Peace

Actions for Peace

/ Dr Craig Dalzell / 2 Comments

“Just war theory has been converted into a form of apologetics for whatever atrocities your favored state is carrying out.” – Noam Chomsky

This blog post previously appeared as an article in Secure Scotland‘s Whit Noo? magazine, for which I received a commission.

Peace

People sometimes mistake pacifism for inaction when it is the very opposite. To choose and to strive for peace is just as affirmative an action as to choose and to strive for violence. It is not something that happens due to the absence of violence or because we are protected by violence from some threat outwith or within. I write these words on the 14th of July 2024. The day after an attempted act of horrific violence against Donald Trump – a person with whom I share little in terms of worldview or aspirations and yet he is a person who, as with all people, I do not wish the harm he received nor the harm he very narrowly avoided and which some others that day sadly did not.

This essay is not about those events nor the events that led to them nor those that shall follow from them other than to say that my mantra that we should all strive always for peace is very much at the top of my mind as I write.

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Where Are The Peacemakers?

/ Dr Craig Dalzell / Leave a comment

“Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.” – Albert Einstein

(This blog post previously appeared in Common Weal’s weekly newsletter. Sign up for the newsletter here.)

Chess

Rishi Sunak has finally, though sooner than expected, called a General Election and has launched his campaign promising to conscript teenagers into the military (or force them to do unpaid labour instead). Rather than gear up for yet another round of war, where are the promises to promote peace both at home and abroad?

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Rolling Over Scotland

/ Dr Craig Dalzell / Leave a comment

“As the tail on our back disappeared as we no longer had any use for it, nuclear weapons will also disappear once we realize, we no longer have any need for them. But no matter how much we daydream, it will never happen as some sort of grand geopolitical gesture of international collaboration – somebody has to take the first step – one nuclear-capable state has to take that first leap of bold faith and naive trust! The question is, who will it be? The first nuclear nation to abandon its nuclear weapons, will be the First Peacemaking Nation of Earth – and their head of state, the First Peacemaker.” – Abhijit Naskar

(This blog post previously appeared in Common Weal’s weekly newsletter. Sign up for the newsletter here.)

This week saw the publication of the 11th paper in the series of the Building A New Scotland Independence White Papers by the Scottish Government, this time looking at the defence and foreign affairs and the policies that the current SNP/Green Scottish Government would advocate should they form the Government of that independence Scotland.

The paper was recently described by Alyn Smith as a sign that the Government had “done its homework when it comes to foreign policy and security”. Unfortunately, he is very far from the mark on that. The paper instead shows a profound ignorance about the process of becoming an independent state and a serious contempt for the internal party democracies of the parties involved.

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