POLITICAL AND IMPERIAL ROLE IN "SUPPORTING MILITARY INTERVENTION"

Dateline 20th September 2004

INTRODUCTION
Five EU countries are setting up a paramilitary force of up to 3,000 "police" to tackle crisis zones within and without the European Union. But even the Germans will not take part in this new EU paramilitary police force because (based like many quasi-fascist policing methods on the French system!) it is even alien to German traditions. Perhaps it reminds them all too clearly of the Nazi political "police" forces alien to democracy and the rule of law.

The British would never tolerate a system of military police with such a blatantly political role, separate from ordinary policing. Although Blair has refused to take part he "welcomes" it. In other words as in so many other collaborations with the anti democratic, centralist and authoritarian EU, Blair has so much in common with the European political elite but dare not - openly at least - impose it on the British people whose democratic instincts are so different from his personal penchant for power! Needless to say part of the appeal to Blair would be the imperial spread of this "task force"(!) to places like Africa.

It is particularly noteworthy that all the countries involved in this paramilitary force embraced the authoritarian tradition either during the war (Vichy France, Fascist Italy while the Netherlands provided the Nazis with two SS divisions!) had fascist Government (Spain) andr continued military Government (Portugal) long after the war.

Once again we see how the politics of the European Union appeal so much to those very forces to which it always (hypocritically) claimed to be the alternative.

As reported by EU Observer 20.09.2004: (Freenations comments in brackets)

Defence ministers from France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands signed an agreement on Friday (17 September) in the Dutch town of Noordwijk to form a joint paramilitary force. The 3,000-strong European Gendarmerie Force (EGF) will be based in Vicenza in north-east Italy and is designed to help restore public order to regions emerging from conflict such as the Balkans and beyond. (Restoring public order is what a country's own police force does. But this force, like other EU interventions, seeks not to restore order but to impose its own political order!)

Michelle Alliot-Marie, the French defence minister, said the force was designed for "post-conflict" duties in regions emerging from civil war such as Bosnia, Kosovo and the Ivory Coast. (The Ivory Coast shows the imperial nature of this force and only a fool would describe the continuing ethnic cleansing, murder and religious bigotry of today's Kosovo as "post conflict"!). Italian Defence Minister Antonio Martino explained the new force could be used for three different types of intervention.

"The force could be used to prevent a conflict, so before a military intervention, it could be used in support of military intervention, or it could be used after military intervention to make sure the post-conflict runs smoothly", he said. (This is of course the opposite of a "post conflict peace keeping force". Here is betrayed the conflict creating power of this blatantly political paramilitary force).

The EGF will have a core of 800-900 members ready to deploy within 30 days and a pool of 2,300 reinforcements on standby. The first commander will be French. Other EU members will be invited to participate in the force, but some countries with no national paramilitary forces ruled out any involvement. "Germany will not take part", said German Defence Minister Peter Struck to Reuters, adding Germany wanted to maintain its strict separation between the police and army. And yet it has agreed to hand over a NATO responsibility in Bosnia to just such a force - although given the fascist tradition of the Bosnian Waffen SS division during the second world war it will certainly fit in well!

Britain welcomed the scheme but without its own tradition of a militarised police it has no plans to take part, the Daily Telegraph reported. (The reason why we have no "tradition" is because the idea is fundamentally anti democratic and pernicious so why would we "welcome it"? - we don't but our Prime Minister does!)

The agreement was signed in the framework of a meeting of the 25 defence ministers of the European Union. The informal meeting was chaired by the Dutch defence minister Henk Kamp. The gendarmerie is only the latest in a series of new European cross-border military, paramilitary, and police bodies, including a Finnish-Swedish force to patrol the Arctic wastes and a Franco-Spanish anti-terrorist police corps. The Finnish-Swedish joint force is likely to be comprised of about 1,000 Swedish soldiers and 200 Finns. (These seem to be bilateral solutions between nation states - the exact opposite of the EU idea - but imperial wannabes must impose their stamp!)

The EU defence ministers are to announce, during their so-called resource meeting on 22 November, how much each EU country will contribute to the combat units, and what countries will set up units together. NATO will hand over command of a 7,000-strong peacekeeping force in Bosnia. (This is of course grotesque given that the main ingredients of NATO - Germany, Britain and the United States - all disapprove of such paramilitary forces and refuse to take part in this one!)