Text of the Speech:
"Britain in a 21st century world".
A century ago today, thousands of young volunteers were crossing the channel to fight for King and Country, in the process bringing down the curtain on almost a century of peace in Britain. Since Waterloo, Britain had enjoyed a stable surge of development, safe in the knowledge of our naval, commercial and industrial supremacy. We were in a new era.
We have since been in another new era. Since 1945 that era has spurned the Commonwealth and focused on embedding ourselves within the European venture. So, why did we do it, and turn our backs on our history, and a highly successful model, with Britain as an internationalist, outward-looking and confident nation?
I blame John Foster Dulles! Nearly 70 years ago, the United States’ Secretary of State so mishandled events in the Middle East, that he changed British Foreign Policy for the worst, pushing us off our centuries’ old approach to the wider world, which has weakened our standing internationally, and created a schism in the British political debate, and continuous unrest within the Conservative Party.
John Foster Dulles, Dwight Eisenhower’s Secretary of State from 1953 to 1959, combined a traditional U.S. jealousy towards the British Empire with a strident anti-Communism and an obsession with securing the Middle East oil supply. He concluded that wooing Nasser was the solution to both issues. He wanted Egypt within his proposed Middle East Defence Organisation, defensive against the Soviet Union. He therefore backed Nasser’s hostility towards Britain and France, not realising that Nasser’s aim was a non-aligned Arab Nationalist Middle East with himself as Leader, very ready to play off the superpowers, and quite ready to throw in his lot with the Soviets if it suited him. Indeed, after the event, Eisenhower came to believe that Suez was the “biggest foreign-policy blunder of his administration.”
His blowing hot and cold with Nasser, and going ahead with his alliance in the form of the Baghdad Pact, both alienated Nasser and led directly to the Suez crisis. Nasser’s grab of the Suez Canal was another step to consolidate his power, and drew the inevitable response from Britain and France who saw it as both an attack on their shipping jugular, and as undermining their prestige throughout the Middle East.
The United States’ failure to support their allies, combined with their attack on Sterling, resulted in Macmillan’s “first in, and first out” which destroyed the credibility of Eden’s government. Even worse, it destroyed the West’s position in the Middle East – led to the overthrow of the Iraqi regime two years later, and arguably to the Soviet/Russian dominance in Syria, still evident today.
In Britain, our political class suffered a collective nervous breakdown. True, Macmillan himself profited through his taking over the Prime Ministership. But our place in the world was the subject of much agonising. It was summed up some years later by former U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson, when he commented “Great Britain has lost an Empire and has not yet found a role”. Indeed, he was right.
For over four centuries Britain was outward looking and adventurous. The flag followed trade. Almost by accident, Britain created for itself an Empire on which the sun never set. The East India Company created an Empire for itself, which had to be taken over by the Crown, following their disaster in the Indian Mutiny. Our trade to the West Indies and the East had to be protected by a vast Royal Navy. Adventurers and businessmen spread from India to China and discovered Australia and the Pacific islands, and in the nineteenth century spread through Africa. It is ironic that the high-noon for the Union Jack came after the First World War, thanks to absorbing much of the German colonial empire and holding suzerainty over much of the former Ottoman Empire in the Middle East and North Africa.
But from that time onwards, the Empire was threatened by the very forces we profess – democratic representative government. Our steps towards a Commonwealth of Nations were slow to develop, and were disrupted by the Second World War which only underlined our global weakness. Exhausted by the war, and without the resources to rebuild our own country, we were hardly in a position to finance the development of the territories of the Empire. Even then, the East African groundnuts scheme didn’t exactly inspire confidence!
The trauma of Suez, which highlighted our imperial weakness, led the British body politic to completely re-assess our foreign policy. We couldn’t afford our Empire, so Macmillan disposed of it – Ghana, Malaya, Cyprus, Nigeria, were spun off, following recently released India, Pakistan and Ceylon. A torrent followed his “Winds of Change” speech.
Fortunately for us, we had a Commonwealth of Nations structure. First proposed by Lord Rosebery in 1884 as a vehicle to encompass the newly self-governing colonies in Australasia and Canada, it received its title in 1921, to accommodate the newly independent Irish Free State. The Statute of Westminster of 1931 established the principle of national independence for its members. The prefix “British” was dropped in 1949, when India prepared to become a Republic, to accommodate her and other later Republics within the organisation. Under the benign Headship of our Sovereign, the Commonwealth retained the membership of most departing colonies.
It is now a free association of 54 States, even some which were never part of the British Empire, like Mozambique and Rwanda. Whilst the birth pains of the New Commonwealth in the 1960s and 1970s were painful, with much posturing by the independence generation of African leaders, the organisation today is having a new lease of life based upon a heritage of the English language, culture and shared values of democracy, human rights and the rule of law. The maturity of its members, many of whom are celebrating decades of independence, provides a strong foundation for world development.
British politicians in the late 1950s bore the scars of Suez. We were no longer a Great Power which could stand alone. Our Special Relationship with the United States was unreliable in times of stress. Indeed, we needed to find a role – and one beckoned enticingly from across the Channel.
Europe was uniting. The countries of Europe were recovering from a state of awesome destruction. The need to avoid another war was foremost in their politicians’ mind. A structure to embrace Germany so closely that it could never again go to war was essential. It is ironic to recall that this was Churchill’s vision, but he never intended us to be part of it. He stated clearly, “... we have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked, but not comprised. We are interested and associated, but not absorbed.”
This gave the opportunity to a post-imperial France to take an approach more focused than Britain. They would lead Europe, playing on Germany’s guilt complex, and create a French led axis to which all other participants would be subservient.
Ignoring both French intent and Churchill’s warning, the British establishment rushed to join in, where they had previously stood aloof despite invitations, They applied to join, with the avowed intent to share with France the leadership of the continent. They counted without the French President, Charles de Gaulle, who seeing France’s supremacy endangered, delivered an emphatic “non”.
It is worth remembering the role of Edward Heath in all this. During the Suez crisis he was Government Chief Whip, and he saw the anguish of the government and party in close-up. He became a firm advocate of the European focus of British policy. Under Macmillan he became Lord Privy Seal, handling the European Accession negotiations. He was ready to sacrifice the Commonwealth and its historic trade links, and access to British fisheries, to achieve his objective, and yet De Gaulle punched him on the nose!
Heath was nothing if not obsessive. Prime Minister in 1970, he made it his total priority to gain membership of the burgeoning European Community, prepared to sacrifice eventual sovereignty (ever-closer Union), our fisheries, the access of the Commonwealth in terms of trade and immigration, and even financial equity. Because of the sovereign authority of parliament, and the basic patriotism of the Conservative Party, he resorted to subterfuge to achieve his objectives.
We all now know the corporatist intent of the players at the heart of the European project. Slowly and steadily the ratchet has been turned. At every stage, the British government of the day has gone along with it. Even Margaret Thatcher reluctantly went along with the European Single Act, ostensibly as it created the British objective of a single market. She later claimed she had been misled on the detail.
Her ire led her to her Bruges Speech, "We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a European level, with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels."
The European establishment merely banked the step forwards, and set off for Maastricht. Jacques Delors’ proposed that the European Parliament be the democratic body of the community, the commission be the executive and the Council of Ministers be the senate. That brought fireworks in Margaret Thatcher’s response - “No, no, no!”. It also brought her to defeat by the European establishment then in the late stages of its hegemony within the Conservative Party.
In the post-Thatcher age, Europe has made further steps to closer union, through Maastricht, Amsterdam, Nice and Lisbon. Successive British Prime Ministers have protested and then acquiesced. John Major, to his credit, and responding to the rapid growth of euro-scepticism in the Party, obtained the vital opt-out from membership of the European currency, which the pragmatic Blair did not abandon. However, Blair did abandon Major’s Social Chapter opt-out, and allow for the watering down of the Rebate in exchange for a French promise on agricultural subsidies, which was not delivered.
The Euro has proved to be the disaster that many economists predicted, forcing the periphery into depression, and Germany to prosper. National governments have found themselves in a strait jacket, unable to take the financial steps necessary to solve their problems. Meanwhile the Eurocrats ignore the suffering, and demand further centralisation, which is necessary for the functioning of a single currency. In the process, our Euro-suffering colleagues look balefully at Britain, with its own currency and the financial freedom that flows from it, and note that we have world-leading growth.
Those self-same Eurocrats busy themselves with a torrent of legislation, a failure to reform and to tackle corruption, with an Olympian disregard for the misery that their policies have created in terms of unemployment, stagnation, and the endangering of democracy.
Meanwhile, our Party, always uncomfortable with European policy, has steadily swung from the respectable pro-europeanism of the Heath-era, to the realistic euro-scepticism of the modern age. As ever, the pragmatic Conservative Party reflects that underlying unease of the British electorate in these matters.
We now need a clear policy. The pledge for a Referendum in 2017, however it was brought about, is unique to the Conservatives amongst the historic great parties. UKIP is a spasm brought on by the failures of the past combined with the unclear European policy of today.
On the reasonable assumption of electoral victory in 2015 (and without it, there will be no referendum, and therefore no negotiation), our Government should by now be clear as to its objectives in the negotiations with Europe which will ensue. They are either inadequate or undefined. Hence, UKIP.
The likelihood is that the negotiations will produce nothing of significance in the timescale planned before the referendum. All precedents show British Prime Ministers going in like a lion and coming out like a lamb. The only caveat is the precarious state of the European Union itself, and the Euro-zone in particular, which could produce an unstoppable continent-wide tsunami for reform and dismantling. The likelihood of that, and in a suitable timeframe, would currently appear to be negligible.
The odds are therefore that David Cameron will return empty handed, or with little to show. If he proceeds to campaign for us to remain in the European Union, he will split the Party. If he campaigns with the great bulk of the Party for a withdrawal, we may nevertheless not win. The original 1975 referendum, and the recent Scottish referendum, shows the power of the unknown on the electorate.
And yet, it need not be so. The European Union is a 20th century construct, unsuited to the needs and conditions of the 21st. It was constructed on the fears of a renascent Germany, and wishing to tie them in and down, conditioned by the appalling destruction of the Second World War. We are now 70 years on.
This century is grounded in a global market, in a world that can flourish, and in many ways already does so, through world trade, powered by the scale of the internet and all its capabilities. The dramatic decline of the European share of world trade and investment should serve as a clarion call against the complacency and introversion of the European establishments.
Our Leaders should have the guts and imagination to say “We shall negotiate, but if we do not achieve a good settlement and fundamental reforms, we shall withdraw”. Fear of the future is not appropriate. The opportunities for new generations are immense.
If we withdraw, Europe will negotiate new arrangements. Given the trade balance in their favour, they will not wish to lose their access to our market. We would still have access to a European, albeit declining, market. We would have the freedom to negotiate new arrangements with the countries of the Commonwealth, with all our affinities, and with other major growth areas, notably in Latin America.
All it depends on is to have clear, unambiguous, and inspiring leadership. Franklin D, Roosevelt, the U.S. President, said to his people in their time of crisis, “...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” He went on to win a further three terms! Has the new generation of British politicians the courage to inspire and then to implement the new scenario for Britain to prosper as a Great Power in the 21st century?
Speech to the Conservative Foreign & Commonwealth Council, 13th October 2014.
Jacques Arnold is an international businessman and former Member of Parliament. He served for ten years as M.P. for Gravesham, until 1997. He was a Private Parliamentary Secretary at both the Department of the Environment and at the Home Office. In the House of Commons he was Chairman of the Conservative Backbench Committee on Constitutional Affairs, and Secretary of the Conservative Backbench Committee on Foreign & Commonwealth Affairs. He also served on the Treasury Select Committee. Before entering the House, he was Midland Bank's Deputy Representative in Brazil, and then Regional Director for Latin America & Africa at Thomas Cook Bankers. Since leaving the House of Commons he has been an Adviser to a number of companies, notably GEC, BAE SYSTEMS, VT Group and FIRST. He lives in Kent, of which county he is a Deputy Lieutenant.