World

Friday

Hamish Macdonell

Salmond’s next stop: testing the Act of Union

Fresh from his astonishing victory in Holyrood, Alex Salmond has declared his next stage is an independence referendum. This is scoffed at: technically he has no powers to do so and a maximum of a third of Scots back independence. But it’s a brave man who’d bet against Alex Salmond right now, and there are many reasons to take seriously the prospect of Scottish independence. Here are some.   1) Scotland is making a mockery out of received wisdom. A few weeks ago, Labour was cruising towards victory. When the Scottish Parliament was designed, the prevailing wisdom suggested that the SNP could never win a majority because the electoral system

Thursday

Peter Hoskin

Claude Choules RIP

As the nation heads for the ballot boxes today, it might spare a moment of reflection for Claude Stanley Choules. The last surviving combat veteran of the first world war, born 110 years ago in Worcestershire, died earlier this morning at his residence in Australia. It leaves Florence Green — who served in a non-combat role as a mess-waitress — as the only remaining veteran of that great and terrible conflict. No doubt, our collective memory is weaker for Mr Choules’ death. But our country is stronger, more secure, for his life. An election, by whatever voting system, seems an apt sort of memorial to his passing.

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Pakistan responds

The covers of our newspapers are emblazoned with Bin Laden this morning — but it is an article in a US newspaper that really catches the eye. Pakistan’s President, Asif Ali Zardari, has written an op-ed for the Washington Post that defends his country’s role in the struggle against Al-Qaeda. It’s a defence that has four components. 1) Sympathy: “Pakistan … joins the other targets of al-Qaeda in our satisfaction that the source of the greatest evil of the new millennium has been silenced.” 2) Credit-sharing: “We in Pakistan take some satisfaction that our early assistance in identifying an al-Qaeda courier ultimately led to this day.” 3) Defiance: “Pakistan has

Monday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Why Bin Laden’s death matters

The more we hear about the operation that killed Bin Laden, the more impressive it becomes. US Navy Seals held dummy-runs of the raid on April 7th and 13th part of the extensive, leak-free planning that appears to have been going on for months. I think there are two things that come out of this raid that the West need to talk about. First, Pakistan and its role: did no one in the Pakistani state have any idea that Bin Laden was in Abbottabad, a town dominated by the Pakistani military? As Steve Coll writes at the New Yorker, ‘Who owned the land on which the house was constructed? How

Daniel Korski

Bin Laden died in Cairo<br />

The world’s most wanted terrorist, Osama Bin Laden, was shot Sunday morning in Pakistan by US special forces. But in reality he had died months ago. On the 25 of January 2011 to be exact. Or that is at least when Bin Laden’s power ended. For on that day millions of protesters — predominantly young Muslims — took to the streets of Cairo and demanded the overthrow of the regime of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and succeeded. With this act, they gave, for the first time since 9/1 and arguably for three decades, the Muslim world a more easily-understood and persuasive narrative than the one of anti-US resistance Al Qaeda

James Forsyth James Forsyth

What the death of Bin Laden means for Af-Pak policy

The political and strategic implications of Osama Bin Laden’s death are legion. One of the biggest impacts of this operation could well be that it speeds up the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Obama has long been keen to start bringing US troops home in large numbers. But a withdrawal from Afghanistan with Bin Laden not dealt with could have been portrayed as humiliating by Obama’s political opponents. Now, that Bin Laden is dead, it is much easier for Obama to scale down the US operation there, arguing that the central base of al Qaeda’s operations have now moved out of the country. The embarrassment for Pakistan of where Bin Laden

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Revenge at last

After a top secret operation costing a lot of money and carried out by myself, I can reveal that I have at last killed Adolf Hitler, the man responsible for the second world war. Only hours after the American government told a jubilant world that its special forces had killed the evil Muslim murderer, Osama Bin Laden, I was able to report that I had also done for Hitler. I discovered the Austrian-born madman, owner of a dog and a toothbrush moustache, in a gents outfitters in Coventry – ironically, one of the places which he devastated with his infamous airline company, Lufthansa. I approached the now 122-year-old purveyor of

James Forsyth James Forsyth

How the US pulled it off

The veil is being pulled back on how the United States tracked down and killed Osama Bin Laden. The New York Times reveals that the intelligence trail started with information obtained from a Guantanamo Bay detainee about the courier that Bin Laden used to pass and receive messages to the outside world. This is proof that the public debate about the utility of Guantanamo is far too glib. This courier was then tracked down last August to the compound, in Abbottabad which was so secure and grand that the Americans realised that it could well be Bin Laden’s hide-out. These suspicions were reinforced when it became clear that this million

Peter Hoskin

What Obama said about Bin Laden and Pakistan before he became President

After the events of today, the video above has fresh resonance. It is from the first presidential debate in 2008, and features Barack Obama defending his previously stated view that “if the United States has Al Qaeda, Bin Laden, top level lieutenants in our sights, and Pakistan is unable or unwilling to act, then we should take them out.” Turns out, in this case, he was true to his word.

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The world’s most wanted man becomes the world’s most wanted photograph

Will we see pictures of the dead Bin Laden? When Saddam’s sons were killed, pictures of their corpses were released by the American military, on the grounds that it was crucial for Iraqis to believe they were no more. This time, we’re told that Bin Laden has already been buried at sea, the Saudis having refused to repatriate his body. The CIA say they have pictures from yesterday’s assassination, and that the pictures of Bin Laden circulating right now (which have been picked up by some of the British media) are fake. It’s unclear whether they intend to release the real pictures. Bin Laden’s body was identified by some members

Peter Hoskin

Osama Bin Laden’s death: the world responds

We have already seen Barack Obama’s statement on the death of Osama Bin Laden. Below is more reaction from across the world: David Cameron: “The news that Osama Bin Laden is dead will bring great relief to people across the world. Osama Bin Laden was responsible for the worst terrorist atrocities the world has seen – for 9/11 and for so many attacks, which have cost thousands of lives, many of them British. It is a great success that he has been found and will no longer be able to pursue his campaign of global terror. This is a time to remember all those murdered by Osama Bin Laden, and

Peter Hoskin

A map that raises questions

Here’s a map that I’ve put together of the area where Bin Laden was discovered and killed. The red point is his suspected residence, the blue and green points are Pakistani military centres. You can, of course, zoom in, out and around the image, as well as click on the points for captions: View A map that raises questions in a larger map

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A triumph for America that raises questions about Pakistan

The killing of Osama Bin Laden is one of the clearest victories in the war on terror since the fall of the Taliban government in Afghanistan in 2001. It is a major triumph for American intelligence. Bin Laden’s death does not mark the end of the war on terror. But it does close a chapter and demonstrate that the United States has the willingness and the determination to keep up a manhunt for a decade. Perhaps, the biggest question it raises is about Pakistan. Bin Laden was found not in the lawless, border regions of Pakistan but living in a mansion right in the heart of the country in Abbottabad.

Peter Hoskin

Osama Bin Laden is dead

The manhunt is over, as is the man. After almost a decade since 11 September 2001, a decade of the Afghan conflict, Osama Bin Laden is dead. The Al Qaeda leader was shot by US forces, not in a dusty cave complex in the mountains, but at a large house north of Islamabad. Announcing the news last night, Barack Obama called it, “the most significant achievement to date in our nation’s effort to defeat Al Qaeda.” It will surely be remembered as the most significant achievement of his Presidency, too. Let’s remember, though, that Bin Laden was not Islamist terror, just as Islamist terror is not Bin Laden. The fundamentalists

Sunday

Daniel Korski

A model for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge

With the newspapers still full of Royal Wedding pictures, I thought I’d draw CoffeeHousers’ attention to something remarkable: a visit by Queen Margrethe II of Denmark (pictured, left, at Westminster Abbey last Friday) to Helmand Province. That’s right, the 71-year old Danish monarch visited the her country’s troops in late March this year, accompanied by the defence minister. Crown Prince Fredrik persuaded her mother to visit the troops after his own previous trip to the region. In this YouTube clip recorded in Helmand, Queen Margrethe talks to the camera (sorry, it is in Danish) about her experiences in the war-torn province. She pays tribute to the two British soldiers who

Saturday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

How the recriminations over AV’s defeat will change the debate over Lords reform

It is odd to think that only the second national referendum in our history is only five days away. The combination of the Royal Wedding and the failure of the campaign to grip the public imagination has condemned it to being ‘In Other News’, on this the final weekend before the vote. At the moment, No appears to be cruising to victory. The Yes campaign lacks both message and momentum. I also suspect that, asPaul Goodman says, the rest of the week will see debate about why it has all gone so wrong for Yes. One thing I expect we will hear a lot of in the coming days is

Peter Hoskin

An honest plea? Or a cynical gambit?

I was planning on collating today’s sunny newspaper covers for Coffee House — but Tim Montgomerie has beaten me to it. So let’s, instead, turn our attention away from the Royal Wedding, and on to Libya. A striking thing has happened there this morning: Gaddafi has called for a ceasefire, and for negotiations between his regime and NATO. Although the murderous leader’s television address was shot through with the usual defiant rhetoric — “No one can force me to leave my country and no one can tell me not to fight for my country,” he bellowed — it also included some concessionary passages. “Let us negotiate,” was one of them.

Thursday

Clarissa Tan

The Royal Wedding (extended expat version)

Last month, dressed as a town crier, the head of the British Club in Singapore, Sean Boyle, visited the offices of every major newspaper in the country. Accompanied by an entourage also in fancy dress, he declaimed that the British Club would be celebrating the nuptials of Prince William and Kate Middleton in a festival that would last 10 days. The reception to his announcement was warm. An editor of the Tamil Murasu, the newspaper that serves Singapore’s ethnic Indian population, left the newsroom to return dressed in traditional Indian costume, to pose for photos with Boyle (see above). The team at the Berita Harian, the Malay-language daily, gave the

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Obama’s military reshuffle

President Obamna’s nomination of  General Petraeus to run the CIA will have a huge knock on effect on the US military. Petraeus will have to resign his commission to take on the post which means that his work trying to transform the US army into a force comfortable trying to deal with counter-insurgency will have to come to an end. One also can’t help but suspect that the Obama administration will be glad to avoid a public tussle with Petraeus over the schedule for withdrawal by moving him out of theatre. Of the other moves in Obama’s shake up of his national security team, one worth paying particular attention to

Nick Cohen Nick Cohen

Libya and the shattering of European illusions

I have a piece in the Norwegian daily VG about how the Libyan war is destroying old certainties. I point out that although: “Den europeiske liberale middelklassens illusjoner ødelegges av krigen i Libya. Tenk på hvordan deres ulike talsmenn og –kvinner snakket om internasjonal politick i tv-studioer i Oslo eller London for få måneder siden. Alt de forutsatte som sant har vist seg å være usant.” We now know that: “Vi må kanskje leve med at Gaddafi overlever krigen – og ved å klamre seg til makten girhan håp til krigsherjede diktatorer i regionen og bryter ned moralen hos motstanderne deres.” For the minority among you who cannot read Norwegian.