The Anger of Parliament (temporary)

Statement from Mr.Raab on Gov.U.K. Website

This thread is about what the UK government has done/is doing Lemongrove. Neither of your three posts speaks to that.

You seem to be implying that because the US is the senior partner, the UK government is not responsible to UK voters for what it does and therefore, there is no point in discussing it from the behaviour of the UK government.

You certainly seem to be trying, again and again, to force the conversation away from discussing the UK government.

However, such an argument would be a fallacious one. There is a fallacy within it. It is not true that because the US is the senior partner, the UK government is not responsible to UK voters for what it does.

Continued discussion and blame on the US government and the relevant Presidents are not relevant to the thread. The only exception to this is if the US government were to begin running our country

your three posts
your last three posts--

I wonder if when Tony Blair deployed U.K. Troops to Afghanistan he had an exit strategy. ?

I guess not as he is conspicuous by his absence on the world stage which he has tried very hard to make his own since leaving No.10.

So Raab

He would now have us believe that he couldn’t make THAT call because he was working at pace (love that word??) and tirelessly to secure the Kabul airport, when we know that it had already had an agreement to be secure with the USA and the Taliban.

The FO officials have also told the world that Raab had indicated that he didn’t want to be bothered at all because he was on his hols.

HE IS LYING.

Threads meander PippaZ as we are repeatedly seeing.

The government ( any government) is always responsible to UK voters for what it does.
Very true..... but what could they have done in the face of what we know just happened?
All the nonsense about Raab not making a phone call to an official in Afghanistan.... the government there was fast melting away ( who could blame them) and the administration there would hardly be concerned about their citizens who had worked for the UK in the chaos enveloping Kabul.
The government ( ours) did the best thing possible at that juncture, namely to ask embassy staff to work as fast as they could to get people out and to lay on military planes to fly them to Brize Norton.
It wouldn’t matter to me who was PM and what political
flavour of government we have here, in a situation such as we have found ourselves in I don’t think there would be much hope of anything better happening.

Rather difficult to have discussions with a Government Ministers which are not only fleeing from their desks but escaping the Country they were elected to Govern.

What thought or care did the Afghani Government have for it’s electorate?

President Biden is apparently considering air strikes to destroy the weaponry left behind. I daresay the Taliban managed to work that out for themselves, but the President has kindly confirmed it. As someone remarked, undoubtedly the weaponry has now been moved to residential built up areas thus making its destruction impossible. As for the telephone call, as I understand it, it was impossible to make for security reasons by either men, but who knows what the truth of the matter is. What is for certain is that Boris requested an urgent phone call to President Biden on Monday morning and finally managed to make contact at 10.10 on Tuesday. The President failed to advise any of America's NATO allies of his intentions until the American ball was rolling and chaos inevitably followed particularly at certain embassy s, where staff scrambled to leave. Everybody including NATO were caught on the hop, not just the British Government.

As a matter of interest Biden is giving a speech at 1pm US time today.

Jabberwok

President Biden is apparently considering air strikes to destroy the weaponry left behind. I daresay the Taliban managed to work that out for themselves, but the President has kindly confirmed it. As someone remarked, undoubtedly the weaponry has now been moved to residential built up areas thus making its destruction impossible. As for the telephone call, as I understand it, it was impossible to make for security reasons by either men, but who knows what the truth of the matter is. What is for certain is that Boris requested an urgent phone call to President Biden on Monday morning and finally managed to make contact at 10.10 on Tuesday. The President failed to advise any of America's NATO allies of his intentions until the American ball was rolling and chaos inevitably followed particularly at certain embassy s, where staff scrambled to leave. Everybody including NATO were caught on the hop, not just the British Government.

Quite so.

But we of course are interested in our rats tail of a government.

So much for the “special relationship”??

Jabberwok all tanks, armoured cars and any other US military paraphernalia will have been relocated near hospitals, schools and residential areas by the Taliban it’s their long practiced MO.

Whitewavemark2

So Raab

He would now have us believe that he couldn’t make THAT call because he was working at pace (love that word??) and tirelessly to secure the Kabul airport, when we know that it had already had an agreement to be secure with the USA and the Taliban.

The FO officials have also told the world that Raab had indicated that he didn’t want to be bothered at all because he was on his hols.

HE IS LYING.

The Raab case attracts criticism as much because it sums up the general political anger at how the UK government prepared (or didn't) for the expected crisis in Afghanistan.

The problem is that it is an example of a wider sense of a British government being slapdash and inefficient. There are now reports from government sources in the Times suggesting that hundreds more Britons and Afghans could have been flown out of the country by now had the Foreign Office acted more swiftly.

This is the sort of thing that will decide Raab''s future and eventually the Governments.

PippaZ

Whitewavemark2

So Raab

He would now have us believe that he couldn’t make THAT call because he was working at pace (love that word??) and tirelessly to secure the Kabul airport, when we know that it had already had an agreement to be secure with the USA and the Taliban.

The FO officials have also told the world that Raab had indicated that he didn’t want to be bothered at all because he was on his hols.

HE IS LYING.

The Raab case attracts criticism as much because it sums up the general political anger at how the UK government prepared (or didn't) for the expected crisis in Afghanistan.

The problem is that it is an example of a wider sense of a British government being slapdash and inefficient. There are now reports from government sources in the Times suggesting that hundreds more Britons and Afghans could have been flown out of the country by now had the Foreign Office acted more swiftly.

This is the sort of thing that will decide Raab''s future and eventually the Governments.

Add incompetent, untruthful, corrupt, immoral to slapdash and inefficient and you begin to get an idea of the nature of the U.K. government.

I don’t think there has ever really been a special relationship wwm2
Certain Presidents are friendlier than others towards us but that’s about it.
It took Pearl Harbour to get them into the last time we really needed their help.
Reagan was the best one ( towards us) in recent times.

Raab does have a problem with his insistence that he was working tirelessly as Kabul fell.

Witnesses at the hotel have quickly refuted rabbis claim saying that he spent the day playing paddle tennis and lounging.

I think that it’s an approach that this government are relying on to get out of sticky situations. It’s never their fault. Any repercussions of Brexit are the EU’s fault; people coming here in dinghies are because the French aren’t doing their duty; I couldn’t phone the Afghan minister because he was so busy; Biden wouldn’t take my call; we couldn’t do anything about Afghanistan because we were the junior partner.

It used to be that the ministers of this country took responsibility for things in which they were involved. If things were difficult, they tried to resolve things and acted as leaders, not as some little guy that just shrugs his shoulders and says there was nothing they could do. Remember when Carrington resigned over the Falklands? Currie over the eggs, of all things? It used to be that the world expected the UK to take the lead and show others how to behave. Not any more, not with this Government.

Entitlement - it’s part of their DNA

Tell you what, you can have our foreign minister. Not exactly someone to inspire confidence,either. Think school prefect.

Lord Carrington resigned over the Falklands as that was wholly our (his) responsibility this fiasco is not.
Yes the 'special relationship ' was ok under President Reagan, except for the invasion of Grenada without prior warning to the UK ! Bearing in mind the Queen was still head of state this clearly caused a furore. Mrs Thatcher was incandescent with rage according to all reports. As you say Lemon, I think, even if this ever existed except perhaps in the imagination , it is now a bit paper thin particularly these days.

I just think its a pity that our current crop of ministers would rather find excuses than 'fess up to things, and usually after they've tried to pretend that there wasn't a problem in the first place.

The Government will close ranks and support Raab. It's what they do.

I am more amazed that some know exactly what Raab did or didn’t do Were they there

rosie1959

I am more amazed that some know exactly what Raab did or didn’t do Were they there

The answer to your question is yes. The FO have reported along with eye witnesses at the hotel in which he was staying.

The pressure is growing for him to resign.

I guess it comes down to the fact that so many of us don't trust him, and he holds one of the Great Offices of State. Can you imagine us wondering if any of the previous Foreign Secretaries was skiving? (Johnson excluded, obviously) Margaret Beckett, John Major, Malcom Rifkind...I might not have agreed with all their policies but I didn't think they would have been on their hols during times of national crisis. They all have more honour.