The basic problem has been the mainlanders’ predisposition to totalitarianism, the islanders’ to individualism.
Initially, religion was the central issue: Catholic authority colliding with protestant conscience. Subsequently, politics aggravated the divide: an autocratic Louis XIV contending with a constitutional William III; a tyrannous Napoleon with a liberal Pitt; a fascist Hitler with a democratic Churchill.
Each time, Britain found itself in the minority. The European majority chose, shamelessly, not to get involved. It preferred expediency to principle. In doing so, the mainland demonstrated an almost unblemished capacity for getting things wrong; the island, an almost equally impressive one for getting them right.
The current spat with the EU should be seen in this context. The majority of member states had chosen, banally, to lumber themselves with an unworkable common currency. Britain, in a tiny minority, wisely, refused to do so. Predictably, the system collapsed; and, predictably also, those who’d embroiled themselves in it most enthusiastically vented their fury most vituperatively on those who hadn’t.
The parallels with 1940 are stark. France is beside herself with petulant rage, envious of Germany’s economic competence and of Britain’s economic insight.
Britain, seventy years ago, wasn’t wholly united; nor is it today. Cameron is unreliable; a latter-day Chamberlain. He has only reluctantly drawn a line in the sand. He’d prefer to compromise, to sacrifice another Sudetenland. He’s being encouraged in this regard by comparably unreliable colleagues. Clarke is Lord Halifax; Clegg, Lord Haw-Haw.
What is needed is a general election; alternatively, a referendum. Let the people decide whether to live under European authoritarianism or Anglo-Saxon tolerance. Don’t let mendacious politicians fudge the issue any longer.
