Rock On

This course may lead you to a great future…

GIBRALTAR is one of the last outposts of the British Empire, and the Tony Blair government is proposing to decolonize it Not by handing independence to the natives, though, as has been the practice everywhere else in the modern age, but by ceding all or some sovereignty to Spain, itself a colonial power with residual outposts in the Canary Islands and Morocco. If they were allowed self-determination, the people of Gibraltar would choose virtually unanimously to stay British. But Britain would like the support of Spain against the Franco-German bloc driving the new and mightily busy European Union in Brussels, and Gibraltar has therefore become a handy bargaining chip in other peoples’ political poker. What is happening today to the Gibraltarians is small stuff in the black annals of betrayal. No trials or deportations, no shooting. But the cynicism could hardly be plainer or more ominous for the European future. Justice and democracy are of no account.

About the Author

David Pryce-Jones

David Pryce-Jones (1936–2025) was a British author and commentator and served as a senior editor of National Review.

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This course may lead you to a great future…

GIBRALTAR is one of the last outposts of the British Empire, and the Tony Blair government is proposing to decolonize it Not by handing independence to the natives, though, as has been the practice everywhere else in the modern age, but by ceding all or some sovereignty to Spain, itself a colonial power with residual outposts in the Canary Islands and Morocco. If they were allowed self-determination, the people of Gibraltar would choose virtually unanimously to stay British. But Britain would like the support of Spain against the Franco-German bloc driving the new and mightily busy European Union in Brussels, and Gibraltar has therefore become a handy bargaining chip in other peoples’ political poker. What is happening today to the Gibraltarians is small stuff in the black annals of betrayal. No trials or deportations, no shooting. But the cynicism could hardly be plainer or more ominous for the European future. Justice and democracy are of no account.