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Troubles Ahead: Will Brexit See a Return of The Troubles in Northern Ireland?

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by Gideon Jones

Forensic experts examining the remains of a car bomb detonated by the New IRA in front of the courthouse in Derry, January 2019 (Image credit: Justin Kernoghan)

Though the Northern Ireland of today is a vastly different place than it was when the Troubles began in 1968, it would be a mistake to assume that those original divisions have completely healed. Despite boasting one of the lowest murder rates in Western Europe, the divisions that led to the conflict are still present, with both the Protestant and Catholic communities still living largely separated from one another, without a strong shared identity to unite them and with the Loyalist and Republican labels remaining salient. Brexit, however, is now threatening to lay bare this sectarian division like no other event ever has. Unfortunately, many are now asking themselves whether the UK leaving the European Union (EU), especially without a deal, will see the return of terrorism in Northern Ireland.

The question of Northern Ireland, and by extension its border with the Republic of Ireland, held only a minor position in the Brexit referendum discourse, some campaigners even denied the very existence of the issue. Regardless, the border has remained a thorn in the side of successive British Prime Ministers. The main concern has been with the economic arrangements that need to be put in place once the UK leaves the EU. What makes this an even more contentious issue in Northern Ireland is that eighty five percent of Catholics voted to remain, whilst sixty percent of Protestants voted to leave. This split along religious lines is concerning to say the least. Britain’s membership in the EU allowed an invisible border to exist between North and South, allowing communities on both sides to remain in close contact, as well as unhindered passage of goods and people. This was a settlement that most in Northern Ireland were happy to keep in place, but Brexit will be seen by many in the Catholic (as well as forty percent of the Protestant) community as being imposed on them by the British against their will.

The prospect of a united Ireland is still an ideal that holds a great deal of weight in the Catholic community, and many persist in rejecting the legitimacy of Westminster (with Sinn Fein still declining to take their seats). Perception matters, and Brexit looks to a great deal of Catholics like a political project of a distant power, meddling in their lives with little to no concern for their needs, or even their consent. If a border and custom checkpoints were to be created through a no-deal scenario, the resentment it would cause amongst Catholics can hardly be understated. Indeed, they would likely become useful recruiting tools for Dissident Republicans, as well as a targets for terrorist attacks.

The threat posed by terrorist and paramilitary groups remains a very real one. Though the Provisional IRA loyalist paramilitaries like the UVF and are unlikely to mount any campaign of violence similar in scale to that of The Troubles, according to a 2015 governmental report, all the main paramilitary groups are still in existence and remain a potential national security threat . The main Republican and Loyalist groups remain committed to achieving their political aims through peaceful means. In contrast, Dissident Republicans continue to carry out an armed campaign to end what they see as British imperialism on the island of Ireland. Dissident Republicans, those republicans who rejected the Good Friday Agreement, are still actively opposing the peace through groups like the New IRA, and have been responsible for several attacks in Northern Ireland, as well as the death of the journalist Lyra McKee. There is a good reason to believe that groups like the New IRA will attempt to capitalise on Brexit and the discontent that it will cause, and may use it as a way to draw many young and disaffected Catholics into their ranks, carrying out further attacks across Northern Ireland.

There is no doubt that Dissident groups would have attempted to carry out attacks with or without Brexit. In fact, it could be argued that Brexit has simply brought into sharp focus the violence they have been carrying out in Northern Ireland for years. The real danger, however, is that Brexit can provide them an opportunity to get back into the spotlight, and to once again legitimise violence as a way of achieving political aims. Brian Kenna, the chairman of Saoradh, a small republican party in Northern Ireland thought to be the political arm of the New IRA, claimed that:

“Brexit is a huge opportunity. It’s not the reason why people would resist British rule but Brexit just gives it focus, gives it a physical picture. It’s a huge help.”

Dissident Republicans will see Brexit, and especially a no-deal, as an opportunity too good to resist passing up - there is a very real chance that they will seek to exploit underlying resentments and take violent action. Though they may receive a bump in support and could feel emboldened by the political landscape, it remains unlikely that we are witnessing the return of The Troubles.

Whilst Northern Ireland’s political landscape may be going through a shift due to Brexit, it is not yet a forgone conclusion that people will give up on democratic means of achieving their political goals. In fact, many non-violent supporters of a united Ireland are feeling more confident of achieving it after Brexit, and believe that, in time, unification will be won through the ballot box.

It is not without some irony that as Northern Ireland approaches its centenary, there is a strong chance that it will have a Catholic majority. It would be a mistake, however, to assume that this will automatically translate into majority support for a united Ireland. Being Catholic no longer equates to being a nationalist, nor does being Protestant mean you are a unionist, with recent polling showing that people are feeling less bound by tribal loyalty and are increasingly neutral on Northern Ireland’s union with the UK. This though does mean that Northern Ireland is no longer the Protestant state for a Protestant people as it was originally envisioned to be - and the state’s ties to Britain will more likely be decided on pragmatism rather than a deep cultural or religious affinity. Republicans are given to feeling that time is on their side, and Brexit may have just sped up the process of reunification. There is moreover a deep feeling within both Protestant and Catholic communities that reunification with Ireland is more a matter of ‘when’, rather than ‘if’, as support for a united Ireland goes up, but also due to a feeling among Unionists that the British people increasingly no longer care if they stay or go.

So, will Brexit bring about a return to the Troubles in Northern Ireland? Dissidents will undoubtedly use it as an opportunity to carry out attacks and increase their own levels of support.

But a return to the Troubles? This is possible, yet highly unlikely. Politics is thankfully still seen as the arena to advance one’s goals, and the ballot box is still seen as more powerful than the bomb.

Gideon Jones is a MA student in Terrorism, Security & Society at the War Studies Department, King’s College London, and completed his BA in History at the University of Warwick.

Coming from Northern Ireland, he has been brought up in a country scarred by the issues of terrorism, conflict, sectarianism, and extremist ideology. Through this experience, he has been given valuable insight into how the legacies of such problems can continue to divide a society decades after the fighting has stopped, and how the issues left unresolved can threaten to upend a fragile peace.

Gideon is a Staff Writer at Strife.

Feature - Et Tu Cod? Reliving Fishy Fantasies

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by William Reynolds

 

“Everybody would just love to see one of them sunk…that’s what we’re here for! Sink the bloody things!”

– Royal Navy crewman interviewed on HMS Bacchante (1975)

“Gunboats? Threatening the civilian citizens of NATO ally over fish? Have you lost your fucking minds?”

–Victoria Freeman, Twitter (2020)

Introduction

Although separated by 45 years and vast differences of opinion, the two statements above accurately reflect what can only be described as a clash of competing fantasies currently taking place on social media. A recent article in The Guardian highlighting the readied usage of four Royal Navy vessels to patrol British waters in the case of a No Deal between the European Union (EU) and United Kingdom (UK), and its comparison to the Cod Wars, has proliferated commentary on the case of fish and how best to manage them.

Immediately after The Guardian’s publication, a number of well-respected academics and practitioners waded into the debate. Sir Lawrence Freedman, also alluding to the comparison made, reminded us that Britain ‘lost’ all three of the Anglo-Icelandic fishery disputes, coined the Cod Wars (1958-61, 1972-73 and 1975-76). Elisabeth Braw couched the news in deterrence terms, referring to it sounding “like a parody”. By contrast, the various jingoistic calls for force through attacking retweets of MP and Chair of the Defence Select Committee Tobias Ellwood’s exasperation very much mirrored Brexit MEP Robert Rowland, who in 2019 called for any foreign fishing vessel in British waters be “given the same treatment as the Belgrano!”

In reality, and perhaps a consequence of the lack of nuance on social media, both ‘sides’ support arguments that can only be described as simplistic in the extreme. First, and foremost, the Cod Wars are not an appropriate comparison for the current situation around UK waters, and The Guardian article has much blame to shoulder for alluding to the connection. Whilst the operational, day-to-day activities that took place during the successive ‘wars’ may offer some insights into the UK-EU tensions, strategically both cases are in very different places. Secondly, the narrative regarding the ship deployments itself is false. Rather than being seen as deployment in response to the tensions, the Fishery Protection Squadron should instead be seen for what it really is, an expansion of already conducted duties by default.

The Cod Wars - A ‘storm in a teacup’

As seen from the commentary on social media, the Cod Wars have clearly captured the imagination of the British public in lieu of raising tensions vis-à-vis fishing around the UK and a Brexit Deal. It is somewhat fitting that the term ‘Cod Wars’ was in fact coined by Fleet Street in September 1958. As yet again, it is the British media who is raising its ghost for today’s issue. However, the comparison is deeply flawed. If one had to identify the core elements of the three Cod Wars, themselves individually distinct in character, it would be the asymmetry of commitment between Iceland and Britain and the political environment, both international and domestic, that these conflicts occupied.

Asymmetry of commitment played a huge role in the dynamics and eventual outcomes of the three Cod Wars. The already struggling British trawling industries of the mid-1950s, and by extension the communities in Hull and Grimsby, were heavily reliant on the fisheries within fifty nautical miles of Iceland, with such an extension reported in 1971 by the Under-Secretary to the FCO Anthony Royle as likely to lead to a decrease in catches by forty to sixty per cent. Whilst the First Cod War’s (1958-61) extension to twelve nautical miles from four was worrying, it was the Second War (1972-3), and the fifty mile extension, which really started to hurt the industry. By the Third Cod War (1975-76) it was understood that a 200 nautical mile limit, which was the planned final extension by Iceland, would kill the industry altogether.

HMS Mermaid ‘Riding Off’ ICGV Baldur during the Third Cod War (Image Credit: Caledonian Maritime Research Trust)

However, the British fishing community as a whole only contributed to around one per cent of the entire British economy during the period of the Cod Wars. By 1956 the trawling industry was no longer profitable to the British state, Britain did not fear damage to the British economy as a whole, rather localised mass unemployment, which was still a fair concern. Thus, preventing the communities from automatically going on social welfare benefits (the Dole) by default was the key objective of the British state. In contrast, the fishing industry was viewed as a real existential issue for the Icelanders. Around 89% of Iceland’s export involved the industry, and there were very real fears that overfishing would see this collapse. Nor was this fear unfounded, when herring suddenly disappeared from Icelandic waters in the mid-60s, it led to a drop in real per capita income by sixteen per cent. It was with no embellishment that a Panorama team based in Iceland (1972) stated: “Icelanders are haunted by the fear that one day the fish will no longer be there.”

This asymmetry of commitment permeated all the actions taken by both states, particularly in domestic politics. In essence, whilst the British government was more beholden to its fishing communities, rather than the wider public, the Icelandic government’s legitimacy in the eyes of the entire public was founded on extending its limits and holding them.

The Icelandic population, around 200,000 in 1956 (and smaller than the 300,000 of Hull) supported five viable political parties and five newspapers. Thus, when the Cod Wars ignited, this politically engaged population was like the fuel for a lighted match. Quite quickly, nationalist rhetoric portrayed Iceland as the plucky ex-colony fighting the colonialist power, with each of the conflicts later compared to the Battle of Britain in terms of their cultural significance vis-à-vis a ‘national struggle’. This nationalist sentiment quickly spiralled out of control for Iceland’s Politicians. In 1958, when the British side reached a compromise in Paris, the Icelandic Foreign Minister stated [N]o Icelander will even consider a further discussion about settlement…”. This led the Icelandic representative at Paris to grumble that “everyone in Reykjavik has gone stark staring mad.” Indeed, such domestic pressures would be prevalent throughout each conflict. In 1975 Prime Minister Hallgrimsson felt compelled to deploy the Coast Guard due to domestic ire, despite favouring a negotiated settlement.

Heath and the stubborn cod, from Stuttgater Zeitung, reprinted in Þjóðviljinn newspaper, 30 May 1973 (Image Credit: Herring and Class Struggle)

By contrast, while the British government was often compelled by the British trawling community to deploy ships, the government ultimately held on to control. This was highlighted by the three successive de-escalatory measures, one for each conflict, which, in essence, capitulated to the Icelanders. As the conflicts escalated, successive British governments ultimately decided the fight was not worth the cost, both politically and economically. After all, the wider British public was rather apathetic to each conflict, and economically, that 1%, was a drop in the water. Perhaps the best example of the British government’s ultimate control, despite domestic pressure, was that Tony Crossland, the Foreign Secretary who hashed out the final Cod War agreement, was the MP for Grimsby!

Send in the gunboats! False comparisons invoked by Brexit

Therefore, the driving forces behind the three Cod Wars hold little water when it comes to comparisons with the fishing disputes between Britain and the EU. Without even touching upon the wider political factors such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the Cold War, it is clear that Britain and Iceland were playing with cards, and for a prize, of considerable difference to Britain and the EU in the modern day. Basically, the actors, the geography, the time and space, are all different today.

Chiefly, Britain is now interacting with waters that, even as a member of the EU, are legally its responsibility. Concepts of 12, 24 and 200 nautical miles, as enshrined under the United Nations Convention for the Law Of the Sea (UNCLOS), were still under intellectual development during the three Cod Wars. Today, they are foundational. This change automatically places the UK on a more even footing when it comes to levels of commitment present in order to achieve a favourable UK outcome. Whereas the conflicts with Iceland were ultimately some 1,600km away from London, these waters are figuratively, and legally, Britain’s ‘back yard’. As a result, Boris Johnson’s government has to consider a playing field, with its advantages and disadvantages, which are radically different to his predecessors of Harold Macmillan’s, Harold Wilson’s, Ted Heath’s and Jim Callaghan’s, former PMs at the time of the Cod Wars. One could even suggest the British playing field looks far closer to what Iceland would have seen back in the day. This is not to say the various European states do not have equal concerns, after all, the waters are equally important to them. But in this case, the Britain-Iceland asymmetry in concerns and distance is no longer present, making the comparison poor.

Secondly, whereas the Cod Wars required a ‘deployment’ of naval vessels to far waters, what follows after 1 January 2021 if no deal occurs would, in fact, be an extension by de facto. River class naval vessels who, alongside their forbearers, have been doing Fishery Protection since 1586, and includes medical and technical support for fishermen, search and rescue and liaison with other constabulary forces. Fundamentally, the four River-1 class patrol vessels are doing the exact same job as the Japanese Coast Guard, French Maritime Gendarme and Icelandic Coast Guard, with similar vessels in terms of weaponry and tonnage to boot! British vessels may be naval, but that is a quirk of history rather than a conscious decision.

Collection of similar Patrol Vessels, from left clockwise: HMS Tyne, FS Champlain, ICGV Thor and the JCG Yonakuni (Image Credits: Seaforces.org, NavyRecognition.com, Baird Maritime and J-Hangar.com)

Thus, it is wrong to say that these vessels are being deployed, when in actuality they are already present. Rather, if the waters revert to purely UK jurisdiction after the end of January 2021, their existing commitments will simply expand by de facto. This is not an aggressive deployment of gunboats, ready to ride off French Gendarme and ‘torpedo’ French fishing vessels, it is an expansion of commitment in line with Britain’s responsibility to conduct effective Maritime Governance, including not just Law and Order, but combatting pollution and search & rescue operations. For the UK to not do this would be an abdication of its responsibilities under UNCLOS.

Conclusion

Whilst there are many more factors and arguments that could be drawn upon to highlight the false mindset of comparing the current disputes with the Cod War, it is clear that the core elements of the three Cod Wars, asymmetry of commitment and political environment, are rather different to that of today.

Moreover, not only are the elements different, but the more tangible structural causes are equally different in flavour. This is not a deployment to waters over 1600km away, nor is the UK legally in a more nebulous environment. Furthermore, no deployments are necessitated, as the Fishery Protection Squadron has been in place in these waters since at least the 16th century.

This may all seem pedantic, but as highlighted by the Icelanders, rhetoric matters. If framing it in terms of the Cod Wars, we risk not only underestimating Britain’s natural position but additionally polarising the British population further, as both more nationalist ‘Brexiteer’ sentiments and false fantasies from the opposing, predominantly ‘Remainer’ sider entrench further and clash in increasingly heated discussions. If one lesson can be learned from all this, it is perhaps a more nuanced understanding of the historical case studies that are being used. Just as Brexit is not a rehash of the Second World War, the fishing dispute is not a repeat of the Cod one.

William Reynolds is a Leverhulme Scholar Doctoral Candidate with the Centre of Grand Strategy and Laughton Unit in the War Studies Department, Kings College London. Graduating with a Bachelor’s in War Studies, and Master’s in National Security Studies from the same department, William’s interests have evolved from military history to maritime security and grand strategy, particularly regarding Britain and the Indo-Pacific area. William’s research focuses on British and Japanese interactions in the grand strategic space post-1945. Over the years, William has conducted work with the King’s Japan Programme regarding maritime security in the Indo-Pacific region, with a particular focus on the maritime arena as a domain for interstate interactions. This has included United States Navy carrier and amphibious group deployments, Royal Navy deployments in the region from 1998 and, more recently, Chinese and Japanese Coast Guard procurement, history and interactions in the East China Sea. Outside of University, he has worked as a research analyst for an IED threat mitigation company, with a focus on Europe and Syria. You can follow him on Twitter @war_student.

Perceptions of Peaceful Transfer of Power: From the British to the American Empire

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by Mariana Vieira

The Battle of Manila Bay (1898) saw the defeat of the Spanish navy at the hands of the fledging American empire (Image credit: Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.)

The transition from British to American hegemony, a shift that fundamentally shaped the post-1945 world order, is often characterised as peaceful. This is brought about by the choice of terminology and the analytical slippage between hegemony and empire. While there were no direct hostilities between the UK and the US as the former declined and the latter ascended, the study of empire highlights the conflict and violence of the two key processes of transition: the rise of the United States and the decline of Great Britain. Indeed, terminology matters because it enables scholars to consider the interactions and dynamics between metropole, the core territory around which power is centralised, and the extensive periphery of dominated areas.

The transition from Pax Britannica to Pax Americana did not happen immediately and the building blocks leading to it were hardly peaceful. Special mentions include the Spanish-American War (1898), the wars of decolonisation, and both World Wars. The absence of a typical hegemonic war between the dominant power and the rising challenger led experts to believe that a peaceful transition took place sometime in the early-mid twentieth century.

However, in determining a more precise timestamp, the most persuasive dates do follow a conflict that fits with the other main characteristics of hegemonic war: a total conflict involving major states that is unlimited in terms of political, economic, and ideological significance. Here, the Second World War epitomises the decay of the European international political order and the triumph of American power. Moreover, even proponents of the peaceful transition thesis highlight how the US became committed to enforcing order internationally after the ‘cataclysm’ of the Second World War.

US hegemonic ascendency accelerated after the annexation of overseas territories, the spoils of the American victory in the war of 1898. While these territorial acquisitions were unprecedented, the Spanish-American War and its consequences have been argued to represent a ‘logical culmination’ of the major trends in nineteenth-century US foreign policy. In removing Spain from the Western Hemisphere and increasing American’s reach in East Asia, the war was crucial in advancing the US’ status as a world power and a full-fledged member of the imperial club.

Analysing America’s colonial experience during the earlier period of transition as an empire, as opposed to as a hegemon allows for a more complex image that highlights the violence and day-to-day coercion intrinsic to how the American empire was built. Whereas hegemons are strictly concerned with influence over foreign affairs, empires seek to exert control over the political regime of the periphery, thereby encompassing both domestic and foreign policy spheres. As an empire, the US proceeded to transform Cuba into a neo-colonial economy built around cash-crops and closely tied to the US market, while the Philippines witnessed an especially brutal war of ‘benevolent assimilation’ furthered by ideologies of racial difference.

The following period of US hegemonic maturity and UK hegemonic decline was partly engendered by significant changes in the international context. As the US entered a global field that was already mostly colonized, it seemingly maintained international peace – or the existing level of colonial violence – by supporting its European allies and outsourcing territorial control. However, the emergence and proliferation of anticolonial nationalism in the periphery changed the global landscape. As the First World War brought to a boil the decades long-simmering tensions of militarism, alliances, imperialism, and nationalism, its aftermath witnessed the break-up of several empires on the losing side, the weakening of the victorious’ hold on their colonial possessions, and the widespread circulation of President Wilson’s Fourteen Points.

The diffusion of ideas of national self-determination in European colonies resulted in multiple movements against colonial rule, including in Britain. Crucially, the rise of nationalism and the eruption of conflict furthered the British hegemonic decline. The transition from British to American international systems was consolidating as the USA found other means to exert their – informal – influence, while the British could not meet their economic goals without the colonial – formal – dimension.

Partly distracted with crises in the Middle East, East Asia, and South Africa and partly constrained by the importance of American raw materials and markets, the British did not seek to actively oppose America’s rise in the Western Hemisphere. Arguably, if there was a shift from perceptions of competition to cooperation with the US, it was largely a result of British non-peaceful priorities laying elsewhere. The British operated a trading empire based on the exchange of European manufactured goods for the colonies’ foods and minerals, relying on imperialism to maintain its economic supremacy.

However, as empires became increasingly illegitimate, the cumulative effect of peripheral wars of decolonisation and the deterioration of the British industrial base undermined the productivity on which its power hinged. In the metropole, the devastating impact of the two World Wars added a further dimension of resource erosion, this disrupted the imperialist center and left the British Empire dependent on American economic and military power. Consequently, the British hegemonic decline was accelerated by interacting conflicts in the center and in the periphery.

It was not a white dove that brought about a new imperial center, but rather a murder of crows.

Finally, when contending the emergence of a ‘peaceful’ international order based on the convergence of Anglo-Saxon values, a study of empire may point in other directions. Both empires share similarities, as capitalist nation-states with an impulse to act imperialistically in ordering their respective international systems. The US gunboat diplomacy showcased its contempt for ‘lesser’ peoples, thereby placing America in the mainstream of Western imperialism. Here, the American elite followed the debates on empire in Britain, applying notions of racism and the white man’s burden to US expansionist imperatives. In hailing the intellectual, industrial, and moral superiority of the Anglo-Saxon peoples, the sense of sameness legitimised and fueled more violence towards ‘backward’ people and ‘little brown brothers’ in the periphery during the initial phase of transition.

For centuries, the rise and decline of powerful empires characterised world politics and not the world of nation-states that is taken for granted in International Relations (IR). The perception of a peaceful hegemonic transition is based on the Westphalian terms of reference, but the framework of sovereign states occludes and distorts imperial relations.

Careful consideration of British decline and American rise showcases precisely these two antonyms of peace: war, on a global scale, and conflict, within their respective peripheries. In rendering the violence of the processes behind this ‘peaceful’ transition visible, the study of empire warns against Eurocentric celebrations of a successful model that rising – non-Western – powers should follow. It was not a white dove that brought about a new imperial center, but rather a murder of crows.

Mariana Vieira currently works as an Editorial Assistant for Chatham House’s magazine, The World Today. Her research interests span US foreign policy, critical security studies, and empire. After completing her bachelor’s in Politics, Philosophy and Economics at the University of Warwick, she pursued an MS in Empires, Colonialism and Globalisation at LSE, followed by an MA in International Peace and Security at KCL’s War Studies department.

Feature - From Debates to Processes: Trajectories of Intelligence Oversight in the UK

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by Joseph Jarnecki

The British Parliament, seen from across the Thames (Image credit: Britannica)

On 17 October 2019, the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) handed their report on Russian interference into British democracy to Prime Minister Boris Johnson. A bipartisan committee, the ISC is mandated by the British Parliament to oversee the British intelligence services – replacing open debates with formal parliamentary procedures.

Following significant delays to its release, the report saw light of day only nine months later. As a result, questions regarding the ISC’s ability to fulfil its brief have begun to be asked more loudly. This has only been exacerbated by the failed installation of Chris Grayling MP to Committee Chairmanship. With members of the ISC being nominated and not elected, and with recent events exposing the limits of the committee’s independence, how effective are current procedures of democratic oversight on holding intelligence services and their ministers to account? And is a nominated committee truly more efficient than open parliamentary discussions?

The 1984 controversy surrounding union membership for Government Communication Head Quarters (GCHQ) employees generated the first substantial debates on intelligence services and democratic oversight in Parliament. To illustrate this point, that year there were over three hundred mentions of GCHQ in Parliament; in all its previous history there had been just fourteen. The rest of the decade continued this trend with increased attention for the intelligence services by parliamentarians. Here, debates frequently turned to questions of the politicisation of security as well as principles of parliamentary and collective democracy.

Of those debates, the 1985 Interception of Communications Bill is notable for opposing parliamentary sovereignty and royal prerogative – that is, those powers held under sovereign authority but exercised by the executive. The legislation, as asserted in the chamber by former Labour MP Tony Benn, expanded the executive’s ability to deploy surveillance such that it undermined ‘parliamentary democracy.’ He argued that those executive justifications for wiretapping on the grounds of ‘national security’ stripped parliament of its central purpose of discussing and deciding national interests, especially its capacity to determine British security interests. Benn’s assertion, that ‘security in Britain is controlled by the Prime Minister,’ seems to therefore echo the thought of later academic work regarding the instrumentalization of security which, despite recent controversies over increasing surveillance through the use of prerogative powers in line with Coronavirus measures, receives little mention in contemporary Parliaments.

Two years later, the 1987 House of Commons (Services) debate, regarding the Speaker of the House’s decision to suspend Ronan Bennett’s parliamentary pass also centralises themes of security versus parliamentary democracy. Employed as a researcher for then backbencher Jeremy Corbyn, Bennett had been previously linked to the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and had been convicted for the murder of a police officer – though this was overturned a year later. The decision to rescind his access was justified by advice received from the security services that Bennett was a ‘security risk,’ an accusation that quickly found its way into the media.

The foremost issue that MPs took with this incident, other than asserting that it subverted their right to hire as they please, was that the Speaker had not questioned the reasoning for this advice and that the recommendation was not a matter of public record. As such, neither the accused, his employer, the House services committee, nor the issuer of the ban knew the justification for the advice to exclude Bennett. This led backbench MPs to articulate a broader critique of undefined ‘security risks’ as instruments used to claim authority and to construct boundaries to debate, all whilst avoiding transparency. Tony Benn in this debate raised such limits on open debate in order to critique what he saw as executive overreach, saying that ‘Members of Parliament are in danger of being licensed only to discuss what Ministers want them to discuss.’ Whilst Benn’s words again stand out for what Conservative MP John Biffen called his ‘characteristic zeal,’ upon looking at the debate in full its apparent that references to themes of democratic oversight and its tensions with security were habitual touchstones for this cohort of parliamentarians.

These two accounts highlight that amongst initial debates on the intelligence services, the problematisation of security and liberty, as well as contestations over principles of parliamentary sovereignty, were apparent. This stands in contrast to the belief that these themes are unique to our current moment or else only emerged following 9/11, the so-called “migrant crisis”, or the Snowden revelations. Indeed, these subjects which were evident in the 1980s persisted in parliament into the early 1990s, accumulating momentum such that the government was pressured to establish the ISC. With the creation of the committee, however, direct debates on the intelligence services have become limited to the yearly presentation of the ISC’s report or else to issues with a high public profile. Accompanying this drop in frequency has been a shift away from discussing the politicisation of security and principles of democracy. In their place, there has been a movement towards reflexively supporting intelligence activities and an increasing emphasis on vesting authority in procedures and professionalised bodies.

Whilst this shift has been gradual since 1994 a key case that illustrates a change is the 2013 debate regarding the operations of GCHQ. Held in the wake of revelations by whistle-blower Edward Snowden that the US National Security Agency (NSA) was operating illegal mass surveillance, the debate saw then Foreign Secretary William Hague address questions regarding active GCHQ-NSA cooperation and whether comparative GCHQ initiatives existed. Hague opened the debate by outlining what he saw as the three main issues raised by the controversy, these therefore can inform our reflections on how government positioning has adapted to the existence of the ISC.

First, in describing ‘the action that the Government are taking in response to recent events’ the Foreign Secretary solely refers to the ISC. Saying that they have ‘already received some information from GCHQ and will receive a full report tomorrow,’ and adding that they ‘will be free to decide what, if any further action’ to take. His response here, barely longer than the included extracts is telling for two reasons. Centrally, Hague seems to equate action by the government with action by the committee, or else he seeks to derive legitimacy from the committee’s presumed authority as a parliamentary body exerting oversight. Secondly, by sidestepping a commitment to substantive action by deferring to potential ISC scrutiny the foreign minister is pushing the discussion far into the future. Any ‘further action’ the committee could take would necessitate a long report process with the possibility of executive delay in publication.

The second issue raised by Hague, regards how intelligence services work ‘in accordance with UK law’ and democracy. His justification here being that agencies operate under 1994 and 2000 legislation and are therefore legitimate in their actions. Regardless of the flawed assumption that law is necessarily good, which tellingly was not challenged by other debate participants, his point is undermined by his own government’s 2013 Justice and Security Act, which imposed greater restrictions, later that year.

Lastly, the Secretary’s third issue relates to how the law is upheld in international intelligence cooperation, which he acknowledges is regular between the NSA and GCHQ. He quickly outlines again that legislation alongside oversight by ministers and the ISC ensures adherence to the law, however in contrast to speakers in the 1980s, who might have interrogated the underlying rationalities for these agencies, Hague instead advocates for them through the prism of threat. In doing so he invokes physical and economic security, without a single mention of the preservation of life or democracy. As such, he displays an instrumentalisation of the authority the ISC is supposedly vested with as a scrutinising body, alongside an unreflexive prioritisation of the actions of the intelligence services.

Besides Hague’s statements what is also telling about this debate is what is excluded from the responses and questions to him. Of the forty-one MPs who spoke not one mentioned the word “democracy” nor “rights,” and of the three mentions of “liberty” two came as part of an exchange citing the paradox of Snowden’s invocation of the ideal from within the People’s Republic of China.

The final mention of ‘liberties’ came from former Conservative MP Rory Stewart wherein he urged Hague to focus not on the ‘legal problem’ of secret operations but instead on their repercussions for ‘balancing security and liberty.’ In what constitutes the only Benn-like elevation of the debate, Stewart went on to emphasise that the continuation of these operations relies on an informed public, who ‘through understanding, consent.’ Hague’s response to this assertion was to offer agreement that the public should be engaged, though he hedged this commitment with a call-back to the greater importance of secrecy as a guarantor of our security and the cooperation of our intelligence partners.

What is shown through these three debates is that there is no linear development of accountability for the intelligence services. Whilst the ISC provides a mechanism through which a select number of parliamentarians can access information the state has made secret; it has guaranteed neither substantive change in the powers afforded to Parliament nor multifaceted and nuanced debate. Moreover, the committee’s procedures provide ample excuses for governments to deflect or delay, as we have observed with the Russia report, and its annual sessions in parliament often do not receive great consideration. Whilst the executive retains the power of appointment and the ISC’s ability to launch formal investigations is limited, its capacity to achieve significant accountability is narrow.

The original full-length article can be found at the King’s Research Centre in International Relations (RCIR) Forum. The piece was written as part of the King’s Undergraduate Research fellowship held in the context of the GUARDINT project, which is supported by the Economic and Social Research Council.

Joseph Jarnecki is a MA International Conflict Studies student at King’s College London and the Coordinating Editor for Strife blog. His research interests include the politics of knowledge production, the proceduralisation of democratic accountability, as well as violence and (in)security. He completed his BA in International Relations at King’s. You can follow him @Jarnecki.

Parsing the Safe Passage

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by Matthew Ader

“They can’t fight!” by Frederick Burr Opper, January 1896, originally published in Puck. (Image credit: National Archives)

Scholars and policymakers around the world are turning to history to understand how to navigate the onrushing collision between the ailing United States of America and an increasingly assertive China. The most famous example, expounded upon at length in Graham Allison’s Destined for War, is the clash between Sparta and Athens as documented by Thucydides. However, the most recent hegemonic transition, that of Britain to the United States, deserves significant attention – it is well-sourced, exhaustively documented, and involves national actors still relevant today. That makes it a valuable case study.

However, little work has yet been done to model this period in a way, which would allow the clean transfer of lessons learnt to the modern context. Even Kori Schake’s Safe Passage, written explicitly with the intent of informing Sino-American competition, is an excellent history before it is a work of political science. The relative paucity of overarching models means that policymakers must either fall back on heuristics or delve into intricate historical details.

This article attempts to split the difference by deriving a broader model of hegemonic transition from the circumstances of the Anglo-American case, with the hope that it will ease comparative work between the historical and contemporary situations.

I argue that the transition can be broken down into five distinct phases:

  1. Potential for competition (1756 – 1823) – the United States begins to grow in capability, but Britain is not yet aware of the potential threat.
  2. Recognition (1823) – Britain recognises the United States as a potential threat.
  3. The window of opportunity (1823 – 1914) – Britain conducts policy to (in most cases) conciliate the United States as the two nations move towards parity.
  4. Moment of transition (1916) – the United States surpasses Britain, as a result of British losses and American industrial growth during the First World War.
  5. Settling into a new order (1917 onwards) – the United States becomes the new global rule-setter, and Britain adjusts its position accordingly.

The United States’ growth in power began before the American Revolution, with the Seven Years War and American independence, but a combination of internal weakness and British distraction with eastern conquests and ambitious Corsicans – not to mention America’s poor performance in the War of 1812 - meant that it took until the 1820s for senior British officials to directly recognise the future potential of the United States as a major disruptive influence. Notably, and seemingly uniquely in terms of hegemonic transitions, this was recognised long before the United States even began to approach military parity with Britain. This may be due to traditional British lack of confidence in its own power, and also the naval character of said power – as Lord Palmerston observed in 1858, the simple reality of American geography rendered it invulnerable to British domination even in the absence of a major US force.

Given that Britain recognised the potential for competition relatively early, they had a large window of opportunity to apply policy. Instead of launching a preventive war, which would have been ineffective given the fact that Britain could not achieve lasting dominance over the United States, they pursued a consistent policy of conciliation. During the Oregon boundary dispute (1846), the Trent Affair (1861), and the Venezuelan Debt Crisis (1895), among other crises, Britain de-escalated even when it held the upper hand in coercive force. British bankers and merchants were encouraged to invest in the United States, even as propaganda about a joint Anglo-American destiny, linked by shared Anglo-Saxon heritage, percolated into American culture.

This was sagacious policy and was enabled in large part by the early recognition of the potential threat the United States posed and subsequently extensive window of opportunity. Given 80 years, most diplomatic relationships can be transformed in major ways – this is much less viable over shorter time frames. The result was that at the moment of transition, towards the end of the First World War – as British policymakers acknowledged that American industrial power so outmatched their own that America held the upper hand in any interaction, as was evidenced by the Paris Peace Conference and the 1922 Washington Naval Treaty - the United States looked on Britain not as a weakened rival, but as a culturally, economically, and at least somewhat strategically aligned partner. Debate persists, however, on the specifics of the Anglo-American transition of power, with many scholars placing it in 1945. However, I would argue that the passage happened in 1916 and was already visible at Versailles. Nevertheless, Britain continued to play a global role arguably disproportionate to its means. The USA, in turn, did not emerge as a hegemon until after the Second World War.

Why A Model?

Given that the historical record exists, why would a model of that transition be helpful? Principally because it allows clearer comparative analysis and the codification of lessons learnt.

First, in terms of comparative analysis, we can transfer this model to Sino-American relations relatively clearly. The potential for competition existed throughout the 1990s and 2000s as China grew in power, but the distracted United States only recognised the threat in 2009 with the Pivot/Rebalance to Asia. Others would argue that this recognition came even later, with the American declaration of China as a near-peer competitor. The United States is now in the window of opportunity vis a vis China, as the relative gap between the powers narrows, and must implement policy to forestall or cushion its decline. If current trends continue unabated, there will be a moment of transition, either when China peacefully surpasses American power; or when its aggressive moves run into a mutual red line.

Rather than attempting to draw difficult comparisons based on historical events in the Anglo-American relationship, the existence of the model allows references to history without getting lost in the details. Similarly, the model allows a clearer discussion of lessons learnt. British success stemmed in large part, I would argue, from early recognition of the American potential as a competitor. Others might suggest it was the result of effective policy within the window of opportunity. A model equips us with a common vocabulary to discuss a difficult topic.

This is not, of course, perfect. The model itself is applicable to Anglo-American hegemonic transition, and I believe Sino-American too, but it carries with it the weight of hindsight – assuming as it does that China will at some point fight the United States or move past it in some peaceful yet vital way. Equally plausible is the idea that China may fall short of hegemony, not due to American action within the window of opportunity, but internal socioeconomic weakness. Another possibility not fully incorporated in this model is that the United States and China may reach parity and remain there for a long period, with neither able to act as a hegemon. And, of course, in the general sense, having an avowedly simplifying model often makes things more complex, not less.

Despite that, given the growing importance of hegemonic transition, it is important to ensure rigour and clear communication in debates around it. This model, or something like it, may go some way towards helping in that effort.

Matthew Ader is an undergraduate student in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London with an interest in climate change and grand strategy. He tweets occasionally from @AderMatthew.