The Partition of India — and before it the Partition of Bengal — were among the most consequential acts of British imperial cartography, with the former leaving countless dead, a subcontinent in perennial trauma and perhaps even helping create some of the geopolitical conditions from which pan-global Islamist terrorism later emerged with a little help from Uncle Sam.
asserted
terrorism → leave → Sam
Ergo, there is a little schadenfreude in seeing talk of partition engulf the country that facilitated it: the United Kingdom, or should we call it the Divided Kingdom?
asserted
we → be → it
The latest shot comes from the person whose logorrhoea has truly upended the world order carefully put in place after the Second World War.
asserted
logorrhoea → come → War
Speaking in Ireland, Donald Trump put the fat in the fire by saying he would “love” to see a “united” Ireland, saying it was inevitable and “may as well happen now”.
uncertain
it → speak → Ireland
UK PM Andy Burnham – who, if you squint your eye, looks like an AI-generated image of Keir Starmer – pushed back, only for Trump to double down and call it “pretty cool”.
asserted
Trump → squint → it
Now, for Trump, saying something is “pretty cool” could be as serious as toppling a Supreme Leader or having regular Coke instead of Diet Coke, but his statement certainly caused some excitement.
uncertain
statement → say → excitement
Now here’s the reason why Trump’s rhetoric is a little more than just words.
asserted
rhetoric → ’ → words
For perhaps the first time in their history, Ireland, Scotland and Wales are led by parties and politicians who want to change their nations’ relationship with the UK, a sort of
Brexit, if you will, except this was never how Brexit was supposed to work.
asserted
Brexit → lead → Brexit
The Brexit Referendum in 2016, which is as hackneyed as Yes Minister’s British sausage plot to get Jim Hacker elected as PM, has consumed six Prime Ministers, effectively turning 10 Downing Street into an AirBNB.
asserted
Hacker → get → AirBNB
Instead of freeing the UK from the bureaucrats in Brussels, it has instead put a man who recently beat a novelty candidate wearing a trash can within touching distance of the Prime Minister’s seat.
asserted
who → free → seat
And now it has created a political situation where the UK might finally become “divided”.
uncertain
UK → create → situation
Britain has survived the Spanish Armada, Napoleon, two world wars, the loss of empire, the Troubles, Brexit and even Meghan Markle — but it might not survive Donald Trump.
uncertain
it → survive → Trump
Scotland wants independence, Plaid Cymru (Wales’ governing party) is toying with the idea, and Sinn Fein wants Northern Ireland to leave one state and join another.
asserted
Ireland → want → another
In
Ted Lasso, the Panglossian protagonist once asked: “How many countries are in this country?”
asserted
countries → ask → country
And to explain that properly, we have to go back to the World Cup quarter-final when England faced Erling Haaland and Norway.
asserted
England → explain → Haaland
In a way, Haaland’s predecessors, the Vikings, are responsible for what we call the United Kingdom.
asserted
we → call → what
Unlike Haaland and his compatriots, who weren’t that successful while raiding the English defence, his predecessors attacked so much that the warring Anglo-Saxon tribes had to band together under Alfred the Great before Æthelstan put together what can be recognised as the first united England.
asserted
what → raid → England
Once it had set its own affairs in order, England turned to its neighbours, conquering Wales.
asserted
England → set → Wales
The neighbour that gave the most trouble — and not just because of Mel Gibson’s antisemitic views — was Scotland, which continued to resist England.
asserted
which → give → England
Edward I tried, William Wallace resisted, Robert the Bruce won at Bannockburn in the first Spiderman prequel and Scotland remained sovereign.
asserted
Scotland → try → prequel
And then in 1603 the joke wrote itself when James VI of Scotland inherited England.
asserted
VI → write → England
No invasion was needed, but the two kingdoms retained separate parliaments and laws, perhaps because the Scots were always wary of the English.
asserted
Scots → need → English
That arrangement spectacularly imploded under James’s son Charles I, whose quarrels with Parliament eventually produced civil wars across England, Scotland and Ireland and ended with the rather permanent constitutional remedy of chopping off the king’s head.
asserted
quarrels → implode → head
Ireland was already deeply entangled in the mess after the rebellion of 1641, and when Oliver Cromwell crossed the Irish Sea in 1649, he ended up causing far more damage than the Dothraki and the Unsullied did on Westeros.
asserted
Dothraki → cross → Westeros
Abolishing the monarchy, Lord-Protector Cromwell briefly pulled England, Scotland and Ireland into one republican experiment which was as successful as the MAGA Republican experiment.
asserted
which → abolish → experiment
Cromwell’s Puritan regime was so maudlin that the entire kingdom decided that it was considerably less irritating to have a Crown than a prude in charge.
asserted
it → decide → charge
While the monarchy returned with Charles II, the constitutional problem remained as all three countries continued to behave on their own.
asserted
countries → return → own
The marriage between England and Scotland began properly in 1707 because England wanted a common Protestant succession and Scotland’s elite wanted to dip their fingers into the giant and ever-expanding pie that was the English colonial markets.
asserted
that → begin → pie
The Acts of Union created Great Britain, and Scots subsequently became energetic participants in the British Empire.
asserted
Scots → create → Empire
Ireland, however, kind of like Roy Keane in his last days at Manchester United, continued to rage.
asserted
Ireland → continue → United
It had been under varying degrees of English control for centuries, beginning with the Anglo-Norman invasion, through the Tudor conquest and Cromwell’s campaigns.
asserted
It → vary → conquest
It still remained a separate kingdom, and after the 1798 rebellion and with the French making eyes, London decided enough was enough.
asserted
enough → remain → eyes
While the Irish Commons initially rejected the offer, palms were greased with peerages, pensions and patronage to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
asserted
palms → reject → Britain
Like Roy Keane at Manchester United after his epic MUTV rant, the arrangement didn’t last, with Irish nationalism, the Easter Rising and the War of Independence eventually producing the Anglo-Irish Treaty, and in 1922 most of Ireland chose Brexit while Northern Ireland remained.
asserted
Ireland → last → Brexit
As the empire crumbled under its own guilt, Westminster tried devolution, with the Scots getting a parliament, Wales an assembly and the Good Friday Agreement creating power-sharing in Northern Ireland in an awkward situationship in which, if a majority of Northern Ireland wanted it, it could become a part of a united Ireland.
uncertain
it → crumble → Ireland
And things roiled on, despite the fireworks brought by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) – seldom referred to as terrorists because they are white – ending with the aforementioned Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
asserted
they → roil → 1998
IRA’s political wing Sinn Fein was admitted into the multi-party peace talks and by 2005 the IRA put down its arms, realising there were better ways to make noise.
asserted
IRA → admit → noise
And then came Brexit, in which Scotland voted heavily to Remain, Northern Ireland voted Remain, while Wales voted Leave alongside England.
asserted
Wales → come → England
Now Scotland has the most mature independence movement, with the SNP holding 58 and the pro-independence Greens 15, giving them 73 in a 129-seat assembly.
asserted
Greens → have → assembly
While Scotland has a fair degree of freedom with its own parliament and legal system, foreign affairs, immigration and monetary policy are still decided in Westminster.
asserted
affairs → have → Westminster
…and 11 more, not listed.
The Aporia
