From Liberation Scotland Committee (LSC). ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- As detailed in our email response to Jim Sillars, while this draft paper correctly identifies some of the key issues that must be addressed by Scotland’s independence movement to achieve its goal and protect the national interests of a future Scottish state, the proposed ‘foreign’ policy positions in response to these are entirely counter-productive and frankly dangerous for Scotland’s future. If adopted and published widely, they will damage the emerging positive relationships on the world stage created to date by the work of Liberation Scotland, undermine Scotland’s case to the UN and threaten the likelihood of support for and recognition by the international community of nations for an independent Scottish state. -------------------------------------------------------------------------
We fundamentally disagree with your proposals to align the ‘foreign policy’ position of an independent Scotland ahead of achieving independence, on the basis of essentially continuing to follow the UK’s historic position, i.e. support for the US ‘special relationship’, continued membership of NATO and (unwilling) host of US nuclear weapons on the Clyde. This policy position will greatly damage Scotland’s case for self-determination (currently being taken by Liberation Scotland at the UN) and will not deliver security or sovereignty for a future Scottish state. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The policy positions proposed in your draft paper for Scotland – and particularly those expressed regarding the US, NATO, the EU, China and the nations of the Asian and African continents – will do immense damage to Scotland’s international credibility and standing, including amongst the 29 member states of the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation (C-24). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Given that (a) the likelihood of the Scottish Government being granted ‘Section 30 permission to hold another independence referendum during the life of the current Scottish Parliament is extremely low, and (b) the governments of most western nations (including the US and our European neighbours) are predominantly hostile to Scottish independence (due to their own self interest), we consider it entirely unhelpful to the process of the international relationship building for Scotland’s independence movement to express support for the US and NATO, while marginalising the importance to Scotland of building positive relationships with nations in Asia, Africa and the emerging powerful global non-aligned movement.
Maybe Mr Sillars should read Mark Carney's speech on the changes developing in the so called " rules based international order" and the recent Chinese paper on the same topic.
Although I agree that consideration and preparation of Scotland's re emergence as a independent sovereign state requires forethought and preparedness I believe that equal importance must be given to the formation of a more direct democracy Scotland where indigenous Scots are not spoken at by politicians and political parties but directly involved in the ongoing process of OUR futures , am I the only one who is sick of politicians and political parties dictating what is good for us without any consultation of what we the electorate actually want
I have some thoughts on Sovereignty and Foreign Policy Relations:
Sovereignty
We should not talk about Scotland 'gaining' what the article refers to as 'sovereignty'. This implies that sovereignty lies somewhere other than with the Scottish people. That can only mean Westminster and, by extension, means accepting that the parliament sitting at Westminster is currently sovereign.
I do not concur!
The historical Scottish tradition is one of popular sovereignty which can be traced back at least until the Declaration of Arbroath (1314). This democratic lineage was reiterated by the Claim of Right (1689) and reiterated by Kenyon Wright in 1989 – remember “ we say yes … and we are the people”?
It is not a parliament of political representatives and certainly not one that resides in another country and is not representative of the Scottish population at all.
We are seeking the return of our statehood via our human right of self-determination as underpinned by the UN Charter, a right that we are currently barred from exercising due to the British government and the acquiescent and timorous compliance of the SNP led by John Swinney and his Scottish administration at Holyrood.
It is the people who are boss in Scotland. Not the people subject to Westminster agreement. The people alone. That principle must be asserted at all times.
Foreign Policy
It seems as though the thrust of the argument here effectively aligns with the current foreign/defence/NATO policy of the British government which can be summarised as 'Russia bad'. In fact, it is the USA and Europe including the UK but via Ukraine, that is the aggressor. The Russians are protecting their, to use the term in the article, 'state interests' in Eastern Ukraine, 90% of whom are Russian speaking and who, previously, had been subjected to brutal murder and mayhem by neo-Nazi militias in these areas.
It is largely accepted that the CIA engineered the Maiden Coup of 2014 which overthrew the Russian friendly government of Viktor Yanukovych, ultimately leading to the unstable and dangerous position that we are now in. So why would we wish to ally ourselves with an organisation whose prime member goes around the World overthrowing (or attempting to) governments that it doesn't like (Iran 1953, Chile 1973, Grenada 1983, Panama 1989, Afghanistan 2001, Iraq 2003, Libya 2011 etc). It does this regardless of the whichever flavour of the uniparty holds the US presidency and whoever the personality is (Biden, Trump) in office.
Perhaps a period of fence-sitting would be a good idea. Why not join the Partnership for Peace for example? That way, we could be like Ireland and signal our willingness to engage but not unconditionally where we might be forced to do the bidding of the clearly militant dominant states comprising NATO.
Why have independent statehood if your foreign/defence policy will remain largely unchanged in terms of military alliances?
In any event we really should be making contingency for the Scottish people to have the final say on the matter once a proposal has been fashioned - that's called democracy. Where the people are in charge - remember the DoA 1314 and the COR 1689?
Finally, perhaps we should remember that the Russians might actually be our friends. After all it was they who paid by far and away the largest sacrifice in WWII. The 28m Soviet dead, of which 14m were Russians.
The Arctic convoys may have supplied them but it was the Russians who did the brutal fighting on the Eastern Front. If any country or people can be described as having 'won the war' It was they - not the Americans and certainly not the British - who did so.
We should approach our foreign relations with an open mind not one conditioned by decades pro-Western propaganda since the end of the Second World War and centuries of British indoctrination since 1707.
The Yes United 'foreign policy discussion paper 1' assumes Scots' only option is to trade our sovereignty to the US/NATO umbrella to avoid economic and political sabotage.
As acknowledged in my earlier email submission, my respect for Jim Sillars, his knowledge and legacy within this movement are undeniable. In the 20th century, the brand of "realism" that he has put forward in this discussion paper, making a deal with the biggest empire and powers to ensure a small state's survival, was considered an essential geopolitical move. Notwithstanding that, the mechanics of global power have shifted fundamentally under our feet, and statecraft must update to match the 21st century.
1. The Rise of Elite Power Networks
The current American administration is openly hostile to the established 'rules-based order' it once anchored, treating even NATO's mutual guarantee as something transactional. What is rising in its place is not a stable new settlement; it is a fractured system driven by breakaway elite power groups. Trump's "Board of Peace", unveiled at Davos, shows one such shape of it: a body that routes around consensus-driven institutions to hand its own executive board sweeping, unaccountable power. Between the alliance treated as transactional and the consensus bodies bypassed, the old order is collapsing. Tying a newly independent Scotland to a fracturing military alliance, or bowing to an unstable, warring elite network, is not statecraft; it is walking into a burning building.
2. The Technocratic Front Line
We are moving into the age of technocracy, yet the enemy is not the technology itself; technology is a tool, made by humans and neutral until it's wielded in the wrong hands: the enemy is the people who mean to own it, exploit its benefits and bend its uses for self-empowerment and gain. Those who view technology through a corporate, neoliberal lens see it merely as a commercial market to capture. But technology is now the primary civic infrastructure of the state, and these elite power networks want to use centralised digital infrastructure to build a new colonial cage. The counter-mechanics, though, already exist.
3. The Open-Source Infrastructure of Democracy
The very technology these elite power networks want to use to bind us, centralised digital IDs and proprietary walled gardens (centralised systems), is ultimately constructed from foundational tech that can actually set us free, provided we reject the levers of corporate control. We must not be fooled by proprietary, patented platforms designed to gatekeep our digital identity. True sovereignty cannot be rented from a tech company. The foundational tools for a decentralised society are already in the public domain, as open standards that no single company owns.
The Secure Asset Transfer Protocol (SATP), an open standard being developed through the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), is one such tool: the interoperability rail that lets sovereign networks connect and move value between them without a corporate gateway owning the road. On an open rail like that, the identity and agency of the individual can ride freely, held by the person and not leased from a platform. Push that agency down to the individual level and we serve all of Jock Tamson's bairns alike, a civic architecture with no single off-switch that a corporation or a state can reach for to censor, veto, or shut down.
4. Breaking the Structural Encasement
As Scots resuming the exercise of our national sovereignty, we should not be looking to escape one collapsing empire only to kneel to new maisters in the form of an unstable elite network. We must refuse the outdated 'realist' choice that says we must immediately surrender our greatest strength, our popular sovereignty, to survive the chaos of hegemonic power.
If Scotland pioneers this sovereign, peer-to-peer civic architecture, and by that I mean delivery by the will of the people, we don't just secure our own borders, we offer a structural blueprint for the Global South to finally bypass the legacy financial gatekeepers that have created the generational issues now faced by our young folk and children as we enter a new technological paradigm. What passes for realism today is fear being swept along by the current of rapid change, mistaking motion for direction. If Scots embrace the true potential of their existing sovereign powers internally this could in turn become the building block for a Sovereign Nations Network, a neutral, equal buffer zone of nations and peers backed by decentralised, foundational infrastructure. This network would stand as a robust alternative not only to the failing systems of the current elite power groups, but also as the mechanism through which direct democracy can begin to emerge beyond the current extractive capitalist 'democratic' model.
That is the foundational sovereignty we should be offering the Scottish people and the vision of a new enlichtenment fir awe o Jock Tamson's bairns.
This is a useful contribution because it pushes the debate beyond slogans and mandate politics into the harder question of statecraft.
For Scotland, the central issue is not only whether independence is desired, but whether the institutions, strategic thinking and negotiating capacity required for statehood are being built seriously enough in advance.
I do not think every question here has to be settled immediately, but the paper is right to insist that foreign policy, defence, trade, EU/EFTA choices, relations with England and Ireland, and the practical transition from devolution to statehood cannot be afterthoughts.
A credible independence case has to show not just democratic aspiration, but governing capacity.
Cheers for that,going to stew on it for awhile then give it another read later....
Would be nice if just ticking YES was enough.....
One thing I would say straight off is that though trump is himself temporary,the reality of maga and the newer crop of republicans,particularly in their Christian nationalism/america first narrative is going to be an ongoing feature of US politics....
Warning! This is my Bob Geldof/Band Aid "moment", minus the swearing! Yes United, as far as I can tell, is one of the Few pro-indy organisations actually working Seriously, Now, on potential crunch indy prep issues! Most political parties & other civic groups are doing nothing substantial, just usual opportunistic bluster & periods of silence. Holyrood is still talking about its "committee work programme" and goes in to two month recess at the end of this week! Jim Sillars is one of the best intellectual assets we have (whether you agree with all his views) and has a personal historical perspective that won't be around for ever. We really owe it to Jim to read this paper and comment directly to him as he has requested. Doesn't have to be a "War and Peace" response but "the guy" deserves feedback, critical and constructive, for what he is doing for us & future generations. This is an intellectual -political process (just like "back in the day"); it can't be reduced to social media "bites" . We really have to take this seriously and make some progress. So, please, please, read it and comment directly to Jim!
From Liberation Scotland Committee (LSC). ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- As detailed in our email response to Jim Sillars, while this draft paper correctly identifies some of the key issues that must be addressed by Scotland’s independence movement to achieve its goal and protect the national interests of a future Scottish state, the proposed ‘foreign’ policy positions in response to these are entirely counter-productive and frankly dangerous for Scotland’s future. If adopted and published widely, they will damage the emerging positive relationships on the world stage created to date by the work of Liberation Scotland, undermine Scotland’s case to the UN and threaten the likelihood of support for and recognition by the international community of nations for an independent Scottish state. -------------------------------------------------------------------------
We fundamentally disagree with your proposals to align the ‘foreign policy’ position of an independent Scotland ahead of achieving independence, on the basis of essentially continuing to follow the UK’s historic position, i.e. support for the US ‘special relationship’, continued membership of NATO and (unwilling) host of US nuclear weapons on the Clyde. This policy position will greatly damage Scotland’s case for self-determination (currently being taken by Liberation Scotland at the UN) and will not deliver security or sovereignty for a future Scottish state. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The policy positions proposed in your draft paper for Scotland – and particularly those expressed regarding the US, NATO, the EU, China and the nations of the Asian and African continents – will do immense damage to Scotland’s international credibility and standing, including amongst the 29 member states of the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation (C-24). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Given that (a) the likelihood of the Scottish Government being granted ‘Section 30 permission to hold another independence referendum during the life of the current Scottish Parliament is extremely low, and (b) the governments of most western nations (including the US and our European neighbours) are predominantly hostile to Scottish independence (due to their own self interest), we consider it entirely unhelpful to the process of the international relationship building for Scotland’s independence movement to express support for the US and NATO, while marginalising the importance to Scotland of building positive relationships with nations in Asia, Africa and the emerging powerful global non-aligned movement.
Maybe Mr Sillars should read Mark Carney's speech on the changes developing in the so called " rules based international order" and the recent Chinese paper on the same topic.
Although I agree that consideration and preparation of Scotland's re emergence as a independent sovereign state requires forethought and preparedness I believe that equal importance must be given to the formation of a more direct democracy Scotland where indigenous Scots are not spoken at by politicians and political parties but directly involved in the ongoing process of OUR futures , am I the only one who is sick of politicians and political parties dictating what is good for us without any consultation of what we the electorate actually want
I have some thoughts on Sovereignty and Foreign Policy Relations:
Sovereignty
We should not talk about Scotland 'gaining' what the article refers to as 'sovereignty'. This implies that sovereignty lies somewhere other than with the Scottish people. That can only mean Westminster and, by extension, means accepting that the parliament sitting at Westminster is currently sovereign.
I do not concur!
The historical Scottish tradition is one of popular sovereignty which can be traced back at least until the Declaration of Arbroath (1314). This democratic lineage was reiterated by the Claim of Right (1689) and reiterated by Kenyon Wright in 1989 – remember “ we say yes … and we are the people”?
It is not a parliament of political representatives and certainly not one that resides in another country and is not representative of the Scottish population at all.
We are seeking the return of our statehood via our human right of self-determination as underpinned by the UN Charter, a right that we are currently barred from exercising due to the British government and the acquiescent and timorous compliance of the SNP led by John Swinney and his Scottish administration at Holyrood.
It is the people who are boss in Scotland. Not the people subject to Westminster agreement. The people alone. That principle must be asserted at all times.
Foreign Policy
It seems as though the thrust of the argument here effectively aligns with the current foreign/defence/NATO policy of the British government which can be summarised as 'Russia bad'. In fact, it is the USA and Europe including the UK but via Ukraine, that is the aggressor. The Russians are protecting their, to use the term in the article, 'state interests' in Eastern Ukraine, 90% of whom are Russian speaking and who, previously, had been subjected to brutal murder and mayhem by neo-Nazi militias in these areas.
It is largely accepted that the CIA engineered the Maiden Coup of 2014 which overthrew the Russian friendly government of Viktor Yanukovych, ultimately leading to the unstable and dangerous position that we are now in. So why would we wish to ally ourselves with an organisation whose prime member goes around the World overthrowing (or attempting to) governments that it doesn't like (Iran 1953, Chile 1973, Grenada 1983, Panama 1989, Afghanistan 2001, Iraq 2003, Libya 2011 etc). It does this regardless of the whichever flavour of the uniparty holds the US presidency and whoever the personality is (Biden, Trump) in office.
Perhaps a period of fence-sitting would be a good idea. Why not join the Partnership for Peace for example? That way, we could be like Ireland and signal our willingness to engage but not unconditionally where we might be forced to do the bidding of the clearly militant dominant states comprising NATO.
Why have independent statehood if your foreign/defence policy will remain largely unchanged in terms of military alliances?
In any event we really should be making contingency for the Scottish people to have the final say on the matter once a proposal has been fashioned - that's called democracy. Where the people are in charge - remember the DoA 1314 and the COR 1689?
Finally, perhaps we should remember that the Russians might actually be our friends. After all it was they who paid by far and away the largest sacrifice in WWII. The 28m Soviet dead, of which 14m were Russians.
The Arctic convoys may have supplied them but it was the Russians who did the brutal fighting on the Eastern Front. If any country or people can be described as having 'won the war' It was they - not the Americans and certainly not the British - who did so.
We should approach our foreign relations with an open mind not one conditioned by decades pro-Western propaganda since the end of the Second World War and centuries of British indoctrination since 1707.
The Yes United 'foreign policy discussion paper 1' assumes Scots' only option is to trade our sovereignty to the US/NATO umbrella to avoid economic and political sabotage.
As acknowledged in my earlier email submission, my respect for Jim Sillars, his knowledge and legacy within this movement are undeniable. In the 20th century, the brand of "realism" that he has put forward in this discussion paper, making a deal with the biggest empire and powers to ensure a small state's survival, was considered an essential geopolitical move. Notwithstanding that, the mechanics of global power have shifted fundamentally under our feet, and statecraft must update to match the 21st century.
1. The Rise of Elite Power Networks
The current American administration is openly hostile to the established 'rules-based order' it once anchored, treating even NATO's mutual guarantee as something transactional. What is rising in its place is not a stable new settlement; it is a fractured system driven by breakaway elite power groups. Trump's "Board of Peace", unveiled at Davos, shows one such shape of it: a body that routes around consensus-driven institutions to hand its own executive board sweeping, unaccountable power. Between the alliance treated as transactional and the consensus bodies bypassed, the old order is collapsing. Tying a newly independent Scotland to a fracturing military alliance, or bowing to an unstable, warring elite network, is not statecraft; it is walking into a burning building.
2. The Technocratic Front Line
We are moving into the age of technocracy, yet the enemy is not the technology itself; technology is a tool, made by humans and neutral until it's wielded in the wrong hands: the enemy is the people who mean to own it, exploit its benefits and bend its uses for self-empowerment and gain. Those who view technology through a corporate, neoliberal lens see it merely as a commercial market to capture. But technology is now the primary civic infrastructure of the state, and these elite power networks want to use centralised digital infrastructure to build a new colonial cage. The counter-mechanics, though, already exist.
3. The Open-Source Infrastructure of Democracy
The very technology these elite power networks want to use to bind us, centralised digital IDs and proprietary walled gardens (centralised systems), is ultimately constructed from foundational tech that can actually set us free, provided we reject the levers of corporate control. We must not be fooled by proprietary, patented platforms designed to gatekeep our digital identity. True sovereignty cannot be rented from a tech company. The foundational tools for a decentralised society are already in the public domain, as open standards that no single company owns.
The Secure Asset Transfer Protocol (SATP), an open standard being developed through the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), is one such tool: the interoperability rail that lets sovereign networks connect and move value between them without a corporate gateway owning the road. On an open rail like that, the identity and agency of the individual can ride freely, held by the person and not leased from a platform. Push that agency down to the individual level and we serve all of Jock Tamson's bairns alike, a civic architecture with no single off-switch that a corporation or a state can reach for to censor, veto, or shut down.
4. Breaking the Structural Encasement
As Scots resuming the exercise of our national sovereignty, we should not be looking to escape one collapsing empire only to kneel to new maisters in the form of an unstable elite network. We must refuse the outdated 'realist' choice that says we must immediately surrender our greatest strength, our popular sovereignty, to survive the chaos of hegemonic power.
If Scotland pioneers this sovereign, peer-to-peer civic architecture, and by that I mean delivery by the will of the people, we don't just secure our own borders, we offer a structural blueprint for the Global South to finally bypass the legacy financial gatekeepers that have created the generational issues now faced by our young folk and children as we enter a new technological paradigm. What passes for realism today is fear being swept along by the current of rapid change, mistaking motion for direction. If Scots embrace the true potential of their existing sovereign powers internally this could in turn become the building block for a Sovereign Nations Network, a neutral, equal buffer zone of nations and peers backed by decentralised, foundational infrastructure. This network would stand as a robust alternative not only to the failing systems of the current elite power groups, but also as the mechanism through which direct democracy can begin to emerge beyond the current extractive capitalist 'democratic' model.
That is the foundational sovereignty we should be offering the Scottish people and the vision of a new enlichtenment fir awe o Jock Tamson's bairns.
This is a useful contribution because it pushes the debate beyond slogans and mandate politics into the harder question of statecraft.
For Scotland, the central issue is not only whether independence is desired, but whether the institutions, strategic thinking and negotiating capacity required for statehood are being built seriously enough in advance.
I do not think every question here has to be settled immediately, but the paper is right to insist that foreign policy, defence, trade, EU/EFTA choices, relations with England and Ireland, and the practical transition from devolution to statehood cannot be afterthoughts.
A credible independence case has to show not just democratic aspiration, but governing capacity.
Cheers for that,going to stew on it for awhile then give it another read later....
Would be nice if just ticking YES was enough.....
One thing I would say straight off is that though trump is himself temporary,the reality of maga and the newer crop of republicans,particularly in their Christian nationalism/america first narrative is going to be an ongoing feature of US politics....
And they do seem intent on spreading it here...
> Nothing we say before independence, or do in the early stages after independence should threaten the interests of the United States.
This makes pragmatic sense. I would add "or the EU".
Or start as you mean to go on. Because once you strike out on a certain path, it becomes increasingly difficult to choose a different one.
#EndTheUnion #ScottishUDI
Excellent contribution, have sent comments directly to Jim.
Warning! This is my Bob Geldof/Band Aid "moment", minus the swearing! Yes United, as far as I can tell, is one of the Few pro-indy organisations actually working Seriously, Now, on potential crunch indy prep issues! Most political parties & other civic groups are doing nothing substantial, just usual opportunistic bluster & periods of silence. Holyrood is still talking about its "committee work programme" and goes in to two month recess at the end of this week! Jim Sillars is one of the best intellectual assets we have (whether you agree with all his views) and has a personal historical perspective that won't be around for ever. We really owe it to Jim to read this paper and comment directly to him as he has requested. Doesn't have to be a "War and Peace" response but "the guy" deserves feedback, critical and constructive, for what he is doing for us & future generations. This is an intellectual -political process (just like "back in the day"); it can't be reduced to social media "bites" . We really have to take this seriously and make some progress. So, please, please, read it and comment directly to Jim!
What is your proposal for addressing the issue of legislative competence?
Sorry, but I’m more concerned with ensuring Scotland has any kind of role in the modern world.
#EndTheUnion #ScottishUDI
Be constructive or be gone.