On June 18, 1940, Britain was reeling. Just two weeks before, the British Army had narrowly escaped Nazi encirclement in northern France. But by June 18, France had fallen and a Nazi invasion of England beckoned.
Prime Minister Winston Churchill, was undeterred. He rallied Parliament and the nation.
“…. if we fail,” Churchill said, “then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, this was their finest hour.”
Churchill ordered British commanders to relentlessly attack Nazi ships and planes. His mission was clear: “If this long island story of ours is to end at last, let it end only when each one of us lies choking in his own blood upon the ground.” Those sacrifices, especially in the air above southern England, (albeit helped by Hitler’s obsession with conquering the Soviet Union, and Japan’s amazingly-idiotic decision to bomb Pearl Harbor) saved Britain from tyranny.
The war was won. Freedom’s future preserved.
Reflecting that victory, in six weeks — 77 years and 10 days after Churchill’s speech — Britons will vote in another general election. Prime Minister Theresa May of the Conservative Party and Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn (the equivalent of the Democrats from the United States), are the two candidates who might win. And while the stakes today are not as great as in 1940, they are significant. Britain faces a severe threat from terrorist extremists and escalating aggression from Russia.
Correspondingly, like Churchill, whoever becomes prime minister on June 9 must be ready to deter Britain’s enemies — and if necessary, defeat them.
On Sunday, we learned that Corbyn is not up to the job.
Interviewed on the BBC’s flagship weekend show, Corbyn was asked how he would control British nuclear forces. This question matters because on entering office, the prime minister must write “letters of last resort” to the commanding officers of Britain’s four nuclear ballistic-missile submarines (these SSBNs represent the entirety of Britain’s nuclear deterrent force).
Briefed on various retaliatory strike options, the prime minister writes orders for different attack scenarios. The intent of these letters is two-fold. First, to ensure that adversaries recognize a decapitation strike on London will not prevent retaliation. Second, to ensure redundant response to an attack.
It is a solemn, unpleasant, but necessary responsibility. And we already know the current prime minister is up to the job. Last July, May was asked in Parliament whether she could order a nuclear retaliatory strike. The questioner thought he had caught May out – that she might be scared to admit her responsibility as prime minister. He was to be disappointed. May responded simply. “Yes.” She was unequivocal and unassuming.
On Sunday, Corbyn had his chance to answer the question. Here’s what happened.
BBC presenter, Andrew Marr, asks Corbyn: “What will you be telling them [the SSBN commanders]?”
Corbyn responds: “What I’ll be saying is that I want us to achieve a nuclear-free world. What I want us to do is adhere to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and take part in negotiations surrounding that…”
Marr interjects: “And this goes in the letters to the commanders?”
Corbyn waffles. When pressed by Marr, he responds with obfuscation: “A strict instruction to follow orders when given.”
Marr, unimpressed: “So you don’t tell them to fire or not to fire? They don’t know what to do?”
Corbyn, trapped by his own radioactive ignorance: “Listen! The issue has to be, we want a secure and peaceful world. We achieve that by promoting peace, by also promoting security. And security comes from that process.”
Marr, increasingly unimpressed: “Can I ask you directly, are there any circumstances in which you would order a nuclear strike? Any circumstances?”
Corbyn: more waffling on “the process” of “achieving peace.”
This is the man who would be a key leader of the free world. In other words, this is a man who Russian President Vladimir Putin loves. He will watch that interview (you can bet the Russian diplomatic/SVR/GRU/FSB staff in London have forwarded it), and smile. He knows that Corbyn is weak. He knows that were Corbyn to become Britain’s next prime minister, Russian ICBM strikes would be matched only by moral philosophy.
Corbyn’s amazing ridiculousness doesn’t end there. In the same interview, Marr asked whether, if presented with a high-confidence intelligence assessment on Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s location, he would authorize a drone strike. Again, Corbyn equivocated.
As I say, this matters.
In 2017, we have the fortune that our leaders mostly negotiate to get policies enacted. This is the give and take, sometimes frustrating, of a democratic society. Democrats must deal with Republicans and vice versa. Yet when it comes to the Islamic State, or indeed our national existence in a nuclear showdown, our leaders cannot hesitate in enacting a credible strategy. As important, our enemies must know we will not hesitate. They must fear an American or British SSBN commander receiving orders to achieve strategic effect.
We now know Corbyn could not make that decision. Fortunately, May leads him by 20 percentage points in the polls.
Tom Rogan (@TomRtweets) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a foreign policy columnist for National Review, a domestic policy columnist for Opportunity Lives, a former panelist on The McLaughlin Group and a senior fellow at the Steamboat Institute.
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