Nearly a year ago, I published this video:
Using words that now seem prescient given what is happening in Venezuela and the threat to Greenland, which is being widely acknowledged, I said:
In the world we now live in, the crazy is possible, and I'm suggesting that we need to prepare for it.
My argument was that Donald Trump's behaviour at the time signalled an expansionist mindset that was not merely rhetorical. Having already, at that time, floated the idea of absorbing Canada as a US state, threatened Panama over the canal zone, and pressured Denmark over Greenland, Trump was obviously already willing to treat sovereign territories as assets to be acquired. The concern was that once such demands began, they would escalate rather than stop.
Nothing suggests that anything I said was wrong: I did not have Venezuela on the list, that was all.
I then argued that from this perspective, Scotland could plausibly enter Trump's sights. Trump has a personal fixation with Scotland, claims ancestral ties, owns golf courses there, and views the country as familiar territory. More importantly, Scotland has significant strategic and economic value in a climate-stressed world: vast renewable energy potential, abundant clean water, and a central role in future European energy security. These assets align with Trump's interest in Greenland's mineral wealth as the ice recedes.
Scotland also hosts the UK's nuclear submarine base at Faslane. An independent Scotland might challenge that arrangement, and Trump could seek to remove the uncertainty by asserting US control under the guise of security.
The most disturbing element was the risk of political complicity. In a scenario in which a Farage-led UK government faced an economic crisis, I suggested that Westminster might be willing to trade Scotland's sovereignty for financial support. I remain of that opinion.
However extreme that sounded, the core warning was that in a world of volatile politics, previously unthinkable outcomes can no longer be ruled out, and Scotland must be alert to that risk.
Does that warning still stand? I think it does. The chance is low, I admit, but just thinking about the possibility is important.
That is firstly because it draws attention to the UK Government's wholly inadequate response to what is happening, where it is claiming that it needs to see Trump's legal justification for the action he has taken before taking a view on it, when it is glaringly obvious that he is in breach of international law and the UN Charter, which, as permanent Security Council members, we are meant to uphold. Our prevarication is dangerous and could have consequences; in other words, it matters.
Secondly, this demands that we consider what it would be like if what is currently UK territory were under threat and how we would feel then. Little would concentrate the mind more than that, when right now it seems that ministers have only one intention, which is to deflect attention from what Trump is doing.
Thirdly, by changing the perspective, we gain a view of this country that is usually found almost impossible to comprehend, because it can be argued that it has been so long since we suffered occupation and external control. Even if such a takeover is unlikely, to think about the risk is relevant because it demands we form a view on Trump, on our government, on what the UK is, what defence means, and what we think Scotland is, from wherever we are on the independence issue.
What troubles me right now is the utter incoherence of Labour on what is happening.
Ask what would happen if Scotland were at risk, and they either respond by saying "don't be daft", except that the risk is not so remote that this is an appropriate reaction, or they have to address the issue. The question is worth asking, then. And I want to know their answer, because it is based on such scenario analysis that the government creates policy. So, what do they think?
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Labour HQ, when they bother to think about Scotland at all, won’t be thinking beyond the Holyrood election in May. Their entire focus is driven by their perceived entitlement to Scottish votes and their loathing of the SNP.
I am worried about the Trump’s actions in Venezuela. It abandons international law replacing it with “might is right”, euphemistically called “Realpolitik”.
Today’s headline in the Telegraph is “Trump sets sights on Greenland” (yes, I do read that neoliberal rag – it’s important to know what the contrary opinions are and not to live in a group think bubble). Personally I suspect that is just “click bait” but there’s probably an element of truth.
Trump has previously set his sights on Canada too. So why not Scotland? The UK has long been called the 51st state, though that accolade seems to have passed to Canada. So why stop at Scotland? Why not annex the whole UK?
If Trump annexes Greenland, which given his other actions is not out of the question, where does it stop?
World war would be the destination.
Hmmm. That’s what I was afraid of. 🙁
‘Sovereign is he who makes the exception’ said Carl Schmitt.
It’s a pity that we cannot have such a clear methodology in making more benign decisions or courses of action.
What underpins the veracity of your inquiry is similar to that we have seen in the fascism of Hitler and Putin – that a domestic caucus of ‘believers’ or fellow travellers will be used to justify being ‘liberated’ by the likes of Trump’s aggression. Thus Trumps universal ‘brand’ can be used the world over to push aside domestic politicians. Scotland and Greenland had better watch its Reform vote! Or you might face an American army of liberation. Boom!
In one way though, what is going on seems to be in broad daylight at least – it is in reality the same old Uncle Sam – America has always been first – but this time there is no pretension about being a ‘shining city on a hill’ and all that homely apple pie bullshit. This is America in the raw, being simply American – that is, being capitalist monopolists through and through – taking everything from their own and us.
America is and always has been pleonexia as politics. Which is a shame – because the American people are not all like that at all.
What did they used to say in the last war ‘ When the Germans bomb us we dive for cover; when we bomb the Germans they dive for cover; when the Americans go bombing, everyone dives for cover’ – or something like that.
So what is truly dangerous here and will be the big testing point, is that the U.S. is really good at destroying opponents or targets but totally appalling at managing what comes after. The prospect of that is truly horrifying.
Much to agree with in your conclusion.
Trump’s abduction of Maduro has given the green light to Xi to move on Taiwan, Kim Jong Un to invade South Korea, Netanyahu to scour the West Bank of Palestinians, and Putin to drop an ICBM on the middle of Kyiv. I don’t think they will – but they have the green light now. Trump has announced his concerns are the nations and territories around the Continental United States. It will be read as such. More to the point we have just shuffled past the point where rationales have to be given for attacks on foreign countries – probably Netanyahu’s attack on Qatar was the precursor; it needn’t have been but it probably was. I think Canada, Mexico and Greenland (because of Denmark, the EU and NATO) are a step too far for Trump now. But when he moves on Cuba, which Rubio deeply wants, the green lights multiply. I live in Scotland but don’t see us on the hit list just yet – but Trump is flailing about as the US economy fails to thrive, and anything is possible.
Re Scotland potentially being annexed, which leader would be flown back to the US for a show trial?
With all due respect to Swinney, I don’t think he’s big enough box office. Starmer being given the orange jumpsuit treatment might prove surprisingly popular in Scotland too, particular in Aberdeen if the North Sea oil industry was forcibly re-opened.
Scotland as annexed territory of UK and is already under Washington’s heel. So no need.
The US alt right have been pumping out anti SNP anti Independence videos for years.
Janie Godley would weep if she were still alive.
Demos describes Scotland as an annexed territory of the UK , which is one way of looking at it. I’d define it as a colony of the UK. Westminster has treated it like a colony for centuries and in recent times passed the UK Internal Market legislation in a clear attempt to legitimise its right to impose its will without the Scottish people and Parliament having any say in the matter.
Incidentally, Janey Godley didn’t do weeping, but she was a world-class curser whose 4-word home-made placard told the world exactly what she thought of Trump and she’d have told him so to his face if she’d got the chance.
I agree with the colony description