War and peace

I confess to a liking for Second World War films.  I just watched The Cruel Sea.  Some years ago at a dinner in Brussels I met Frau Von Moltke.  Her husband, a Director-General in the European Commission, was at the other end of the table.  I asked if he was related to the general.  "Which one ?", she asked and then added "actually he's related to all of them."   Relations of his had fought in the Franco-Prussian War, the First World War and the Second World War.   Of course, so had members of my family (except the Franco-Prussian).   Generations of Europeans have died and killed each other in war for centuries.  Their descendants have tried to build something better.

It makes me so angry to hear the nationalist bollocks of UKIP and their friends in the Tory Party.  It also makes me angry to hear the half-hearted, luke-warm, grudging comments of British so-called pro-Europeans.  How do they imagine we can build peace without the European Union ?  For pity's sake, let's learn from history, stop moaning and get on with working for peace in Europe and the world.

Peace in Hampstead (for nearly 2 minutes)

Sunday morning found me walking across Hampstead Heath as 11 o'clock approached. I sat on a log for the two minutes' silence, which was nearly perfect in the silvan sunshine but for the distant wail of a police siren. Long gone are the days when the traffic stopped and even the trains paused on their journeys.

Peace in Glastonbury and Wells

Thursday was a sunny, misty November day and I climbed Glastonbury Tor and attended the Wells Constituency Dinner (in Highbridge, NOT on the Tor). I always meet interesting people on the Tor and at the dinner. On the Tor there was a group with a peace banner planning a demonstration for the next day, the 11th of the 11th of the 11th. I wished them luck. Peace is the fundamental value of federalism. At dinner, Paddy did not use the "F" word but spoke of the need for countries to work together in Europe and characterised the independence chimera of the eurosceptics as "the perfect sovereignty of corks bobbing around in the wake of an ocean liner".