Armaments
The national media has recently reported on some of our major banks continuing to invest in companies that make cluster bombs. Britain is a signatory, along with 107 other countries, to a global treaty banning the production, distribution and transfer of these weapons. These munitions pose an indiscriminate wide-area threat to civilians, and can kill and maim years after they have been deployed.
Apparently there is a legal loophole whereby investments can be made in the production companies provided that the money does not directly resource the creation of these weapons. This is all rather disturbing especially as some of the investing institutions have a substantial British taxpayer stake in them. There is surely a need for Parliament to legislate to make the law in this area align with our international treaty obligations.
It is interesting how times change. In Britain, in 1977, we started the development of the JP233 airfield-denial weapon. This system contained multiple small bombs of the kind that are now made illegal by treaty. The weapon was used as recently as the early 1990’s in the first Gulf War. Since then, the system has been superseded by what are called precision-guided munitions, of the kind used in Libya.
Although there are continuing campaigns against the arms trade, it is the people using these weapons who really do the killing. The likelihood of this happening is more realistically driven by the continued popularity of undemocratic systems of government in many parts of the world. These regimes can be military, political and theological but all seem to embrace the idea of dictatorships being an efficient way to run a country.
More than that, some regimes believe that their ideology is so wonderful that it will eventually spread across the world. These ideas are perhaps the most dangerous, especially if they see armaments as a means of giving the export of their philosophy some kind of nudge. The Nazis foresaw a 1,000-year Reich that lasted just 12 years. Even in the West, there was a brief period after the Cold War where views were expressed asserting the universality of our way of life. The trouble is that such a dogmatic stance is at least impolite to other cultures and civilisations.
It is the polarisation of views, supported by armaments, and an apparent inability to seek peaceful solutions, that drive continued conflicts. Instead of fighting, it is generally better to talk, but this is perhaps too complex for some opposing factions.
A starting solution for any two belligerents can be disarmingly simple, and taken up on any morning that they have a will to choose.
We shall not kill today.
Councillor Bob Lanzer, Leader of Crawley Borough Council
30th August 2011