History records that George II was the last British king to lead his troops on the battlefield, at the Battle of Dettingen in 1743. But maybe it is only a matter of time… Addressing the COP26 summit in Glasgow Prince Charles called for a ‘vast military-style campaign’ against climate change. We must put ourselves on a ‘war-like footing’, marshalling the resources of the private sector as we did during wartime. I look forward to the sight of Charles, on horseback, leading a battalion against Xi Jinping’s People’s Army to try to take the site of China’s latest coal-fired power station.
There is a very big problem with this kind of rhetoric. If, as Prince Charles added, COP26 is the ‘last chance saloon’ then where will that leave delegates at COP27? Clearly, there will be no point in them attending at all, given that it will be too late and the world will presumably be finished.
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