Thursday 27 July 2017

Is Brexit like Dunkirk?

In my post Just how close were we to SS GB? (22 July) I noted that the German panzers paused 30 miles from Dunkirk, allowing the British Expeditionary Force to make it's chaotic escape. This decision is credited to Hitler by most historians - and by Boris Johnson in his book on Churchill which was on the bookcase in our holiday hotel room. However, writing in this week's Sunday Times* Scottish historian Niall Ferguson says that the decision is "often  wrongly attributed to Hitler himself" and was based on a recommendation by his generals Gerd von Runstedt and Gunther von Kluge. Either way, the key point about Dunkirk is that it could have been very much worse.

I said that I wasn't drawing a parallel between between Dunkirk, in the news because of the Christopher Nolan film, which I may go and watch - inspiring no doubt but a bit heavy maybe  - and Brexit. Ferguson also concludes Brexit is not like Dunkirk: "it may be a colossal bureaucratic mess but it is not a military disaster." Nevertheless he recalls Churchill's speech of 28 May 1940 (see my 22 July blog) and goes on to say that, while some notable people are urging us to backtrack on Brexit, it remains difficult for him to imagine us exiting from Brexit. This despite him having warned before the referendum that a vote for Brexit would be like sending the UK down a "stairway to hell".

Part of his reasoning is that, having invoked article 50 there is no way back to the "status quo ante" as any return to EU membership would be on standard terms, including joining the single currency and without the Thatcher/Major opt outs. This is a point which readers will recall me making in several previous blogs. While this would not be enough to put off the Europhiles (I nearly said euro-mentalists) who have always been in favour of as much Europe as possible, it would surely be enough to keep the current majority for Brexit which seems to be solid in opinion polls. It would certainly be enough for me to switch from remain to leave if there were another referendum.

Ferguson, who was against Brexit a year ago, has come round to one of the key arguments for leaving that I advocated - that it would be better for both the EU nations and the UK to divorce, for they want a federal Europe and we never did. "Put less politely, they are prepared to put up with German dominance and we are not."  So, despite the fact that the divorce will cost a lot more and take a lot longer than the leavers claimed, Ferguson says this is no time for second thoughts, "any more than May 1940 was the time for peace talks".

So Brexit isn't like Dunkirk, but there are parallels.

As for me, I agree with what Ferguson says, though I voted remain because I was sure I could guess how difficult, lengthy and disruptive our exit would be. Indeed, it's quite painful for me to think how much better the medium term outlook would be for the economy had we voted remain, with the world economic climate apparently fairly benign. I think I'd much rather have been trying to normalise interest rates and unwind quantitative easing than negotiating with the EU.

But we are negotiating - though it sounds from a distance like a dialogue of the deaf - and Michel Barnier, with his threats that the talks could stall over the ridiculous and unjustifiable severance fee he is said to be demanding, is reminding me why, in my heart, I wanted rid of Brussels and the eurocracy. It may not be a flotilla of little boats that bring our negotiators back, but we should be ready to evacuate and pull up the drawbridge. The parallel with 1940 is that we must fight our corner. No appeasement!

* It is not our finest hour, but Brexit must stand, Sunday Times 23 July 2017. Ferguson is Laurence A Tisch professor at Harvard as well as a senior research fellow at Jesus College Oxford and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. I got a history 'O' level.

P.S. Not surprisingly I wasn't the only one thinking on these lines: here is Nick Newman's cartoon from this week's Sunday Times - got round to that page by Thursday!

2 comments:

  1. Exit Brexit Phil, it is utter madness!

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    1. I'm with Ferguson, DM. We can't go back only forward. Exiting Brexit would mean forward into a federal Europe. I expect you'd be happy with that, but it's definitely not what I voted Remain for. A bit like the Remainers say the Leavers "didn't vote to be made poorer", (though that wasn't the question and it might not happen anyway), I know for sure more Europe definitely wasn't on the ballot paper and I don't think many would vote for it.

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