John Watler

In memoriam

John Bertram Watler was a member of Mosley’s Union Movement in the 1970s. He joined the Movement after Robert Edwards set up the Thanet group in Ramsgate during a stay in his home town in 1969. As group leader, Edwards invited Jeffrey Hamm and others to Thanet in order to launch the group officially, which included several new members from nearby Deal. John, with his wife Margaret, were to host the gathering in their Ramsgate home, with spectacular views over Pegwell Bay serving to add to the pleasure of the occasion. John and Margaret were always warm and generous hosts.
When Edwards returned to London, becoming West London Area Organiser in 1970, John took over the Thanet group, later contributing articles to UM’s paper ACTION, writing under his own name.
He was a prolific writer throughout the early 1970s, when UM was briefly re-named Action Party. He was reported in ACTION No 169 (March, 1974) as “getting ‘Action’ into his local library at Ramsgate”. Thereon, he continued to organise members’ and contacts’ meetings.
John Watler died suddenly on November 18th, 2009, aged 82 years.
A ‘Celebration of his Life’ took place at Thanet Crematorium on Monday, December 7th, 2009.
He leaves a wife, son John and grandson Jonathan.

TELEVISION:
THEN AND NOW
From Editorial, issue No 25, November/December 2009


(photo) OM being interviewed at 302 Vauxhall Bridge Road in 1962

Readers of European Action who listened to our CD of Oswald Mosley on the David Frost Show will be aware of OM’s masterly performance before a live audience on British television and how he handled hostility from the audience with his usual aplomb.
Throughout the show, Mosley had to contend with shouting from a section of the audience, mainly Jewish communist militants, whose life-long purpose seemed to consist entirely of attempts to silence Mosley wherever he stood up to speak.
Solly Kaye was the most vociferous on this occasion but the only point to be made from this Jewish thug’s behaviour was how Mosley was perfectly justified in forming his supporters into a uniformed defence force. It was the only way to overcome organised communist violence in those days.
As a television performance it stands out as a good lesson in political triumph in the face of adversity.
Coming to the present day, I wonder how people would compare Nick Griffin’s descent into the lion’s den that is BBC’s Question Time to Oswald Mosley’s noisy reception on the David Frost Show on November 16, 1967.
Here we have two examples of method and technique ... how to do it and how not to do it. But are there any lessons to be learned for the present day that would assist anyone who wants to succeed in politics?
Mosley always gained control of a situation, often turning what was potentially a disastrous situation to his advantage. He did it through sheer force of personality. It was his powerful personality that held sway in the face of communist intimidation on the David Frost Show. He had the situation under permanent control as a result.
According to Paul Callan of the Daily Express on October 24 (whose grandparents were Jewish immigrants fleeing Russia, by the way), Mosley “was undoubtedly a charismatic speaker”. Callan’s article was entitled, Fascists Always Fail in Britain, and was largely aimed at Nick Griffin and the far-Right fringe.
This Daily Express columnist begins, “The bigoted babblings of the porcine-featured British National Party leader, Nick Griffin, on Thursday’s Question Time would have inflicted a feeling of nausea on decent people”. It goes on in similar vein with Griffin as “gorge-raising fascist” and so on ... but never is Griffin referred to as possessing charisma.
I find it significant that Callan, who also interviewed Mosley in the late 1960s, should attribute charismatic qualities to Mosley and remain very much the anti-fascist. John Freeman, the broadcaster who interviewed Mosley for BBC’s Panorama programme around the same time, described Mosley as the most intelligent British politician he had ever met.
No one is going to say any of those things about Nick Griffin no matter how many BNP local councillors are elected. His performance on Question Time will go down in broadcasting history as probably one of the worst by any aspiring politician.
What we saw was a man bereft of any personality, moral courage or honesty. He writhed and squirmed, ducked and dived throughout the questions ... and, unlike Mosley, he had no real violently noisy opposition. Just an audience that laughed at his ineptitude. I had a little chuckle, myself.

MOSLEY WARNED OF WORLD CRISIS
by Peter Kendall

(published in European Action No 23)

Sir Oswald Mosley is almost invariably described as ‘Britain’s war-time fascist leader’ but how could he have possibly led the British Union of Fascists in wartime when he was in prison and unable to communicate with the world outside? How could there have been a mainstream fascist movement when the majority of Blackshirts had enlisted to fight for their country in 1939? Mosley certainly did oppose another European war but left his followers in no doubt: once the die had been cast it was everyone’s duty to fight for king and country as he had in the 1914-1918 conflict.
He had no illusions. When the politicians and international bankers wanted war they usually got their way – and it was then the common man who had to fight and perish as death and misery piled up across Europe. Bravery, chivalry and self-sacrifice were not restricted to one side and there were finally no genuine military victories – only financial gain and initiation of dark influences seeking to destroy European culture and traditions, replacing the great European composers with punk rock and stealing great European advances in aerospace and a hundred other technical advances that Mosley said might provide prosperity to the European peoples.
The Bell X15 supersonic aircraft was not designed in America – it was designed in a small aerospace firm on the outskirts of Reading, Berkshire (Miles Aircraft). The supersonic flight research exchange was one-way. The British gave over their research but the Americans then refused to honour their side of the agreement in the interests of their ‘national security’. That is how incompetent Mosley’s ‘tired old men’ were – they simply gave away Britain’s lead in aerospace technology, totally mismanaging the exchange so that Britain was cheated.
Much the same could be said about German missile technology taken forcibly from Europe after the 1939-45 conflict. Try as they might, the dark forces cannot prevent the words of historians and politicians of the 1930s, still proving Mosley right - they have managed to ban free speech but not books, at least not yet. Any thinking person can reasonably judge that the misery and social injustice of the 1930s pre-war depression could have been avoided by implementing Mosley’s economic plans. Hitler and Mussolini did provide their peoples with a solution to mass unemployment – but the London Stock Exchange resisted Government initiatives to recruit labour battalions because it would have been against the interests of the big company shareholders to enable the masses to earn money.
The British Union of Fascists is still heavily criticized for its associations with Hitler, Mussolini and Franco but pre-war European fascists had one common political aim: to improve living standards of the masses, expel the exploiters and halt the creeping disease of communism in Europe. European counter-communist political movements were essential in defeating the common enemy in the 1930s and to bring back prosperity and full employment. The last nine years in British politics have shown us how the Reds work: atheism, perversion, 1984-style control of the individual and major financial mismanagement. Consider the hunger marches, unemployment and social hardships of Britain in the 1930s and ask the question, “What possible reason could there ever have been to commit this generation to an all-out war because of Poland?”
Who had been so recklessly insane to conclude a treaty of guarantee to Poland – and what common interests did the British Empire have with Eastern Europe? The freedom of the Polish people had nothing to do with the September 1939 declaration of war against Germany. The Polish people were sold down the river in the Potsdam conferences and their nation subjugated by the Reds. Freedom proved to be an exotic dream for the half century following the war under the Soviet jackboot. In this context, there had been nothing to fight for – Britain was mortally wounded for no good reason. In one sense, we lost the war.
The war-time leaders knew that the game would be up if the British public knew of the Soviet invasion of Eastern Poland and of the crimes the NKVD had perpetrated against humanity – Polish warriors died at Arnhem, at Monte Casino and a thousand other battlefields in British uniforms while Allied leaders agreed to Poland being swallowed up after the conflict. At the same time, these same leaders concealed discovery of mass graves in the Katyn Forest and mass murders of the Kulak classes. Delivery of Poland to the USSR after the conflict had already been planned well before the war ended when Polish soldiers spilled their blood fighting for the Britain they trusted. Was it really the will of the British people to enter into war in the first place? Would they have agreed to a betrayal of Poland, the forced return of Cossacks and Yugoslavs to the Soviets? Or did international forces decide for us as they did in the case of Iraq?
In fact, Mosley’s immortal words continue to ring with absolute truth. Governance of Britain, he maintained, was nothing to do with the British government – it was governance by the international bankers headed by the Wall Street financial thugs and the legions of the world's banks and the faceless figures who run them. The power of unlimited money determined that Britain should go to war against the very European population with whom they had so much in common. Clearly, an Anglo-German alliance would have had a moderating influence after the 1918 European disaster – but it would have failed to make vast fortunes for the international arms manufacturers – it was nothing to do with Poland but rather engineered for profit and for a major power shift towards America and its small ally in the Middle East.
Big money continues to fuel the third world sweat shop industries, engineered to turn out disposable goods for the opulent nations of the world, while depressing traditional domestic skills and wage levels in Europe. Big money also continues to use the European peoples in their reckless gambles such as buying up debt. As my fellow European Action contributor Dermont Clark so eloquently wrote in the March/April edition, “Banking should serve the people”. In fact, Mr Clark’s opinion is proved absolutely right by recent history. A large section of British banking did serve the British people – the traditional mutually-owned building societies imposed sensible lending limits, thus ensuring that greed would not end in families being thrown onto the streets. But the sharks moved in, sensing blood in the water in the form of unprincipled profit margins. They were determined to end the Mutual organisations that operated exclusively for the benefit of their investors and mortgaged customers.
Building societies did not need shareholders and did not participate in wild gambling. In all probability, mutual societies were consequently considered blasphemous by the big corporations who moved in to devour most of the decency and prudence of the long-established societies. At the same time, the politicians moved in to end tax relief on both mortgages and on marital status. The ordinary citizen should not be helped to put a roof over his family’s heads or to afford a decent standard of living for his children. If he dared dream of buying a home, then he would have to sweat blood in paying taxes for it.
Bear in mind governments give nothing in offering tax relief – they merely fail to take money away from its rightful owner. The resulting financial institutions threw caution to the wind in the hopes of enormous gains. They put away the conservative methods of mortgage provision and introduced the free for all attitudes of the nineties, buying up questionable international debt and offering self-certificated mortgage applications or 150 per cent loans when easy money was limitless. They all went along with the greed: local authorities, the government and the banks. Flog everything –the utility companies, our traditional productive industries, coal and steel. Blue the North Sea fuel wealth in the interests of quick money and voter popularity. No longer was borrowing linked to incomes – if people borrowed too much, why worry? Their properties could easily be re-possessed and the breathtaking appreciation in property values used to recover any losses: credit card companies adopted the same blackmail techniques: you can have as much credit as you want - provided you put your home on the line.
The international bankers had some smart moves tucked up their sleeves selling packaged debt. What an absolute contrast Mosley’s plans offered the people: the generation of European industries backed by the purchasing power of the Europeans. He was horrified at Third World sweat shops that treated indigenous populations as animals, beasts of burden, while spreading the curse of unemployment throughout our European nation. He was so right in suggesting that the West Indian plantations should be properly financed – given prosperity, the inhabitants would never have wanted to live in these cold, sad islands and immigration might not have ever reached crisis proportions. Even now, the government pours billions into failed banks and arranges so-called ‘shotgun marriages’ to save the institutions that have choked on their own greed and particularly if they are in Scotland. The British government never even thought of bringing back the old mutual institutions to ensure that families would not lose their homes.
British politicians do not fight for the British people – they serve the international bankers and if these mysterious dark powers had wanted Britain to adopt the Euro – we would have been in the Euro-zone before you could say ‘Gordon Brown’. Within the context of the 1920s and 1930s, Mosley was right to ally himself with Hitler and Mussolini. Before total all-out war was engineered, both leaders brought full employment to their peoples. Both opposed the advance of Soviet communism, a fight that the post-war Western nations had to continue from 1945 until 1989. Those who rejected Mosley’s conviction that Westminster was run by the ‘tired old men’ of British politics, might do well to consider the present circumstances. Recently, a Downing Street website was deliberately designed to ‘smear’ opposition political figures. The perpetrators had the nerve to name their website after the Red Flag. Is this really where the so-called Mother of all Parliaments has ended up? Do the long-suffering, tolerant British people really deserve this financial and moral decline in politics?
How could Mosley possibly be judged as an extremist when he put his finger on the very organisms that have now developed into a full-blown fatal disease? Suddenly last year, Mosley was again proved right as the international bankers pressed their luck too far and began to go to the wall. But the radical reforms he proposed were again swept under the carpet. Do not worry if the banks and Westminster had been reckless, there was always the taxpayer to fall back on and there was still plenty of capital to fund gigantic pension pots and bonuses for poor performance. Those who had lost pensions and the widows surviving on meagre pensions could whistle for any rise in basic living standards. All the Flash Harry characters in the City and in Westminster have to take precedence – that is why British state pensions are the lowest in the developed world, why the British government has ruined the pensions industry by over taxation and lack of regulation, why Britain imposes the highest tax burden on the lower earnings sector and why our local taxes have more than doubled under Labour: the heaviest local tax in the whole of the European community.
Europe a Nation? Good God, no! We could never afford tax harmonisation and the British people have already found out far too much about European living standards – who knows, they might even demand the same standards for themselves! British taxpayers – what perfect investors! They never choose which investments to make or dictate any policy. It is an absolute nonsense to cite local or national elections as instruments of democratic change or policy determination. British elections are mad illogical games played by all-colluding professional politicians and simply do not express the wishes of the British people.
If the banks or the current administration go into the red, billions will be immediately supplied by the taxpayer provided the country has not been bankrupted in the meantime: there will be no annual general meetings or referenda to gauge opinion or to vote politicians off the board. The former postman, cruise ship steward and parson’s son can decide the vital national issues, doubtless assisted by the rag-bag of feminists and other extremists and perverts that Blair used to hoodwink the electorate. After all, the clown in charge has banished the boom and bust cycle and has subsequently saved the world, what more do we want? – how modest Baron Brown von Munchausen now appears to be!
The present administration is in power by virtue of a 35 per cent majority, made legitimate through the ‘first past the post’ electoral system that divides the nation into non-proportional geographic segments. Political movements are also restricted. Only two almost bankrupt organisations are allowed with a third force kept in line by the banning of proportional representation. Democracy yes, new leftist parties yes, but never anything right of centre. The British people will be told who will govern and there will never be an issue decided by the whole population.
Decentralisation and devolution are nonsense terms used by the very politicians that keep Britain a divided nation. Mosley was so right in advocating the end of Westminster because the bodies that he proposed for the new administration would truly serve the people. His vision of an NHS governed by a panel of physicians and nursing professionals still makes good sense – the leading medical experts would never have allowed the dried human blood on walls and floors or minimised expenditure on hygiene. There would be no stench of stale urine or used syringes left on bedside cabinets. Qualified British nurses and doctors would have led the field – not incompetent so-called managers and a rag-tag host from overseas, often with bogus qualifications. His proposed system would have made the majority of present hospital infections virtually impossible. The Panel would have known how to keep wards clean and how best to provide patient care – hospitals would have been built here most needed and not as political sweeteners. Instead of recruiting questionable medical staff from the Third World, Britain would have continued to send well-trained the doctors and nurses so badly needed abroad. The Labour government has been exposed. It is now clear that Britain is ruled by a gang of vicious, sleazy opportunists who have no respect for either decency, freedom, prosperity or democracy. The opposition parties offer nothing better, particularly as discussing vital issues have been banned. Mosley's views have been vindicated and proved right. Who knows if Gordon Brown’s desperation to cling on to power will allow him to concede a General Election next year (President Mugabe shows the way forward for despot). Blair and Brown have allowed Westminster to descend into the politics of the gutter with Downing Street now rightly described as a cesspit. The British people would benefit by reading Mosley’s aims and to dismiss the continual vilification. They will never be called upon to fight for Poland but they might have to fight for a return to decent governance and restoration of the right to their own nation. Britain has always favoured reform and debate but now we edge towards the abyss where a 1939 fighting spirit will be needed – this time in exclusive defence of the British. Let us be prepared to face the challenge and to make the sacrifice.

The Myth of Islamisation

by Robert Edwards

(Published in European Action No 23)

Any attack upon another’s religion is a violation of a human right. A man’s religion is his free choice of worship and should be inviolable. Let us make it clear that the politicisation of religion is the real cause of so much human strife and suffering and not the religion in itself. Religion is often attacked by atheists and other secularists as being responsible for the slaughter of millions over the centuries ... and it is the cynical political manipulation of religion for secular ends that concerns us here.
Here in Britain (and elsewhere in Europe) we have this ugly phenomenon of some fringe parties adopting a violent type of religious intolerance as a nationalistic platform. Its exclusive target is Islam and what is perceived to be ‘the threat of Islamification’, supposedly challenging Britain’s identity as a Christian nation. Are we really justified in claiming to be a Christian nation?
Where did all this begin? What are its origins? Attacking anyone for his religion was unheard of in the days of Mosley’s Union Movement. Mosley always said, “We do not attack people on account of what they were born [what they are] but solely on what they do”. This is a perfectly sane and rational point of view and can not be challenged on any moral grounds. At that time, Mosley was referring to what was described as ‘the quarrel with the Jews’. He would say the same regarding Muslims, always consistent, and he abhorred any ill-treatment of the under-dog. In Mosley’s case, there was never a quarrel with Muslims. Quite the opposite. He regarded the Arab world as Europe’s natural ally.
I believe this bogus ‘crusade’ against Islam erupted at the time of the end of the Cold War, when international communism dealt its own death blow. The Age of Ideology came to an end leaving an enormous vacuum waiting to be filled by a much-needed external threat in the form of another global bogeyman. That is when the idea of a ‘war against terrorism’ was first hatched with the Middle East in mind and the new neo-con global agenda linked to Israel and a New World Order. The rest is history, as they say.
Far-right opportunists latched onto this conspiracy theory, opposing Islam worldwide, as an ideal substitute for a previous ‘external threat’ now re-invented as the Muslim ‘enemy within’ ... the militant Muslim with his eye on world domination. Ring a bell?
A new vocabulary was needed in order to articulate this myth. We had ‘jihadists’ and then ‘islamofascists’. ‘Jihadist’ is a clear corruption of a noble and pious obligation for the religious. It has no political equivalent. Jihad means the daily struggle to improve oneself as a religious person, having a subjective dimension as well as an obligation to the greater well-being of the community. It does not mean holy war, which is a cynical invention of the self-styled, latter-day ‘crusaders’ stirring up religious hatred. This is but one example of how Islam is being distorted and how it is being misrepresented by the far-right groups, without which they are completely moribund in terms of ideas.
All of this has been cobbled together to create a grotesque caricature divorced from reality ... reality being one of three Abrahamic faiths experiencing a revival that was once the Christian experience, uplifting and dynamic. This is ‘Islamification’ to the conspiracy theorists ... meaning Islam gaining in size and strength but it is only in terms of the religious without a political base. This is where the conspiracy theory falls flat on its face.
Although Muslims recognise the Ummah as the world community of Islam, it has no political organisation as such and is simply the recognition of a universal brotherhood of the religious. Universality is a characteristic of all the major religions and Islam is no exception.
This brings us to another weakness in the claims of the anti-Islamic far-right. There is a mad idea that only ‘British’ religions have a place in these isles, corralling their ‘British gods’ within a sanitised cordon off North West Europe. Universality is too much like the nightmare of world government which, as all good Empire Loyalists know, is a Jewish communist conspiracy in the pay of New York bankers. How Muslims fit into that equation is something that only the complete paranoiac can incorporate into his tangled web of a mind.
We find them defending the Christian values of Britain against the ‘alien’ faith, the interloper and destroyer of the true faith. Christianity has its roots in the Middle East, the Holy Land, as does Islam. If Islam is deemed alien then so is Christianity and, of course, the predecessor of both, Judaism. That any religion should have a national identity is absurd in the extreme ... equally as much as the idea of a Christ renewing his British passport with the Home Office.
Christian values are not British values. They are universal values ... meaning they are for all mankind. Islamic values are so similar that the same universality applies. How these giant faiths co-exist is a mark of our nation’s tradition of tolerance and the magnanimous nature of its people. Whether church, mosque or synagogue — they are all centres of religiosity and the human feeling that there is something greater than all of us. This is higher than any politics.
Then there is the scaremongering concerning Sharia Law. This is regarded by the anti-Islamic ‘crusader’ as barbaric, involving torture and mutilation unto which no Christian should succumb. For the benefit of the ignorant, Sharia Law is for Muslims only, being based on the Holy Qur’an ... perceived to be the word of God. The reasoning being that God is higher than man, so it follows that God’s law is higher than man-made law.
The Jews in Britain have their Beth Din, Jewish ecclesiastical courts for the religious. This is perfectly reasonable and acceptable. Surely it follows that different faiths must have different needs. What a dull, grey world it would be if everything in our society were to be standardised and subject to a one-size-fits-all rule on matters of law and regulation. Yes, we have diversity and there should never be coercion to conform to a single standard way of living. I say that Muslims are entitled to another tier of law if their faith demands it. There will always be our tier of secular law ... but there is nothing wrong with choice. According to Islamic injunction, a Muslim is obliged to honour and respect the laws of a host country and to do otherwise is deemed un-Islamic, of course.
We have large Muslim communities settled in Britain that have become part of a permanent demographic change. Second, third and fourth generations have adopted much of our culture, as one would expect, but most retain the faith of their fathers and those before them. Islam is now firmly rooted here and it deserves to be respected and understood ... not attacked as a conspiracy.
Have I changed my mind on the immigration issue since the days of the 1960s when our slogan was ‘Stop Immigration — Send Them Back to Good Jobs and Conditions’? It was always a humane policy and one that became part of a wider economic solution for Britain and Europe. At that time, reversing non-white immigration was a very reasonable and practical proposition. Fifty years later, it is a different world that has left many far behind but one that demands a rethink if we are to preserve our European culture in peace and in prosperity.
All things are in a state of becoming. It is a law of the Universe. Race and culture are no exception in the great movements and upheavals that occur from time to time. Races have always migrated and moved around the world.
However, ‘Islamification’ is nothing more than a cheap scare tactic. This must be understood first. Islam saved Europe before when the Arab Empire civilised Andalucía for hundreds of years while Europe lived in the Dark Ages. Islam can again have a benevolent influence upon our lives in terms of morality, human character and a code for families and communities. After all, it is a complete way of life for the believer in a way that the Christian churches never quite managed to pull off for their flocks.
In these times of economic stress and uncertainty many of us are struggling and finding it all very difficult. The solution is not to turn on a perfectly innocent, hard-working community because it appears different in custom and worship.
I am often urged to seek out what unites us rather than to knock the far-right for its short-comings. I would apply that same principle to all other groups and communities living alongside us during these difficult times.
What should unite us all is a common interest in survival as people first.

My Father, the Loyal Blackshirt

by David Whelan

(Published in European Action No 22)

Whenever the name of Mosley is mentioned in print it is usually to vilify or in some way ridicule his memory. Occasionally, a brave journalist will praise him but when this is done the very same writer cannot help adding some comment about ‘Blackshirt bully boys’. There seems to exist a complete misunderstanding of what motivated the men and women who joined Mosley’s ranks.
I have some personal knowledge of this because my own father, James Whelan, was a member of both the BUF and Union Movement. He was also detained under the Emergency Powers Act, Defence Regulation 18B. One major influence on people turning to radical ideas was the tragedy of the First World War. My own father lost his father fighting on the Western Front (Pte John Joseph Whelan, 1st Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers, killed September 1918 ). Many who joined had either served on the Western Front or, like my own father, had lost someone close to them. The prospect of another war which would destroy, yet again, a generation of Europe’s youth appalled them. In addition, the effects of the economic collapse of the late 1920s and the mass unemployment of the 1930s caused young men and women of my father’s generation to look for more radical solutions.
Some turned to communism, others to fascism. The people who were at the core membership of the BUF and Union Movement were never, even from the earliest times, narrow nationalists. My father always detested the ‘little Englanders’. He understood, like all those who served the Movement, the real meaning of patriotism. Another part of his motivation in joining the BUF was Mosley’s attack on the Black and Tan atrocities in Ireland. My father always supported the idea of a united Ireland. He was also an admirer of T.E. Lawrence and the Arab world in general.
In fact, Eastern societies always fascinated him, especially Japan, and he read many books about Eastern religions. I read recently of the BUF policy on animal rights. I am not sure how aware my father was of this when he joined but it is something for which he would have had strong support. I believe that my father was typical of the serious-minded people who joined and stayed in the Movement, even when their freedom was taken away.
So why the term ‘Blackshirt bully boys’? Well, there was certainly plenty of violence involved whenever the BUF or Union Movement held meetings. Over the period he was involved, my father was punched, kicked, beaten with clubs, shot at and attacked with a machete (by Spanish communists at Hull docks, I believe).
The following is an excerpt from Jeffrey Hamm’s book Action Replay and recalls an incident where my father was involved.
“In September 1949, a particularly successful meeting in Bradford provoked the Yorkshire communists to lay on a warm reception committee for me when I returned a fortnight later. They brought in heavy reinforcements from Leeds and at one stage they backed a heavy lorry into our platform, which was gallantly defended by two old friends, Jimmy Whelan from Manchester and Norman Heys, a native of Accrington but then living in Brighouse. (I have lost touch with Jimmy, and I was sad to hear of Norman's death in September 1980). Jimmy had recently had his teeth out and was wearing a set of dentures; as the situation grew more menacing I saw him take them out and carefully deposit them in a tin which he slipped into his pocket, ready for action. Norman grew increasingly impatient at the antics of the mob and was muttering to me, out of the corner of his mouth: "I'll shift this lot in a minute". He could have done so, single-handed, because he was a great bull of a man who knew no fear but I restrained him as I did not want the meeting to break up in disorder. When we eventually closed it, we found that we were in a cul-de-sac and that the only way out was through the mob in front of us. "What do we do now?", my friends inquired of me. There was only one answer: we go through them. We walked up to them and I politely asked them to excuse us. This so astonished them that they obligingly parted and made way for us. We walked through them and were away before it occurred to any of them to attack us. The golden rule on such occasions is to follow the advice which Corporal Jones used to tender to Captain Mainwaring, and "don't panic". To run away would not only be cowardly but suicidal; a steady walk is the correct procedure. Self-confidence is a valuable asset which has extracted many of us from difficult and dangerous situations”.
The calmness and bravery displayed here is typical of the many tales my dad told me. Also the humour, in the face of what must have been a frightening situation. He was, until the end of his days, a fierce enemy of communism and staunch supporter of Mosley and his ideals. For many years I had assumed the ideals my father had fought for had been forgotten. In the 1970s and 1980s, I observed the emergence of organisations like the National Front and later the British National Party. I have to say, I was not in the least bit impressed by these people. They seemed to represent the very narrow-minded nationalists my father had always ridiculed, the BNP being the foremost present-day culprits. They do not have the answers to the problems which face us. In fact, they do not even have the questions. The NF just appear to want to rid the world of all minorities who do not fit their bizarre definition of what it means to be British.

I am involved in a music project called The Pride of Wolves. In certain aspects of our music we like to express our feelings about the present political situation. In some of our songs I have included quotes from The Alternative and from The European, Mosley's essays on Europe.
The music scene in which we are involved, the Neo-Folk, martial scene, can be quite political. One band of particular interest is German band Von Thronstahl, fronted by Josef Maria Klumb. The concept of Europe a Nation features prominently in his work as does the history and ideas of fascism. As a result of this, attempts have been made to place his music on ‘the index’, the list of forbidden publications and works in Germany. These attempts have failed and Von Thronstahl continue to produce very interesting and varied music.
In 1979, Jean Jacques Burnel of The Stranglers (my all-time favourite band) did a solo LP called Euroman Cometh, which deals with the ideas of Europe as a nation. The Pride of Wolves next CD will be called Imperium Europa and is partly about the historical concept of Europe a Nation.
We hope to release this later in the year.
© David Whelan 2009

Robert Edwards Interview

Interview with Blood and Honour magazine (published in B&H issue no 41)

B&H Question: Mr Edwards, what is European Action and what exactly motivates you?

Answer: European Action is the title of both our bi-monthly newspaper and an informal association of those who remain loyal to the ideas and policies of Sir Oswald Mosley. By his policies, I mean his post-war thinking on European unity which he proclaimed as 'Europe a Nation' way back in 1948. European Action has several supporters who were members of Mosley's Union Movement, including myself. It was the inspiring leadership of Mosley that motivates us today, along with our belief that he was right on so many issues. We also believe his ideas were well before their time, particularly the economic arguments in relation to the international banking system. Mosley predicted the problems we are faced with today. That is why we carry on the struggle that began in our youth. It is far from over.

B&H Question: You were once jailed for drawing the cartoon strips for a comic called The Stormer. Can you explain the circumstances that brought this about?

Answer: It was way back in 1981 when I drafted the cartoons. In retrospect, it was more of an experiment in bad taste than anything else. I suppose I would now be considered the Russell Brand of the cartooning pen. I was given a twelve months prison sentence at Snaresbrook Crown Court in East London and I served just over nine months. I remember the wording of the original summons - “material likely to incite racial hatred ...”. There was never any evidence that these comics actually incited anyone to harm or injure others but I do admit the cartoons were a bit over the top. I tend to avoid depicting Jews or black people in caricature. The risks are too great and sitting in a prison cell is a complete waste of time. Martyrdom is often short-lived in the memory of others, besides.
As a cartoonist, I do find myself severely restricted. There have been many more examples of cartoons causing serious controversy since then. I am sure they will not be the last.

B&H Question: When did you first get involved in politics?

Answer: My father was a Welsh miner and a communist, so I was brought up in a highly charged political household. My father admired the Soviet Union and especially so since he served in the Royal Navy on the Arctic Convoys to Russia. As a lad I began to form an admiration for Hitler's Germany and this tended to cause a rift between us which went on for years. At the best of times it was a controlled rivalry. I learned very quickly that communists do not engage in debate nor tolerate anything that challenges their political mission. But my regard for Hitler's Germany evolved into something more British after reading The Fascists in Britain by Colin Cross. I was still a schoolboy.
After leaving school, I joined the Army at 17 and, on my way home on leave, I stopped in Victoria, London, and found myself at 302 Vauxhall Bridge Road ... the European Bookshop and the offices of Mosley's Union Movement. It was a fateful event that changed the course of my life. My political apprenticeship was to begin from that point in my life.

B&H Question: What aspect of Mosley's ideas inspired you most? Was it anything like the pre-war British Union of Fascists, for example?

Answer: After reading The Fascists in Britain, it was understandably easy to associate Mosley with the fascism of the 1930s and to assume that he remain an unreconstructed Blackshirt. After reading Union Movement literature in the comfort of a barrack room I found a wealth of advanced thinking that transcended the fascism of the Thirties. To me, Mosley was a forward-looking genius with answers to everything. I was given a paperback book called Mosley-Right or Wrong? containing over 300 questions and answers on a plethora of subjects. I had never read anything so brilliant. It was a blueprint for the reconstruction of Britain and Europe spelled out in the most easily read style. I still have that first copy after all these years ... kept together with tape and a strong elastic band. Europe, Faith and Plan was another great Mosley book and I quickly became a National European believing strongly in the necessity of complete European unification with common government and an economy that would be self-sufficient. Mosley explained that he had gone beyond both fascism and the old-style democracy to a new synthesis which he described as 'European Socialism'.

B&H Question: Why exactly did Mosley go beyond the fascism of the British Union of Fascists? Can you explain how fascism had become out-dated and unnecessary after all the struggle and sacrifices that he and many thousands of his pre-war supporters had endured, including being imprisoned without charge or trial under Defence Regulation 18B?

Answer: There were two main reasons. Firstly, there was the fact that Britain had lost its Empire as a consequence of the Second World War. The British Empire had been the means whereby the BUF's Empire Insulation Policy could create the mechanism for insulating the British worker from under-cutting by unfair international trading that used overseas cheap labour from countries outside the Empire. We had all the overseas resources and access to important minerals, for example. The British Empire could easily have been self-sufficient and our workers protected.
Britain, alone and without Empire, could not possibly compete against cheap sweated labour from the East, as it can not do so today. We have lost our major means of manufacturing production. That makes us vulnerable and dependent on others. And so Mosley revised his thinking.
The second reason was the resolve that Europeans should never fight each other again and European unification would be the means of preventing further wars. Mosley always claimed that he had no blood on his hands from the 'Brothers' War', as he termed it, being interned in 1940 for his campaign for a negotiated peace. He had fought in the First World War in trench and in the air and had seen the senseless slaughter of much of his generation. He was resolved that this should not occur again. Certain interests were intent on war with Germany and so the inevitable happened with appalling consequences for all of Europe which was then carved up between the Americans and the Russians. What lessons do we learn from this? As Mosley said, “The worst were ever united and the best were ever divided”. He called for an extension of patriotism ... to regard Europe a Nation as our country and to fight for its liberation

B&H Question: What is the position of European Action on the subject of race? Are you, for example, white supremacists? I ask this because many still regard Mosley as a racist.

Answer: That is a complete distortion of the facts and possibly something that holds us back in the public eye. Mosley rejected the idea that some races were above other races and that they should be there to be exploited. We had all been victims of international finance, as we remain so today. Races are neither superior nor inferior to each other ... they are different. That was his fundamental position on the subject. He was the first to openly campaign against coloured mass immigration in the early 1950s because he could see it for what it really was. A British government had reneged on a deal with the West Indies, preferring to trade with Batista's Cuba, with the result that its sugar industry collapsed at home. A further consequence was mass unemployment there. A British Nationality Act then opened the flood-gates to what became a large pool of cheap coloured labour with many West Indians willing to do menial jobs for low wages. It was always dictated by 'the markets' and the interests of international finance. The result is a bogus 'multiculturalism', as if it were something desired and perfectly natural. We had all been the victims of powerful forces motivated solely by profit. We should always look at the larger picture that way and not be so quick to attack non-white people simply for being pawns in the same game.

B&H Question: You say that you support the idea of a National Party of Europe. What is the origin of this idea and how do you propose to bring it about? For example, there is a European National Front and there have been attempts to form nationalist blocs in the European Parliament. How are you so different?

Answer: We are different on important fundamental points. In 1962, Mosley attended the Conference of Venice set up to bring together leaders of political parties that would agree on common action by pooling their resources into a single political party for ALL Europeans. Included were the British, German, Italian and Belgian delegates. They all agreed to use the title NATIONAL PARTY OF EUROPE and to eventually drop their separate national titles. It was not just a confederation of European patriots but much more. It was a recognition that Europe should be one with a single, unitary party to campaign to this end.
News of this reverberated throughout the Continent and one of Mosley's National Party of Europe meetings was savagely attacked in Trafalgar Square in 1962 by a coalition of communist and Jewish organisations. These attacks continued in other towns and cities of Britain with the collusion of Government, the police often failing to keep order.
The result was disastrous for Mosley's movement as the conspiracy of the Establishment press along with Mosley's enemies turned it against Mosley, claiming that his presence alone incited this violence. He called off his campaign.
Only Mosley and the Belgian, Jean Thiriart, remained true to the European idea while the Germans and Italians reverted to their separate nationalistic positions in their separate enclaves. Yes, it failed but the real achievement had been that these separate parties had come together in the first place in order to sign an agreement that, to my mind, still stands today as a manifesto for a revival in the future.
With all respects to these gentlemen but the European National Front is an umbrella grouping in intent. It is not a single unitary force but, rather, a collection of separate nationalistic parties that find a common thread in parts of their ideology. They can still go their separate ways if they consider their own national interests above European solidarity. This has occurred when blocs are formed in the European Parliament and then they fall apart because one group does not like another group. They are trying to resuscitate this today but many of the same groups are involved and nationalist rivalry will always rear its head. As Mosley said, “Twenty pygmies can not make a giant”. And, of course, marriages of convenience rarely hold together for long.
We are different because we transcend the old nation-states and do not cling so much to the past. We are for one Europe, for one people and one system for the benefit of all.
How do we achieve this? It is hard work but we need to educate and inspire with a revolutionary idea. That is where our paper, European Action, comes into the equation. It is the flagship of the idea, carrying it out to those who are open-minded enough to grasp the significance of the Mosley message.
But mark my words before anyone should think we want to submerge us all into a common, grey morass. We want to preserve the great diversity of the European people, their culture and traditions, and not imitate America with its 'melting pot', leading to a coffee-coloured nation. Our call for unification has a major purpose and that is to find strength in union, pooling our sovereignties in order to create a single, powerful sovereignty that can stand alone without fear of anything. Within this, we can organise and give all Europeans what they want, which is the freedom to conduct their own affairs free of the vagaries of international trade and the exploitative nature of international finance.
It is a message worthy of the best revolutionaries. We began long ago and so we continue today, drawing in new blood and fresh minds that can grasp the importance of Mosley's message.
We say, “Britain first in Europe a nation” ... the idea that we do not lose sight of the land from whence we came, as we go forward together into that great extension of patriotism – Europe, the coming new force in the world.

B&H Question: What is your position regarding the Holocaust of European Jewry and laws in some European countries that criminalise any criticism or revision of the accepted version of events? Do you believe that there was a German policy for exterminating European Jewry?

Answer: This comes under the category of war crimes and atrocities which still go on today. I would first argue that the Holocaust was not something unique in history and that there have been many holocausts throughout history equally worthy of our sympathy and attention. The Zionists push this too far with the result that this claim of 'uniqueness' only offends other peoples and racial groups that have also suffered horrific genocide. For example, the Palestinians have suffered terribly for more than half a century, being murdered by the Zionists on a daily basis. They pick on children, the frail and the weak. The Gaza Strip is virtually a concentration camp with the Zionist IDF behaving like sadistic camp guards. They torture and harass Palestinians on a level that is undoubtedly inhumane to the extreme.
And yet we are bombarded with Holocaust material on screen and on the airwaves. Yes, we know all about it, so why keep reminding us to the point that many are sick and tired of it all? The Zionists would like the entire world to feel guilt but the point is, we in Britain had nothing to do with it. It is a German issue which the German people should deal with and sort out. Their government makes the laws that incarcerate citizens for questioning the Holocaust. This is persecution for a thought crime which is something totally unacceptable in a free society. The answer would be to remove the politicians who make these laws and replace them with German patriots who care about their own people.
Which brings us to Holocaust Day. They should change the name to 'Day of All Holocausts in Human History'. That would receive my sympathy without hesitation. But I would rather focus on the terrible things happening today.
Mosley said, “Let all things be discussed and truth prevail”. That should be the criterion on which people approach the subject of the Holocaust. I am not an expert on the subject so I can not answer your last question. That is a matter for accredited historians with open minds, along with forensic scientists and other experts. They should be free to carry out investigations wherever they choose.
I would not use the subject as a political issue at all. I would simply object to laws in some countries that criminalise opinion simply because it does not conform. This is something they attributed to the Hitler era. What does that say about the Zionists and their acolytes?
I do not want to sound like an echo of Basil Fawlty with, “Don't mention the war”, but Europe still needs to heal the wounds of past conflicts. Reconciliation requires that we Europeans treat each other with equal respect and the memory of the Second World War should be balanced with a recognition of the decency and honour of the German soldier during that time. Having said that, I feel that any memory of the Holocaust belongs exclusively to the memorial at Yad Vashem in Israel where those who wish go for a visit can do so.

B&H Questions: What do you call yourselves in the context of your political struggle? How are you different to other patriotic groups?

Answer: We are National Europeans and our creed is European Socialism. Both terms were created by Oswald Mosley when leader of Union Movement. The term 'National European' came to the fore during the negotiations for establishing the National Party of Europe in the early 1960s. It should not be confused with 'European nationalists', which is sometimes used to describe the various petty nationalists within Europe.
The National European regards Europe as his nation just as a British person regards himself British, whether he be English, Scots or Welsh. He is no less an Englishman for that. National Europeans have long subscribed to the slogan, 'Britain First in Europe a Nation', which speaks for itself.
The days have long gone when patriotism meant sticking to the past and the status quo. It was long used as an alibi for sending the ordinary man to war and slaughter for a cause that was not his own. It is currently being used to send our soldiers to Iraq and Afghanistan in a quarrel that has more to do with stealing the mineral resources of other people, namely oil. The Americans even instituted a Patriot Act, used to persecute their own people.
In my view, patriotism entails doing the best for your own people. 'Of one's fathers' is the meaning of the original Greek word (patrios) for patriotism and so one would say that it concerns the people as a family going back in time. It has nothing to do with oligarchies, aristocracies or the privileged few. It is the ordinary people as a family bound in common blood that is the basis of patriotic sentiment.
We also say this of Europe as a great family bound in blood ... the blood of the European peoples. It was too often spilled but now it will be preserved in a metaphorical sense, in kinship and in brotherhood. This is the meaning of the extension of patriotism in Mosley's concept of Europe a Nation.

Copyright© Robert Edwards 2009
For more details write to: European Action, PO Box 415, Ramsgate, Kent CT11 9WW www.europeanaction.com

A WELSH ICON

JEFFREY HAMM - SECRETARY OF MOSLEY'S UNION MOVEMENT

www.welshicons.org.uk/html/jeffrey_hamm.php

Jeffrey Hamm is honoured here on this Welsh heritage site. He was intensely proud to be Welsh. His eloquence as a public speaker can be attributable to the Welsh love of prose.