51吃瓜

British security would improve听upon听separation from the European Union.

British Prime Minister David Cameron鈥檚 announcement on February 20 of a 鈥渟pecial鈥� relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union (EU) briefly boosted support for staying in鈥攊f only because he dominated the news agenda.听However, support will decline before the referendum on June 23, particularly on the issue of security, which he falsely offered as a reason not to separate from the union.

On the day after returning from Brussels, in his first ,听Cameron听claimed to have earned a 鈥渟pecial status鈥� for the UK. He listed Britain鈥檚 鈥渆conomy鈥� and 鈥渘ational security鈥� as the two leading things that would benefit from the deal. 罢丑别听reference to security was surprising, mainly because the agreement in Belgium included nothing听that would benefit听security.

Security Spin

Initially, the spin was working for Cameron. This has been an unfair debate so far: Cameron forbade his ministers from campaigning until after he had reached an agreement with the EU. Even afterward, his from assisting ministers who campaign to leave the EU (even though civil servants are supposed to be non-partisan). Nevertheless, within a couple days of Cameron鈥檚 return, a quarter of his cabinet, almost half of his parliamentary , and practically all the party came out for听separation.

The first听poll鈥攃onducted by 鈥攕ince Cameron鈥檚 speech suggested that 51% of British voters wanted to remain in, 39% wanted out and 10%听were undecided. This was a small boost on the proportion a year ago. In听, a survey by YouGov had found that the 鈥渋n鈥� advocates made up 45% of respondents, while 35% would vote to leave. Three weeks before the 2015 General Election, a survey by 鈥攑ublished in the Financial Times鈥攕uggested that Britons were evenly split (40% in, 39% out), while a survey by for immediately after the election found that 45% wanted to be 鈥渋n鈥� and 38% wanted to be 鈥渙ut.鈥�

Yet deeper questions suggest that the majority do not like anything in particular about the EU, even though they like Europe in general. Already, the same听ComRes 听showed that only 45% believe the prime minister had succeeded in improving the terms of Britain鈥檚 membership; 42% said he had failed. Meanwhile, 34% think British national security would improve if the UK stayed in, the same proportion said it would make no difference, and 28% said national security would decline. Meanwhile, the poll found that voters strongly believe that British democracy, sovereignty and border control would improve if the UK left the EU.

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The pro-agreement respondents probably conflate economic security and national security, as has Cameron鈥檚 government, by arguing for the last five years that it needs to stabilize the economy after the Labour Party鈥檚 mal-administration (1997-2010) before it can provide other forms of security.

Economic security is not transitive with the most salient forms of national security: Britain鈥檚 economy might grow, but that would not change its current exposure to various threats through open borders and inept EU foreign policies.

Since then, Cameron鈥檚 strategy has clearly relied on warnings about the 鈥渞isks,鈥� 鈥渦ncertainty鈥� and 鈥渋nsecurity鈥� of leaving the EU without proof, prompting British tabloids to refer to his campaign as 鈥�.鈥�

British support for staying in will decline as the debate exposes more of the facts and less of the spin. Any way you cut security, it would improve听after a听separation: national, transnational and international.

National Security

The UK鈥檚 national risks in the last decade or two have been mostly social: terrorism, trafficking and other transnational organized crime. The EU helps in some ways, but mostly makes them worse, with its policies of open borders and free movement of people, which are channels for criminals and provocateurs to find new opportunities in one country after escaping unwanted attention in another.

These EU policies are destabilizing in general. In the 2000s, the Labour government opened Britain to hundreds of millions of EU citizens. The party admitted to a crisis in 鈥渘ational cohesion,鈥� but denied听that immigration had anything to do with national cohesion, except to characterize all concerns about immigration as racist. Its main solution was to invest in national sports teams (particularly ahead of the London Olympics in 2012), but that sort of vicarious nationalism dissipates in weeks.

Even under Cameron鈥檚 administration, immigration is rising from practically every EU member state, particularly the . Annual听听into the UK is running at more than 320,000 per year, despite the prime minister鈥檚 campaign commitments (since before the General Elections of 2010 and 2015) to reduce net migration to tens of thousands. The British government has no estimate of the number of illegal migrants who get into the UK.

Cameron has repeatedly admitted that Britain receives too many immigrants for integration or employment. Yet he came back from Brussels with no deal on migration. Cameron has staked his campaign on support for the EU as it is, including the free movement of people.

The EU鈥檚 responses to migration are chaotic resultants of hypocritical, contradictory national self-interests pretending to be European interests. For instance, France has ignored international law for years by refusing to process thousands of migrants camping illegally at听听and Dunkirk until they can sneak onto traffic crossing the English Channel. Ordinary travelers routinely post footage of gangs of migrants breaking into vehicles for the trip across the English Channel, due to practically no inspection at the French end.

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罢丑别听听effectively closed the ferry and train crossings for most of July and August 2015. British-French cooperation (such as French allowance of British border agents) has been achieved听bilaterally, not through the EU. In early 2016, France promised to external Syrian refugees within weeks, having not processed any at the Calais 鈥渏ungle鈥� in years.

Similarly, Greece failed for years to secure its maritime borders or to process refugees on Greek soil, so long as it knew that almost all of them would make their own way across open borders to stronger economies (at least 80% of European migrants in 2015 passed through听).

Migrant Identities

惭别补苍飞丑颈濒别,听听(claiming to take the moral lead on behalf of Europe) accepted 1.1 million migrants without any prior screening in 2015 alone鈥攁nd expects at least another half a million in 2016. Last year, German Chancellor Angela Merkel suddenly welcomed all migrants into Germany by describing them all as 鈥�.鈥�

However, around 80% of the migrants are听; most of the non-Syrians rationally but听鈥攁nd are easily identified by journalists who speak Arabic. Yet most end up in Europe anyway, sharing the same refugee centers, where听听break out between real Syrians and impostors. EU policy on migration discriminates against genuine refugees who do not have the money or the youthful vigor to make the journey to Europe, particularly women and the elderly; around two-thirds of the migrants are fit听.

Within a month of letting all migrants in, Merkel wanted to听听arrivals, to be 鈥溾�� on failed asylum seekers and to separate听, which eventually included all Afghans and Albanians (the largest national groups after Syrians, each larger than Iraqi refugees). Since then, Germany has belatedly听听for open borders, while at the same time urging Europeans to uphold the principle of open borders.

European agendas corrupt British discourse too, especially the听, which in 2015 described all migrants as Syrian refugees, until, in 2016, it decided to call them 鈥渕igrants鈥濃�攚here a 鈥渕igrant鈥� is anybody 鈥渙n the move鈥� to claim asylum, but not all migrants are asylum-seekers; most of these migrants will never qualify for asylum. Why not define a migrant literally as somebody on the move? The inaccuracies and conceits are to the detriment of genuine asylum-seekers.

罢丑别听听remains a year out of date. In March 2016, David O鈥橲ullivan, a long-time technocrat from the unelected European Commission who is currently the EU鈥檚 ambassador to the US, referred to all 1.25 million migrants from 2015 to date as 鈥渞efugees and asylum-seekers.鈥� When challenged, he claimed not to know how many are听economic migrants or Syrians.听His meandering attempts to articulate a policy ended in听hope 鈥渢hat the reception of refugees takes place in a more orderly and structured way.鈥�

European conceits on the identity of migrants and open borders are compounded by conceits on the prospects for integration. Merkel promised that all migrants could be听听simply because 鈥渢here are 80 million of us [Germans].鈥� This was before听听by migrants at New Year鈥檚 Eve festivities and public baths that were initially covered up by officials, which prompted unprecedented public protests against migrants, and counter-protests.

All European member states are destabilized by migration, including the most generous and tolerant such as听. Racism toward migrants does explain some of this destabilization, but migrants bring plenty of their own racism (not to mention the sexism), and many problems with few benefits to citizens, so some of the opposition to uncontrolled immigration is logical.

Europe鈥檚 open borders are contrary to decades of best practice: Keep refugees as near to their home countries as possible, given the risks of migration to the migrants themselves and to the stability of destination societies, until their home nations can be restored to peace. This was the practice the EU itself accepted when it took over the mission in the former Yugoslavia in 2004.

Transnational Threats

The greatest security issues of our time are all transnational: terrorism, organized crime, epidemics鈥攁ll due to globalization and integrationist ideals. The EU is a net impediment to the fight against transnational crime because of the prioritization of national economic self-interests hiding behind the ideals of pan-European free movement.

British support for staying in will decline as the debate exposes more of the facts and less of the spin. Any way you cut security, it would improve听after a听separation: national, transnational and international.

Transnational security is impossible without border control, as illustrated in November 2015 when Islamic State (IS)听听gathered weapons and organized in neighboring Belgium before crossing the border to attack in Paris and then returning to Belgium to prepare another assault. Worse, uncontrolled migration is a channel for crime from outside the EU. Some of the Paris attackers were French citizens with criminal records and known jihadist histories who traveled from the IS territory by听.

Yet the EU does not admit these facts, and thus has no policy on these transnational threats. Stepping into the vacuum is NATO鈥檚 Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, , who stated the obvious鈥攖hat migration 鈥渕asks the movement of criminals, terrorists and foreign fighters鈥濃�攂efore leading the European response.

The EU is not necessary to the UK鈥檚 transnational security. The day after Cameron鈥檚 return from Brussels, , former home secretary in the Labour government, claimed that 鈥渢he European arrest warrant鈥� is a 鈥渉uge鈥� benefit to Britain鈥檚 security, without which a terrorist suspect would take years to recapture. This is false: EUROPOL is redundant to INTERPOL. Criminals who flee within the EU are lost because open borders provide no opportunities to discover the identity of a fugitive, until he or she carelessly attracts official interest through another crime or a demand on public services.

The French and Belgian response to the Paris attacks was bilateral. The EU would have been a much slower and less effective channel.

A Separation

Cameron鈥檚 government organized a听听arguing that separation would be bad for international security鈥攁pparently signed by 13 military personnel who had previously served the government, although one of them had never agreed to sign, and another was听听without full disclosure. The letter offered no logic or evidence, only unfounded assertions that 鈥淏ritain will have to confront these challenges whether it is inside or outside the EU. But within the EU, we are stronger.鈥�

One of the signatories later added his assertion that the UK鈥檚 exit from the EU would break up听NATO, but NATO does not need the EU鈥檚 redundant and inferior efforts to establish a separate military capacity.

Cameron鈥檚 subsequent claims have听: that the EU helped Britain to counter Russian and Iranian threats, to help bring the Ebola pandemic under control and to lower its telephone bills. He subsequently praised the EU for听听with dialogue, which has been听听by Peter Mandelson鈥擳ony Blair鈥檚 chief political architect before becoming an EU commissioner for trade (2004-08).

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In fact, peace in Europe was overdetermined after World War II, due to war weariness, the occupation and reduction of Germany, the greater external threat posed by the Soviet Union, and the incorporation of most of Europe into NATO. This is true before the deterrent effects of nuclear weapons are added to the equation.

The EU is an economic and political union, not a military one. So far as the EU has countered international conflict, it has belatedly taken over the monitoring of a region that NATO had stabilized already (as in the former Yugoslavia), or pandered to an aggressor rather than upset its economic interests, as in the EU鈥檚 response to Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014 or Georgia in 2008. NATO and national governments are the ones standing up to Russia鈥檚 many cyber and airspace听, and Moscow鈥檚 harboring of suspects who traveled across Europe with .

As the case of former Yugoslavia illustrates, a strong undemocratic federal executive can deny the unhappiness of its members for decades, but the disputes only become uglier when finally unleashed.

The EU is often credited for encouraging democratization and liberalization in prospective members, but it turns a blind eye when members err back toward authoritarianism, as illustrated by . The EU is now accelerating Turkey鈥檚 prospective membership despite , in return for half-hearted cooperation in managing the flow of migrants into the EU from the country.

Worse, the EU is a cause of conflict, most obviously between its undemocratic executive and democratically-minded member governments; between its undemocratic European courts and national legislatures; and between unrepresentative members of the European Parliament and national representatives.

The chair of the House of Commons鈥� Select Committee on Defence warned that the 听is EU integration into ever more supranational and undemocratic institutions. In other words, the EU has been undermining European democracy itself, in the name of European unity.

The views expressed in this article are the author鈥檚 own and do not necessarily reflect 51吃瓜鈥檚 editorial policy.

Photo Credit:听 / / / /

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