Britain’s “leaders” are not the only ones who could learn a thing or two from de Gaulle. Being such a voracious reader, de Gaulle might well have found time to read the turgid, but chilling, material that the UN has pumped out recently. It calls for what amounts to a materialistic, corporatist political and cultural revolution on a global scale. Just imagine what he would have made of page 1,408, in Section 13.9.5 (“Systemic Responses for Climate Mitigation”), of the third part of the UN’s April 2022 climate assessment report.
“[D]omestic political systems … and prevalent ideas, values and belief systems” are “structural factors that constrain and enable climate governance … [T]he presence of multi-level, multi-sectoral lock-ins of overlapping and interdependent political, economic, technological and cultural forces mean that a new approach of coordinated, crosseconomy, systemic climate mitigation is necessary. Creutzig et al. (2018) propose a resetting of the approach to consumption and use of resources to that of demand side solutions, which would have ongoing economy-wide systemic implications.”
In case that isn’t clear, the UN is obviously up for picking a cultural and political fight: “Demand-side transitions involve interacting and sometimes antagonistic processes on the behavioural, socio-cultural, institutional, business, and technological dimensions. Individual- or sectoral-level change may be stymied by reinforcing social, infrastructural, and cultural lock-ins.”
The General would have eaten these upstart communistic revolutionaries for his carbon-intensive breakfast. Vive la France!
That UN piece makes perfect sense to me! It is clear is it not, that if we humans continue to consume as we have been it will be catastrophic for our climate? Every item we consume it uses energy and resources that spew more and more CO² into the atmosphere and we justà have to reduce that to a minimum. Governments will not do this so people have to do it despite their govt! Your assumption is that it will be forced on us by a global govt but clearly that isn’t going to happen, is it? It will happen only when people finally join the dots.. in my opinion that won’t happen either. Humans are simply too greedy and too stupid and so the we are doomed. As I’m very old I’m kinda doomed anyway, personally but to the rest of you young folk I say: .. So long and thanks for all the fish!!
We are indeed all doomed, my friend, one day to lose this worldly life we lead, come hell or high water. But before that time comes, and let’s hope it is a long time for you and me both, please could I invite you to consider the following questions:
What if the climate models are wrong?
What if participants in the climate change industry face sufficiently strong incentives to prioritise preserving a self-deceptive narrative over truth, with the result that you and many others have been badly misled?
When in history has a successful revolutionary push for immediate and radical political and cultural change, and centralisation of power in the hands of a supposedly enlightened elite who believe people are “too stupid” to manage their own affairs, not caused widespread human misery and grief?
When have such revolutions actually succeeded in sustaining themselves and been successful even on their own terms?
Isn’t it important to protect and nurture national cultural heritage that protects the individual against tyranny, or must everything be sacrificed on the altar of climate ideology, regardless of the possible unintended consequences?
What happens next if a global system of governance is installed and it somehow “stops” or successfully mitigates climate change? Does it just pat itself on the back and then proceed calmly to dismantle itself, or will it seek to perpetuate its own power regardless of its social usefulness? When has the former ever happened?
Leaders of the immediate post-war era such as De Gaulle would instinctively have known the answers to these questions. The ends never, ever, justify the means. Heaven cannot be built on earth. Watching the deluded mob, young and old alike, being led to believe the opposite by a small-minded, groupthinking, smart-phone addled political, cultural and scientific “elite” who haven’t bothered to educate themselves with the lessons that the towering giants amongst their war-scarred predecessors learnt the hard way is simply terrifying.
Sure, but wtf are you going to get that in 2023.. where, within wokism, multi-gender thems are you going to locate basic competence? I haven’t seen any for years!
David Webb
1 year ago
Perhaps French leaders should be more like de Gaulle, and British ones should be more like his contemporary Churchill. Both were ultra-patriots with a clear and coherent view of their country’s interests, and backed up by deep knowledge of history.
Both had plenty of flaws (including staying in office well past their peak), along with their consummate personal bravery.
But it’s difficult to see either CDG or WSC having much tolerance of the wimpishness around the political elites both sides of the Channel.
Peter Kwasi-Modo
1 year ago
“foreign relations (something the French continue to excel in …). The best example of Gaullish guile in foreign relations is surely fooling Sunak into giving France £480,000,000 of UK taxpayers money to stop the Channel migrants. That was pure alchemy.
It wasn’t for the purpose of achieving anything with regard to immigration silly, ot was purely a PR exercise. In that it was quite successful …for a time. Better than the Rwanda plane trips right?!!!
All of these wretched ‘unwanted ones’ should be immediately despatched to our former Internment Camps in Northern Ireland, and from there encouraged ‘à la française’ to leg it to the Irish Republic, where I am sure YOU will give them a very warm welcome.
Sunak knew it wouldn’t do anything. Just like EU leaders know that bunging more money to Tunisia and Turkey won’t do anything. But it’s a step we all have to go through on the way to more…severe solutions.
The guile on the French side was knowing they could take advantage of this phase and not get any blowback from the European press along the lines of “Macron is basically the Erdogan of the EU”.
Katharine Eyre
1 year ago
“…especially in foreign relations (something the French continue to excel in, notably in their responses to Brexit and the Aukus pact)”.
I’m sorry, how did the French “excel” in their responses to Brexit and Aukus? With Brexit they totally overegged the pudding, helping to create the standoff over Northern Ireland for which a pragmatic solution along the lines of the Windsor Framework could have been achieved several years ago. Clever? Not really.
And with Aukus? That was just one long, embarrassing tantrum by Macron which told us more about his childish petulance than any kind of talent in foreign relations.
And how do failed expeditions to Lebanon, the Kremlin and the deteriorating situation in former French colonies in Africa feed into this? Or the disastrous handling of the Champion’s League final in Paris? Or is that being studiously ignored for the sake of this argument (most of which I didn’t bother to read, quite frankly).
I think the point you’ve commented on simply shows the Remainer bias of the author. It is indeed nonsense to make Macron’s stance appear anything other than windy posturing.
Jonathan Story
1 year ago
Our “Remainers” believed in the supranational project t. Nationalism bad; supranationalism good. They ignored a little problem. Democracy requires a nation state. And they ignored a further problem: British nationalism was at least 400 years old, and deeply embedded in our institutions. So the only way to be in the EU was to lie through front teeth that British interests were being served, while of course they were not. That was what the June 2016 vote made clear. The time for lies was gone. Hence their full vindictiveness is on display: use Covid to ruin the economy; back wakery; attack UK history; BRINO. All the while shouting the t the liars are the Leavers.
It’s ‘im wot done it sir! Twernt me!
Brexit os a roaring success; any fool can see that. Indeed every fool does see it!
Charles Stanhope
1 year ago
What is this obsession with France? This is the fourth essay on the place in the last week!
Let’s have something more mundane such as the Northern Ireland Legacy Trials Bill for example.
I’m afraid this week, Charles, the British media ain’t having it. You gotta make do with climate catastrophe….for a change…..and an escaped convict. Maybe try pushing your suggestion and agenda next week….who knows?
Most of the posts on this thread are so mediocre, between revenge from Trafalgar, to the French not doing their bit with illegal migrants wanting to flee to the UK, that I found fitting to join this very interesting article that traces all the way back to post war the divide between the EEC and the UK.
I have no interest nor intention to be dragged into a debate such as was de Gaulle the father of Europe……..who cares !!! But rather more interested into putting things into the context of the time. How did we end up here…..with a profoundly divided UK between remainders and leavers. Spare me the likes : French smell under the armpit or they never won a war….kind request. Happy reading….it is a very interesting article for anyone interested by post war Europe. https://hal.science/hal-02610169/document
Thank you. I will read with interest
I find it helps understanding to know where the key player stood
Martin Butler
1 year ago
Really don’t think UK leaders need to be like de Gaulle to be effective, they just need to be serious, and prepared to engage with the facts rather than make-believe and fantasy. Something recent leaders have struggled with.
JP Martin
1 year ago
If the British seek inspiration in a French leader named Charles, I would suggest that Charles Martel would be the better choice for our times given current challenges.
edward coyle
1 year ago
Im late to this discussion. My father, who was a French teacher, noted that de Gaulle would often say when emphasising a point, ‘Moi,je, de Gaulle’ followed by the verb ‘dire’. He was never sure whether it should be translated in the first (dis) or third person (dit). So way ahead of the trend on pronouns.
Liam O'Mahony
1 year ago
Petulance? Petulance? ..didn’t Boris Johnson have more petulance than a box of frogs? Or was that Anglo-Saxon petulance?
Main Edition
US
FR
Britain’s “leaders” are not the only ones who could learn a thing or two from de Gaulle. Being such a voracious reader, de Gaulle might well have found time to read the turgid, but chilling, material that the UN has pumped out recently. It calls for what amounts to a materialistic, corporatist political and cultural revolution on a global scale. Just imagine what he would have made of page 1,408, in Section 13.9.5 (“Systemic Responses for Climate Mitigation”), of the third part of the UN’s April 2022 climate assessment report.
“[D]omestic political systems … and prevalent ideas, values and belief systems” are “structural factors that constrain and enable climate governance … [T]he presence of multi-level, multi-sectoral lock-ins of overlapping and interdependent political, economic, technological and cultural forces mean that a new approach of coordinated, crosseconomy, systemic climate mitigation is necessary. Creutzig et al. (2018) propose a resetting of the approach to consumption and use of resources to that of demand side solutions, which would have ongoing economy-wide systemic implications.”
In case that isn’t clear, the UN is obviously up for picking a cultural and political fight: “Demand-side transitions involve interacting and sometimes antagonistic processes on the behavioural, socio-cultural, institutional, business, and technological dimensions. Individual- or sectoral-level change may be stymied by reinforcing social, infrastructural, and cultural lock-ins.”
The General would have eaten these upstart communistic revolutionaries for his carbon-intensive breakfast. Vive la France!
That UN piece makes perfect sense to me! It is clear is it not, that if we humans continue to consume as we have been it will be catastrophic for our climate? Every item we consume it uses energy and resources that spew more and more CO² into the atmosphere and we justà have to reduce that to a minimum. Governments will not do this so people have to do it despite their govt! Your assumption is that it will be forced on us by a global govt but clearly that isn’t going to happen, is it? It will happen only when people finally join the dots.. in my opinion that won’t happen either. Humans are simply too greedy and too stupid and so the we are doomed. As I’m very old I’m kinda doomed anyway, personally but to the rest of you young folk I say: .. So long and thanks for all the fish!!
We are indeed all doomed, my friend, one day to lose this worldly life we lead, come hell or high water. But before that time comes, and let’s hope it is a long time for you and me both, please could I invite you to consider the following questions:
What if the climate models are wrong?
What if participants in the climate change industry face sufficiently strong incentives to prioritise preserving a self-deceptive narrative over truth, with the result that you and many others have been badly misled?
When in history has a successful revolutionary push for immediate and radical political and cultural change, and centralisation of power in the hands of a supposedly enlightened elite who believe people are “too stupid” to manage their own affairs, not caused widespread human misery and grief?
When have such revolutions actually succeeded in sustaining themselves and been successful even on their own terms?
Isn’t it important to protect and nurture national cultural heritage that protects the individual against tyranny, or must everything be sacrificed on the altar of climate ideology, regardless of the possible unintended consequences?
What happens next if a global system of governance is installed and it somehow “stops” or successfully mitigates climate change? Does it just pat itself on the back and then proceed calmly to dismantle itself, or will it seek to perpetuate its own power regardless of its social usefulness? When has the former ever happened?
Leaders of the immediate post-war era such as De Gaulle would instinctively have known the answers to these questions. The ends never, ever, justify the means. Heaven cannot be built on earth. Watching the deluded mob, young and old alike, being led to believe the opposite by a small-minded, groupthinking, smart-phone addled political, cultural and scientific “elite” who haven’t bothered to educate themselves with the lessons that the towering giants amongst their war-scarred predecessors learnt the hard way is simply terrifying.
Yes difficult to disagree despite the down ticks – but has this got anything to do with de Gaulle?
Buck up O’Mahoney you’re only 73, plenty of fight in you left!
It is not.
Basic competence would do.
First prize for today’s most succinct, concise and devastatingly accurate comment.
Sure, but wtf are you going to get that in 2023.. where, within wokism, multi-gender thems are you going to locate basic competence? I haven’t seen any for years!
Perhaps French leaders should be more like de Gaulle, and British ones should be more like his contemporary Churchill. Both were ultra-patriots with a clear and coherent view of their country’s interests, and backed up by deep knowledge of history.
Both had plenty of flaws (including staying in office well past their peak), along with their consummate personal bravery.
But it’s difficult to see either CDG or WSC having much tolerance of the wimpishness around the political elites both sides of the Channel.
“foreign relations (something the French continue to excel in …). The best example of Gaullish guile in foreign relations is surely fooling Sunak into giving France £480,000,000 of UK taxpayers money to stop the Channel migrants. That was pure alchemy.
Agreed, “the greatest ripoff in history”, and surely adequate revenge for Trafalgar etc!
It wasn’t for the purpose of achieving anything with regard to immigration silly, ot was purely a PR exercise. In that it was quite successful …for a time. Better than the Rwanda plane trips right?!!!
All of these wretched ‘unwanted ones’ should be immediately despatched to our former Internment Camps in Northern Ireland, and from there encouraged ‘à la française’ to leg it to the Irish Republic, where I am sure YOU will give them a very warm welcome.
Sunak knew it wouldn’t do anything. Just like EU leaders know that bunging more money to Tunisia and Turkey won’t do anything. But it’s a step we all have to go through on the way to more…severe solutions.
The guile on the French side was knowing they could take advantage of this phase and not get any blowback from the European press along the lines of “Macron is basically the Erdogan of the EU”.
“…especially in foreign relations (something the French continue to excel in, notably in their responses to Brexit and the Aukus pact)”.
I’m sorry, how did the French “excel” in their responses to Brexit and Aukus? With Brexit they totally overegged the pudding, helping to create the standoff over Northern Ireland for which a pragmatic solution along the lines of the Windsor Framework could have been achieved several years ago. Clever? Not really.
And with Aukus? That was just one long, embarrassing tantrum by Macron which told us more about his childish petulance than any kind of talent in foreign relations.
And how do failed expeditions to Lebanon, the Kremlin and the deteriorating situation in former French colonies in Africa feed into this? Or the disastrous handling of the Champion’s League final in Paris? Or is that being studiously ignored for the sake of this argument (most of which I didn’t bother to read, quite frankly).
I think the point you’ve commented on simply shows the Remainer bias of the author. It is indeed nonsense to make Macron’s stance appear anything other than windy posturing.
Our “Remainers” believed in the supranational project t. Nationalism bad; supranationalism good. They ignored a little problem. Democracy requires a nation state. And they ignored a further problem: British nationalism was at least 400 years old, and deeply embedded in our institutions. So the only way to be in the EU was to lie through front teeth that British interests were being served, while of course they were not. That was what the June 2016 vote made clear. The time for lies was gone. Hence their full vindictiveness is on display: use Covid to ruin the economy; back wakery; attack UK history; BRINO. All the while shouting the t the liars are the Leavers.
It’s ‘im wot done it sir! Twernt me!
Brexit os a roaring success; any fool can see that. Indeed every fool does see it!
What is this obsession with France? This is the fourth essay on the place in the last week!
Let’s have something more mundane such as the Northern Ireland Legacy Trials Bill for example.
I’m afraid this week, Charles, the British media ain’t having it. You gotta make do with climate catastrophe….for a change…..and an escaped convict. Maybe try pushing your suggestion and agenda next week….who knows?
As they say “When the battle is over the Press come down from the hills and bayonet the wounded”, or in plain English:- ‘ the scum of the earth’.
Hear, hear..
No need to look over the Channel. Enoch Powell would have been a better fit.
I can hardly wait for Staler and Waldorf to show up.
Too easy :))))) I rubbed the lamp and my wish was granted.
I thought de Gaulle was hostile to the Treaty of Rome and in customary fashion they rushed to get it signed before he retuned to office and killed it
Most of the posts on this thread are so mediocre, between revenge from Trafalgar, to the French not doing their bit with illegal migrants wanting to flee to the UK, that I found fitting to join this very interesting article that traces all the way back to post war the divide between the EEC and the UK.
I have no interest nor intention to be dragged into a debate such as was de Gaulle the father of Europe……..who cares !!! But rather more interested into putting things into the context of the time. How did we end up here…..with a profoundly divided UK between remainders and leavers. Spare me the likes : French smell under the armpit or they never won a war….kind request. Happy reading….it is a very interesting article for anyone interested by post war Europe. https://hal.science/hal-02610169/document
Thank you. I will read with interest
I find it helps understanding to know where the key player stood
Really don’t think UK leaders need to be like de Gaulle to be effective, they just need to be serious, and prepared to engage with the facts rather than make-believe and fantasy. Something recent leaders have struggled with.
If the British seek inspiration in a French leader named Charles, I would suggest that Charles Martel would be the better choice for our times given current challenges.
Im late to this discussion. My father, who was a French teacher, noted that de Gaulle would often say when emphasising a point, ‘Moi,je, de Gaulle’ followed by the verb ‘dire’. He was never sure whether it should be translated in the first (dis) or third person (dit). So way ahead of the trend on pronouns.
Petulance? Petulance? ..didn’t Boris Johnson have more petulance than a box of frogs? Or was that Anglo-Saxon petulance?
Boris is NO Anglo-Saxon, thank God!