic oversight by local police authorities. It’s somewhat ironic that it was Salmond who abolished such democracy and formed a National Socialist style Polizei Schottland which is responsible to the office of First Minister. That came to bite him in the arse.
Oh, I see. You want to leave one union (the UK) so that you can join another (the EU). So much for sovereignty.
The EU won’t steal our resources or stockpile illegal nuclear warheads 30 miles from our largest city….
Sturgeon’s uncritical enthusiasm for the EU was bizarre. Scotland’s support should be framed purely in terms of easier trade and travel. The EU’s current bureaucracy and officialdom leaves much to be desired; both in terms of democratic accountability and transparency.
The way the EU is developing is concerning too. The pronouncements from officials are straying further and further into what is rightfully the realm of domestic politics of member states. It’s become a neoliberal, hawkish, US foreign policy aligned supranational entity that nobody voted for.
I assumed with the vexatious British MEPs out of the picture, urgent democratic reforms would follow. Instead, it appears to be intent on corralling more and more power onto itself with its leading representatives there by the flimsiest of indirect democratic mandates. EU ‘foreign policy chief,’ Josep Borrell and Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, being the personifications and prime examples of this arrogant overreach.
The ECB is supposedly ‘independent’ – but what does ‘independence’ mean where monetary policy is concerned? It’s a contradiction in terms. President of the European Central Bank Christine Lagarde was a conservative French politician with a sketchy past, and the ECB is widely defined as ‘German’ i.e. ‘conservative’ in its approach. The vitriol each twitter post of the modern day Marie Antoinette, von der Leyen are met with, should act as a wake-up call that the EU is seen by many as dangerously out of touch. It could collapse under growing popular discontent.
Very good points, well said.
I recommend reading “Adults in the room” by Yanis Varoufakis, which details his struggle as Greek’s finance minister against the ECB. It shows how far from governing in the interests of the people this unaccountable and unelected organisation has become.
All true.
“The EU won’t steal our resources or stockpile illegal nuclear warheads 30 miles from our largest city….”
It certainly will. Scotland will not be allowed to join unless the EU mega-trawlers can scrape the seabed within a few miles of the coast 24/7. And they will want the oil and gas even more than England now the Russian embargo has given Germany a big energy supply problem.
Whether the EU will be allowed control over nuclear warheads is a matter for the psychopaths, but you can be sure that the last people to have a say in the matter will be the Scottish public.
Forget the eu , once Scotland is independent we can have a referendum on joining the eu and on using the euro and on joining nato , let Scottish people decide .At present english people decide everything for us simply because they control Scotland .
An independent Scotland could be in EFTA within a matter of weeks.
They sure will want the oil and gas, but not for free.
The nukes positioning is part of the EU’s remit? Gee, I wish I’d known!
Simon.
No to gain access to the Single market and the UK market Scotland will join EFTA, one of the first things Ash Regan wants to do is create a central bank and prepare Scotland for its own currency, all the important indy structures will be in place, or ready to be deployed as soon as the 50+1% is reached, this gives people the confidence to vote yes knowing that everything is in place.
Despite what our host says towards the end of his video, I don’t believe that an independent Scotland would be wise in refusing to pay its share of UK debt. Firstly, due to QE, the UK’s real debt is only about 60% of its GDP, meaning that the annual interest payments for the Scottish portion would only amount to around £3-4 billion a year.
In addition, a refusal to pay would cause bad blood between Scotland and the residual UK, which currently accounts for around 60% of Scottish exports. Campaigns to boycott Scottish goods & services in the UK (particularly financial services like pensions & life insurance) due to the perceived unfairness of Scotland not paying, whipped up by the tabloid press, GB News etc., would likely lead to a loss in Scottish GDP, and therefore tax take, of several billion per year – as well as a significant increase in unemployment – before new markets could be established, if they could be established at all. It wouldn’t matter if the UK government agreed to take on Scottish debt in the unlikely event that it had to do that to retain its seat on the Security Council.*
Russia did agree to take on all of the Soviet Union’s debt on its dissolution, in exchange for successor states’ nuclear weapon stocks, but at the time it only amounted to around 10% of its GDP, and it could be easily hidden from the Russian public, most of whom were fully pre-occupied with survival in Jeff Sachs’ mad scorched earth, shock doctrine new economic reality anyway.
* In truth, the UK and the other four states don’t have permanent seats on the Security Council because of some historical anomaly or because they agreed to take on the debt of spin-off nations, but because they have verified thermonuclear weapons and ICBMs/SLBMs to launch them. (India, Israel & North Korea probably have thermonuclear weapons as well, but this hasn’t been confirmed).
Lapsed Agnostic , are you serious ? you say Scotland should pay some U.K. debt even though Scotland never ever had a say in how the money was spent and even though England not only decided how and when the money was spent they then told us we cannot have a Scottish independence referendum and planted nuclear submarines next to our biggest city ignored our plea to stay in the eu stole our gas and oil and electricity hid the truth about its value for three decades then charge us the highest unit prices for that gas oil and electricity .
Get real, you have to stand up to bullies.
Thanks for your reply Terence. Of course I’m being serious. Whatever the morals of an independent Scotland not taking on the debt are, it will probably cost Scots more by not paying it, than paying it – at least in the short-to-medium term.
Also don’t forget that there will still be unionist parties in the Scottish Parliament post Independence, and if they get a majority of seats at the following election due to a prolonged recession, mainly caused by boycotts by the rest of the UK, Scotland could find itself back in the Union pretty quickly, though on less favourable terms, e.g. no Barnett formula, which is what Scotland receives in exchange for its oil & gas. Over the last few years when oil prices have been low, far more public money has been given to Scotland via that, than has been collected via taxes on oil.
The Scottish Government has a say on on how plenty of public money – some of which has been acquired by the UK taking on debt – is spent is Scotland, e.g. health, education, social care etc, and that’s been the case for quite a while. It can also raise income tax on employment by however much it wants. If it hadn’t wanted any Scottish public services to be (partially) funded by debt, it could have just worked out the amount that was being funded by this debt, raised tax rates in Scotland to cover it, and then handed over the proceeds to the UK treasury. Then it would have a moral case for not taking on any of the UK’s debt.
Enjoy what’s left of the weekend.
Much of what Scotland ‘exports’ to England is plundered on the cheap, e.g. oil and gas, renewable energy, aggregates, whisky etc. What about 300 yrs of plunder and population displacement, does that not have a value? And the ‘opportunity cost’ of this? Scotland’s supply chain is today dominated by RDCs in England where our retail spend of well over £100bn annually goes to, i.e. goods imported from England. Typical colonial arrangement where the dominated ‘internal colony’ territories resources are taken out on the cheap, and goods and services (incl our own energy) sold back at higher rates. The result is what we see – poverty, inequality, and an under-developed people and nation in a resource-rich land. Colonies are primarily about serving the needs and protecting the interests of the ‘mother country’.Ireland has long had a policy to re-orientate its trade away from a rapacious England to rest of Europe, this now accelerating further due to brexit and hence creation of multiple new direct shipping connections and new Irish freight terminals at continental ports.
Thanks for your reply Prof. The English haven’t been plundering Scottish oil & gas etc, – see my above reply to TC about the Barnett formula. Scotland is not the Gaza Strip: Scots are free to set-up import-export companies and import whatever legal goods they want into Scotland, as long as they pay any required tariffs. Scots can also spend their money on (more or less) what they want: if they don’t want to buy English apples from English growers, they can buy French ones – or if they wish, they can buy Scottish raspberries instead.
Enjoy what’s left of the weekend.
Amusing watching the DUP in Northern Ireland, scream about a trading arrangement, that if applied to ‘remain voting’ Scotland, as part of a fair compromise – well, it would’ve made life harder for those arguing for independence. Scotland would grab at such a deal.
It really illustrates how the SNP have failed to leverage their very strong position over the last 8 years. The SNP HQ backslappers are now congratulating each other on maintained electoral success, seemingly oblivious to the fact that after 2014’s referendum, they were virtually guaranteed votes, almost as if by default, due to the change national sentiment about independence post 2014 – with polls consistently showing those who had voted ‘yes’ to independence, remaining broadly loyal to the party despite doubts, seeing it as the only viable vehicle.
Scotland sells only what the offshore equity funds already control, and buy what England’s retail monopolies sell them. We are not yet sole owners of the soil and mineral wealth of our country. At the moment wealth is not the fruit of labour but the result of organized, protected robbery.
Thanks for your reply Prof. Businesses operating in Scotland come in all shapes and sizes. Some of them are multinationals, mostly owned by equity funds based all over the world on behalf of their investors; however, many of them are private businesses completely owned by Scots. Large companies based in England but also operating in Scotland, such as supermarkets, are not monopolies – the competition is fierce and the margins are slim. That’s one reason why the percentage of most people’s income spent on food is much less than it was several decades ago. Scots are also perfectly free to shop at Scottish mutuals, such as the ScotMid Co-operative which has 350 outlets, mostly in Scotland.
The vast majority of land in Scotland is owned by Scots, just a very select proportion of Scots. Most of Scotland’s mineral wealth is in the form of oil & gas, which again I’ve dealt with my above comments.
Many of Scotland’s major businesses were acquired by London firms between 1950-1980s, with international acquisitions thereafter (Diageo, Pernod Ricard, Iberdrola etc). Tories shut down Scotland’s heavy industries. Lower energy costs would have been a big help there and very likely if we had had control over that. Oil and gas and now renewable energy concessions were more or less given away to foreign operators. Thatcher sold off the utilities, including major seaports and airports, and council housing stock. The latter in their thousands are now owned in some cases by offshore equity funds, rented at inflated rates to poorer Scots, and to the tens of thousands of students coming from outside Scotland taking most of the student places at elite uni’s, the latter run as international businesses selling high status degrees to the global elite, and increasingly managed now by an international academic elite. ‘Shooting’ estates etc are all traded internationally with no controls over ownership. Banks, whisky, publishing etc all sold and HQs gone. Farming in meltdown. In-migration over last 20-25 years, mostly from England, has added one million to the population, oriented toward middle class professionals (Scotland’s best jobs are primarily advertised in the London press) and retirees buying property and high demand has pushed prices up outwith range of Scots. The census is delayed as it will show a dramatic population increase to perhaps 6m+, assumed to be mostly additional ‘No’ voters as per poll trend. Scots birth rate is now at a record low – many Scots can’t get jobs paying a good wage or afford a property or bring up a family.
Scotland run by London has been ‘transformed’ into one big global asset play, its indigenous people disappearing, rapidly following oor langage(s) an cultur.
hello LaAg
My experience of working in the oil industry left me in little doubt that the British state were compliant/enablers in the true exploitation: that by the US oil interests. Anyone who worked in the North sea in the late seventies/early eighties could not have failed to notice that US interests were all over the North Sea. It was not really brought to attention of the wider public because there were huge reserves of cash being mined and nobody wanted to get off the gravy train, or blow a whistle. Corruption was enormously significant. Obviously the financial jiggery pokery was very complex and difficult to follow but I am in little doubt that the Thatcher government (and before that the Callaghan government) basically squandered/sold off the oil assets very cheaply to 1) enrich those in the know 2) Paid a huge price for American ‘help’ in correcting some of the huge Economic problems of the UK at that time. The Americans did indeed help – they ‘helped themselves’ gratefully. Of course there were bigger forces at play. Miners strike/ great shift in ideological direction ie neoliberalisation of the UK under Thatcher, was a major factor, as was the role of Denis Thatcher who was a very quiet, but big inside player in the oil industry and the directions taken were much influenced by him. It was quite simply a huge asset stripping of the UK and its people.
Thanks for your reply DGP. I’m not really an expert but wouldn’t be at all surprised to discover that there had been significant corruption and underpaying for licences in the British off-shore oil industry.* Whilst this would have been a net loss to most UK taxpayers, Scots would have been compensated to a large extent by the Barnett formula. Would it have been much different in an independent Scotland though? The recent sale of off-shore wind leases by Crown Estate Scotland – at an estimated £27,000 per megawatt, compared to leases being sold for the equivalent of over £500,000 per megawatt on the US’s east coast – suggests not:
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/homenews/23300089.scotwind-scotland-faces-loss-60bn-new-offshore-wind-farms/
* Not least because, rather than believing what certain people in the UK off-shore oil & gas industry said in official press releases and RNS statements over the years, it would have cost me less just to throw thousands of pounds into the North Sea.
How does England plunder whisky?
Transfer pricing?
I understand that the exports are through English Ports, which confers various advantages to England. Scotland, like Ireland, would have to develop shipping routes/port facilities. There was an attempt to use Rosyth as a shipping hub but it fell through. Does someone know more about this than I do?
The green port at Cromarty is an interesting development. Again I know little about this apart from the fact that Cromarty was an important Scottish port in the 18th century, for trade with Europe. You can still find traces of its economic significance if you visit the area (highly recommended). Visit the Hugh Miller museum – a self taught geologist and lad o’pairts who was a significant contributor to the Scottish enlightenment.
This paper on Scottish ports and trade may be of interest: https://reidfoundation.scot/2016/01/sort-out-our-ports/
And this on maritime policy: https://scotlandspeaks.com/a-maritime-vision-for-an-independent-scotland
It’s always the case, in my experience, that those who continually blame others for their imagined misfortunes never consider it may be them that are the problem !
At the time of the Security Council’s founding, October 1945, the only atomic power was the US. Being a permanent member has nothing to do with being a nuclear power.
Thanks for your reply Pears. Permanent membership of the Security Council has a lot to do with being a nuclear power. It’s true that it was originally set up in 1945 when the only nuclear power was the US – but several of the other permanent members were expected to develop them in the near future, the US being well aware that Los Alamos was leaking like a broken colander. How also do you explain why the nuclear-free Republic of China (i.e. Taiwan) was kicked off the Council in 1971, despite not having caused any problems, and replaced by the People’s Republic of China shortly after the latter had developed nuclear weapons?
In 1945 the Republic of China (ROC) held the seat on the UN, after the civil war of 1948 which saw them retreat to Taiwan they could no longer be said to represent China. The Peoples Republic of China (PRC) membership of the UN was continually vetoed by the US until relations began to thaw.
Thanks for your reply Pears. Relations began to thaw between the US & P.R. China in the early 1970’s because the Nixon administration went on a huge charm offensive, and the main reason it did that was because it didn’t want to be in a nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union *and* China. The latter did develop a substantial nuclear programme, but to nowhere near the extent it could have done. As I keep trying to tell people: it’s all about the nukes.
“Despite what our host says towards the end of his video, I don’t believe that an independent Scotland would be wise in refusing to pay its share of UK debt.”
Lapsed Agnostic.
The UK government said it would take on all of the UK’s debt if Scotland left the union. It might have even been written into the Edinburgh Agreement, but more to the point Scotland didn’t create the debt.
“In addition, a refusal to pay would cause bad blood between Scotland and the residual UK”
How so? And what about the moving of the marine boundaries by Westminster in 1999 to steal 6,000sq miles of North sea from Scottish waters waters that contain oil rigs. Then there was the McCrone Report hidden for decades so that Scots wouldn’t know just how wealthy their country was. Also allowing nuclear warheads to travel through Scotland’s biggest city on the back of lorries and be placed just thirty miles from Scotland’s largest city. If there’s any bad blood it began at Westminster.
Westminster is in for a real shock when Scotland exits this union. We’re not going to keep Sterling either.
Thanks for your reply RoS. I can’t find anything about the UK government saying it will take on Scotland’s pro-rata share of the UK debt should it leave the union. Maybe I’m not looking hard enough.
As I outlined above, if Scotland refuses to take on any debt, it will be easy for right-wing columnists and TV hosts to claim that Scots are getting out of paying their fair share because when they were in the union they benefitted from public services like health and education that were partially funded by the UK’s debt. They could go through the numbers and claim that by refusing to pay, Scotland is costing every family in the residual UK an extra £13,000 plus interest.
They could then explain that the way to punish them for this is to boycott Scottish products, and there would doubtless be plenty of takers for this course of action, particularly amongst the older generation who buy most financial services. Look at the way the right wing media etc has been able to put the blame for Britain’s ills firmly on the tens of thousands of (mostly genuine) asylum seekers that have come over on boats in the last couple years, rather than the fact that hundreds of thousands of economic migrants (from outside the EU) have been allowed to live and work in Britain every year for the past two decades, largely to the benefit of capital rather than labour.
The boundary between any future Scottish & residual UK EEZs in the North Sea was changed from a horizontal line to the median line between their respective coastlines, which is usually how maritime boundaries are delineated. The affected oil fields, Argyll etc, are largely clapped out and probably account for less than 2% of the UK’s oil production anyway.
As regards the nuclear issue: In an increasingly uncertain world, being able to get rid of Faslane & Coulport and get out of NATO is *THE BIGGEST* benefit an independent Scotland would offer to the Scottish people, and Independence supporters should be shouting about it from the rooftops, rather than droning on about nonsense like Claim of Right.
“The boundary between any future Scottish & residual UK EEZs in the North Sea was changed from a horizontal line to the median line between their respective coastlines, which is usually how maritime boundaries are delineated. The affected oil fields, Argyll etc, are largely clapped out and probably account for less than 2% of the UK’s oil production anyway.”
Lapsed Agnostic.
Erm….No.
https://www.oilofscotland.org/scottish_politics.html#Scotlands_marine_boundries
I think Craig devoted a thread to the theft, he (Craig) having a wealth of experience in this field.
Thanks for your reply RoS, and for the link. Unfortunately, it doesn’t cite a reference for its claim that 15% of the UK’s oil production comes from the disputed area. It is also from 2010. By my maths, 15% of the total UK oil production of ca. 1.4 million barrels per day in 2010 would be around 200,000 barrels per day. In 2010, the Argyll field was being operated by EnQuest (which they renamed Alma) and had a production capacity, together with the Galia field, of 57,000 barrels per day – average daily production will have been less. The other fields in the area like Fulmar & Auk had much smaller production, so I very much doubt the 15% figure – especially from sites with articles entitled ‘Willie McRae was Murdered’, but let’s not get into that again.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argyll_oil_field
However, that was then. What’s the situation now? Well, the Argyll/Alma & Duncan/Galia fields were shut down in 2020, and the Fulmar & Auk ones in 2021. It’s possible that they may start up again, but probably only if the oil price stays consistently above $100 a barrel for several years. That will depend on what happens in Russia, but I think it’s unlikely.
I think you may be referring to this 2017 blogpost from our host, which I’ve now read:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2017/01/scotlands-stolen-seas-technical-explanation/
He seems to be arguing that, in terms of defining internal waters, the East Coast of Scotland should be treated similarly to the West Coast, and that a line should be drawn from Eyemouth to Peterhead and all the sea west of that be treated as Scotland’s internal waters. However the West Coast of Scotland is largely made up of the Hebredean archipelago, whereas the only islands on the East Coast are Fidra, Craigleith, Bass Rock, the Isle of May (which are all currently included in the UK’s internal waters as part of the Forth estuary) and Inchcape, which is less an island and more a shipping hazard if you ask me.
Seeing as internal waters are generally reserved for estuaries and waters around archipelagos, I don’t think it’s appropriate to draw the line there. You could maybe make a case for a line running from St Abb’s Head to Montrose passing near Inchcape, but in that case you should do a similar thing with Rockall on the West Coast, which really wouldn’t go down well with the Irish.
“As regards the nuclear issue: In an increasingly uncertain world, being able to get rid of Faslane & Coulport and get out of NATO is *THE BIGGEST* benefit an independent Scotland would offer to the Scottish people, and Independence supporters should be shouting about it from the rooftops, rather than droning on about nonsense like Claim of Right.”
To the extent that the whole independence campaign is being managed from outside, it is, IMHO, with that aspect that the managers are most concerned: the last thing that they want talked about is the idea of Scotland leaving NATO.
Thanks for your reply Bayard. Whilst on balance the Yanks wouldn’t like to see Scotland leaving NATO, it probably wouldn’t be the end of the world for them, especially if they could charge the residual UK hundreds of millions a year to berth the Vanguard-class subs at Kings Bay, Georgia, seeing as I doubt whether anywhere in England, Wales or Northern Ireland would want them next door to where they live.
Unfortunately, Georgia (the US one) is nowhere near the “Northern Arc”, the sea approaches to the northern Russian ports, which is why the subs are in Faslane in the first place. They would probably simply move them to Belfast Lough, though. So what if the Northern Irish don’t want them there, what do their wishes count for? They don’t even have the same political parties as the rest of the UK, so Westminster can ignore them with impunity.
” They don’t have a “right” to agree Russian annexation, that isn’t self determination.”
Even if they themselves have determined that they would like to be annexed by Russia?
There was also a stage where the self determined donbass states declared independence from Ukraine. Does an independent state have the right to enter into a union with another state?
Plainly an invader is almost alway going to be able to manipulate a “vote” in favour of their occupation. That is why you can’t vote to be annexed to another state.
@Post author,
Yes, there is an obvious advantage for an occupying force to manipulate such elections. I don’t believe that is the case in Crimea.
The problem here is that *7 polls* conducted prior to Russia going in to Crimea consistently showed 2/3 of Crimeans in favour of leaving Ukraine. The noes never rose above 15%. Polls and elections in Scotland consistently show a near 50\50 split on independence.
So your argument doesn’t hold water. Yet this is the proposal you put forward for your road map for independence in Scotland in your video. Which translates as ‘Scot’s rise up’ ‘Scot’s take power’ Here you are saying that what’s right for Scotland is wrong for Crimea.
Crimeans clearly demonstrated they wanted out, Scotland can’t make its mind up one way or the other…_
*organised in 2009/11 by the UN Development Programme*
Also , if it is plain that an invader is always able to manipulate any referendum in their favour, then it is also plain that any government can do so as well and far more easily, as they will not be dealing with a resentful population, which means that all such referendums are equally meaningless.
Slave mentality runs far too deep with too many I fear. They either believe Scotland, uniquely, could not make it as an independent nation or that Scotland uniquely needs England’s permission to go. The fact the people telling them this are politicians and journalists heavily invested in perpetuating Westminster rule does not register with them and never will. In fact they pride themselves on dismissing everyone who points this out as conspiracy theorists.
There is no such thing as England’s parliament. Westminster is the British parliament.
In the “once in a lifetime” Referendum less than 38% of the Scottish electorate voted for self-amputation.
“In the “once in a lifetime” Referendum less than 38% of the Scottish electorate voted for self-amputation.”
Ebenezer Scroggie.
God this old chestnut has been debunked more times than I care to remember. Salmond said it, Sturgeon also said it, however it wasn’t in the Edinburgh Agreement and that’s what counts.
A interesting note however is that Northern Ireland retains the right to hold a reunification with the South vote every seven years, yet Westminster and its useful idiots such as yourself would prevent Scotland from every leaving this one-sided rancid prison of a union.
Denial of reality is a bit of a characteristic amongst the high heidyins of the SNP. Not quite the same thing as lying, but something slightly similar.
Alex Salmond quite literally signed his name to it and Sturgeon endlessly repeated it.
The independence referendum was once in a lifetime / generation… or something (Eduardo Silva, 23 Nov 2017) – YouTube, 3m 10s
To dismiss what was said so emphatically as a “turn of phrase” is at best disingenuous.
What was said has NOT been “debunked”. It has been denied. There is a big difference between a debunking and a denial of the Truth.
Demanding endless flips of a coin until the desired result occurs is profoundly dishonest. The idea of a chain of Neverendums was never part of the deal.
We could debate just what is meant by a “lifetime” or a “generation”. I would say that the 18 and 19 year gaps between the two referenda on the Scottish Parliament and between the two Brexit referenda is about right.
Come back in 2032 and we can talk about the next referendum. I suspect that the then leader of the SNP will be just as reluctant as Sturgeon was to be the next failed leader slumped in the back of the gumment limo leaving Bute House the morning after the ballot is counted.
Ebenezer Scroggie
I’m not going to keep on repeating myself, they both said it, but it wasn’t in the “binding” Edinburgh Agreement and that’s what counts.
As for neverendums, there’ll be no more referendums – Sturgeon and her minion Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain made sure of that when they allowed the 2009 construct the UKSC to rule on them that Scotland cannot hold an indyref again without Westminster’s consent and that consent will never again be forthcoming.
In a way I’m pleased because the 50+1% via the ballot box will be achieved sooner than later as long as Ash Regan becomes FM.
Smells of the anti brexit arguments: too much gammon, too much pensioners, too much Weatherspoon’s.
The Scottish electorate aren’t stupid and basing your arguments on that premiss is frankly insulting.
The whole independence thing is based on a huge ‘assumption’ that the people of Scotland want to leave the union. Maybe they do, maybe they don’t. What are you going to do if they were to vote stay ?
What are the real benefits for the man in the street ? The reality is that if Scotland left the Union there would be a period of ‘chaos’ as Scotland found its feet and initially the people would be less well off. This is the case with brexit and the UK is still trying to find its feet, such that some are having second thoughts. No politician ever tells the people the reality of decisions taken, usually because they are ‘winging it’ !
So it’s “insulting” now to suggest wall to wall unionist and Murrell propaganda has had any effect?
And Brexit is good despite a bit of initial chaos but Scottish independence would be bad because there *might* be a bit of initial chaos?
Anthony.
I’m absolutely sure you are right that the propaganda has had an effect. However, your rant insinuated that the Scottish people are too thick to realise the SNP/MSM BS – that IS insulting.
I didn’t actually say Brexit or Independence is good or bad. I said there will always be a period of chaos and readjustment with change – but that is never spelt out to the electorate. The degree of chaos and upset is directly proportional to the preparations put in place to ensure the change over goes as smoothly as possible. The Tories made FA preparations for Brexit which is why the UK is in absolute disarray. Tell me, if you can, what preparations the SNP/Alba/etc. are proposing to put in place to ensure Independence is not chaos for Scotland ? Or are they winging it ?
So, why has unionist/SNP propaganda been effective?
Stevie, if the Westminster slaves here during the last 8 Years had meant what they said about Independence, prepared for a currency and set out clear division between the political and judiciary, rather than carrying on with third rank policies and more steals of energy not to speak of the lack of inertia they showed with interconnecting the islands and their communities, i.e. an atrocious ignorance vis a vis the prospects of many more ferries for the same kind of monies they wasted,
then the public would have seen that they are serving their cause towards an Independent Scotland.
Creating fears, when many go hungry and lack services and jobs is just another ruse of a Union that is crumbling.
It seems to many that England fears an Independent Scotland far more than they will let on. Why else do they skew the facts and usurp the media with petty campaign points such as the GRA?
This article pretty much encompasses my views on independence and the SNP. It was written by a man who wasn’t rejected as a SNP candidate, so contains none of the bile spewed out by Craig Murray…..
https://weegingerdug.wordpress.com/2023/03/20/a-new-era-in-scottish-politics/
He he. Cult members flying en masse off the Good Ship Murrell. Not a mea culpa in sight as fresh views are forged mid-air.
Paul – who is a friend of mine – says nothing whatsoever about how to achieve Independence in that article. So I imagine it does encapsulate your views on the subject Alex.
Touche Craig, imagine using a link to WGD to show that they align with your views on independence, Mr Birnie hasn’t been paying attention, the host of WGD and his very loyal followers are for want of better words stuck in a timewarp where Sturgeon is righteous and correct and will ultimately leads us to independence.
Does “Kosovo” refer to the Albanian Kosovans whose “freedom fighters” (or terrorists?) were armed by NATO & whose victory was won by NATO illegally bombing Serbia (the ICJ, I believe, said “illegal” but “justified” – although it has since been established that the justification was manufactured)? Were the Serbian Kosovans asked their opinion? There was a referendum in Crimea. It isn’t recognised in the West for obvious reasons (the Russian military were to be seen outside their bases). But no-one can claim it doesn’t represent the settled will of most Crimeans. Kosovo – NATO military force & no referendum: Crimea – Russian military presence (no force used) & referendum. Is it such a good idea using Kosovo as a template?
The referenda in the Crimea and the Donbass were every bit as legitimate and conclusive as the similar referenda in Gibraltar and the Falklands.
Just as legitimate our once in a lifetime referendum in 2014. AFAIK, there was no monkey business in those five votes, unlike the Murrell shenanigans which has sent out 6,000 more ballots than there are Party members.
As far as Scotland’s independence is concerned, anything – anything – is better than being ruled over by a foreign country.
It is a lesson from history that peoples prefer rule by their own, however venal and corrupt, to rule by foreigners, however just and benevolent.
But best by far to be ruled by your own fairly, compassionately and democratically than by foreigners venal and corrupt.
Doug, totally agree. However, I’d suggest that there are maybe only three countries on the planet that are not in some way ruled or under the influence of a foreign power: USA, Russia and China ? The rest of us fall under the influence of one of these three to a greater or lesser extent.
Who do think would rule over Scotland if you escape out of the clutches of Westminster ? The EU or USA ?
Be careful what you wish for …
Brits are not foreigners in Britain.
We’re aa’ Jock Tamson’s bairns. Most of us, anyway, with a few exceptions for the rubber boat people and some legal South Asian imports.
The UK was created by Scotsmen, in Britain, for the benefit of Scotsmen.
“We’re aa’ Jock Tamson’s bairns. Most of us, anyway, with a few exceptions for the rubber boat people and some legal South Asian imports.”
Mr Scroggle, you have managed to turn, what I consider to be one of the most poignant and far reaching of Scots phrases, into a tawdry mash up – not “cool”
“We are all Jock Tamson’s bairns” means “WE” are all Jock Tamson’s bairns, does it not? If I am correct, “rubber boat people” are also “Jock Tamson’s bairns”, surely?
As for “legal South Asian imports”, are we talking about pineapples or people? If we are talking about people, well I have to inform you, they too are “Jock Tamson’s bairns”. If we are talking about pineapples I will defer to your obviously greater experience.regarding the trans-shipping of fleshy tropical fruits – I would not be suprised to learn that you are something of an expert in this department, no?
However if you are trying to say that “rubber boat people” and ” legal South Asian imports” are twelve foot interdimensional lizards or some other non-human entities and therefore are not Jock Tamson’s bairns, why not come out and say it? “Don’t be shy, show us your pie” is a phrase I heard in Royston once or twice, during those long, hot summer nights of youth.
“Dehumanisation is a very long word, it’s been around since Richard the third”
The Human League, Travelogue
When “Scotsmen” created the UK for the benefit of “Scotsmen”, was this to detriment of “Scotswomen” or just a studied indifference?
A final question, would I be correct in declaring a legal equivalency between the (english) Crown Prosecution Service and the (scottish) Procurator Fiscal?
The United Kingdom was created by Scotsmen, for the benefit of Scotsmen.
Back in those days women did not own property. ‘Their’ property belonged to their husbands.
That much changed quite late in the 19th century. The Britishness of Scottish people did not. We are all Brits. Most of us proudly so.
“Brits are not foreigners in Britain.”
Do you actually live in the UK? In Britain, a “foreigner” can be someone from as nearby as the next village.
Bayard- true perhaps in the 16th century- is that where your mind operates?
Also true in the 20th and 21st century !
In my direct experience, still a thing in southern England and Wales.
DGP, The last time I heard such sentiments expressed was about ten years ago, not even back in the C20th, let alone the C16th. You should get out of the big city more.
Clear, concise and compelling – backed by the necessary experience in the requisite fields, it was a pleasure and an education to watch and listen. You missed your path in life and should’ve been a politician not a diplomat. Do as much of this as possible. In a world where mass confusion is widespread and falsity and bad faith fashion social reality, the rhythms of a sane brain are the rarest of commodities. Marshal McLuhan observed “the medium is the message” – I never really got it until I watched this.
Caledonia carpe diem or more prosiacally, Scotland seize the day. Bin those moth-eaten pashas in Whitehall and Westminster, they care for you not a jot. They only want you for trout tickling purposes, as glorified ghillies – let them tickle their own trout. Playing John Brown to their Queen Victoria is the best you’re going to get and sadder still, it is the best they can offer.
In an interview with ITV News Nicola Sturgeon denies knowing SNP membership dropped by 30,000 since 2021 and said her husband, former SNP Chief Executive Peter Murrell, did not ‘intend to mislead’ the media over membership figures.
You see? All those Trumpian allegations have turned out to be entirely baseless. Two honest public servants and freedom fighters were gravely slandered despite all they have done for us. Abandoned by hair-trigger apologists and “supporters” the instant they can no longer dispense graft. Disgusting.
#StandWithThem
I’m sure Alex Salmond has a cunning plan and I would like to get to see him get to the endgame. With the collapse of the McMafia it should reveal a lot more than if their power base was still secure.
Salmond talks about a failed state emerging. The judiciary have been a failed institution since the judges stitched up Abdelbaset al-Megrahi in 2021.
That case is barely ever referred to, had it been given the attention it deserved then a lot of problems since could have been avoided.
A free and independent judiciary must be a priority for Scots. A bigger priority than independence itself.._
This article exxplains in great detail and with confidence in modern design, why Mr. Ballantynes design and offer to build more superior catamaran designed ferries to provide a reliable service to the Scottish Isles.
It is from last year and a great starting point for any new FM. Have a great day.
https://yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com/2023/03/21/as-the-scottish-government-pour-millions-more-into-building-the-wrong-ferries/
The problem of the ferries is not a matter of monohull versus catamaran or trimaran.
The problem is the goppingly awful incompetence and corruption of the SNP leadership and governance.
The contract tender was put out across the EU, as was required pre-Brexit. A reputable Turkish shipyard submitted a bid for a fixed price of £75M, together with fully funded Performance Bond which would have compensated the Client for any cost or timeline overrun.
Bizarrely, the bid was rejected in favour of the Ferguson bid which was 27% more expensive and had no Performance Bond whatsoever.
Quite literally as soon as Ferguson started cutting metal the whole project started to fall apart. Despite the fact that both Client and Contractor were the same entity, ie the SNumPtie gumment, they fell out over the previously agreed design specification.
Even at a late stage of pre-launch construction the Client wanted to radically change the engine and fuel storage arrangement. The fuel tanks and engines are right down in the bowels of ship. It’s not like popping the engine out of a Ford Focus or dropping an engine from a Boeing or Airbus.
The wretched ferries are already five years overdue and the cost overrun has already run into hundreds of millions of Pounds. More than a quadrupling of the bid put in by what should have been the winning firm.
As you might expect of the thoroughly corrupt SNumPties, vital contract documentation has gone missing. There’s also the stinky matter of some kind of gift or loan to a Monaco-dwelling tax exile of Scottish heritage of £15M which was not properly declared in connection with the Ferguson yard’s ownership.
It’s the sort of crap one would expect of a banana republic in Africa or South/Central America, but that’s what we’ve got right here in Scotland.
“The problem is the goppingly awful incompetence and corruption of the SNP leadership and governance.”
The problem is government officials, Whitehall’s finest, and the unionist cultural hegemony that control institutional Scotland and comprise the establishment, and there are a couple of thousand of them……and then there is a compromised SNP elite. Lets remember that ‘colonialism is always a co-operative venture’ with native elites, and there are a hell of a lot of them.