Underwater Battlespace - The Spokesman 131

During 2016, the debate about Trident has great salience as the British government seeks parliamentary approval for its intention to build four new 'Successor' submarines to replace the ageing and increasingly decrepit Vanguard Class (see Substandard, Spokesman 129). This is a hugely expensive and technically challenging programme, vulnerable to cost overruns in a similar way to the programme to build the smaller Astute attack submarines at Barrow-in-Furness in northern England. Have such lessons about costs really been learned?

Contents

Editorial

Vintage Trident - Tony Simpson

Force for good? - Cdr Robert Green

Downwinders and other Casualties - Lawrence S. Wittner

New Cold War? - Johnathan Steele

China, Britain and Labour - Jenny Clegg

Labour Movement - Jeremy Corbyn MP

'So far as may be lawful' - Len McCluskey

Architect or Bee? - Frances O'Grady

Suffragette - Jo Vellacott

'Economy' no more? - Richard Minns

Life History - Gregory Woods

Missing - A. C. Clarke

Reviews: Nuno Martins, John Daniels, Anthony Lane, Steve Rabson, Abi Rhodes, Nicole Morris, Tom Unterrainer

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ISBN: 978 0 851248530

Price: £6

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Jeremy Corbyn: Internationalist at Work

Another featured article from the latest issue of The Spokesman comes from the 2011 edition of J. A. Hobson's Imperialism. Jeremy Corbyn penned the book's foreword, which we reprint here under the title 'Internationalist at Work'.
As a separate point of interest, we also include this comparative image of the logo of publication The Week, circa 1960s, and Corbyn's recent campaign logo. Cut from the same cloth?

Internationalist at Work
J. A. Hobson wrote his great tome at a different age. His thoughts were dominated by the zenith of the British Empire and the Boer War. The outcome of the war demonstrated Britain’s then ability in sustaining global reach, since Elizabethan times, but also its extreme vulnerability. At home the poor physique of working class soldiers led to Haldane’s investigation into working class health and living conditions. The difficulty in containing the rebellious Boers, and the huge opposition to the war, encouraged further doubts about the whol…

'Not as dumb as he looks' - Muhammad Ali on Bertrand Russell

In his autobiography The Greatest: My Own Story, Muhammad Ali recounts how Bertrand Russell got in contact with him, and their ensuing correspondence:

***
For days I was talking to people from a whole new world. People who were not even interested in sports, especially prizefighting. One in particular I will never forget: a remarkable man, seventy years older than me but with a fresh outlook which seemed fairer than that of any white man I had ever met in America.
My brother Rahaman had handed me the phone, saying, ‘Operator says a Mr. Bertrand Russell is calling Mr. Muhammad Ali.’ I took it and heard the crisp accent of an Englishman: ‘Is this Muhammad Ali?’ When I said it was, he asked if I had been quoted correctly.
I acknowledged that I had been, but wondered out loud, ‘Why does everyone want to know what I think about Viet Nam? I’m no politician, no leader. I’m just an athlete.’
‘Well,’ he said, ‘this is a war more barbaric than others, and because a mystique is built up around a cham…

Vanunu update

Dear Friend and Vanunu supporter,

It is a long time since we last sent you any news of Mordechai for which we apologise. It has been a complicated and difficult period particularly with Mordechai not wanting the campaign for his freedom to continue. However, we thought now was the time for an update, because if you hadn't seen the relevant issues of the Morning Star, Scottish Herald or, just this week, The Guardian, you probably wouldn't be fully aware of what Mordechai had been suffering, once again, at the hands of the vindictive and malicious Israeli authorities.

For some while Mordechai has been threatened with a return to prison for speaking with foreigners; including friends, supporters and journalists. For breaking this restriction he was eventually sentenced to six months in prison. He appealed against this and at a hearing of the Supreme Court, some months ago, this sentence was reduced to three months. As an alternative Mordechai was offered to do a period of Community…

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