The CPTTP trade deal is apparently part of a strategic tilt towards the Pacific for British power, diplomacy, its economy and Armed Forces.
Let’s just look at the last of those, not least because the out going Defence Secretary seems to think we will soon be involved in a war (hot or cold) in that area within 7 years.
The mighty Royal Navy’s contribution to the safety and security of the Pacific consists at the moment, of one or possibly two patrol vessels. Nice ships, excellent for drug patrols or anti-piracy, they are equipped with one 30mm cannon and a crew of 45. The US Navy has probably forgotten how many larger ships than this it has in the Pacific.
Let’s be frank, the UK gave up on an East of Suez policy in. the 1960’s, and that was 20 years too late. By the end of the Second World War the Americans could hardly be bothered with the British Pacific Fleet that turned up to help finish off Japan.
The US Armed Forces had not spent all that money, sweat and blood making the Pacific an American lake to let the Brits in, no least since the RN fleet needed to “borrow” huge resources from the Americans in order to operate. The fall of Singapore finished off any pretensions of UK power in the region and that was 81 years ago.
Therefore the “tilt to the Pacific” is not just economic madness, it is a diplomatic fantasy based on Global Britain, an embarrassing pretension, a joke to most other countries and militarily suicidal.
The ‘more patriotic than thou Tories’ are about to slash the UK’s armed forces yet again, even in the face of Ukraine’s battle for survival. Pretending it can send, supply and maintain significant forces on the other side of the world is nothing more than a Brexit fantasy and a dangerous one at that.
Not just for the UK’s Armed forces but for British national sanity, this madness is pathetic posturing, it is fooling no one; but it is making the UK look stupid.
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.
By Jonty Bloom Media
Well past time to drop the "great"