It was a mission fraught with danger, but British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond insisted that it was his duty to do everything possible to avoid war with Spain. He had been warned that Spanish Air Force (“SAF”) Major General Galeazzo Ciano, was eager to start a war for Gibraltar; the risk was that Ciano, to block Gibraltar negotiations with London, might just order that Hammond be shot down. Instead, in an apparent compromise between moderate and extreme nationalist generals, as Hammond’s aircraft was approaching Spanish airspace, it was intercepted and warded off, by two SAF T Mk IX Spitfires[1]
This, so far, is the only piece of news that has emerged in the European press, about the most serious crisis for NATO since 1949.
SPANISH INTRIGUE
The motive for the crisis is to be found in Spanish politics: Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy is trying to save his party from crushing defeat at the June 2016 general elections. His first choice was to lift the ban on live bullfights on state-run television TVE[2].
When this was not enough to boost the waning fortunes of his party, the Partido Popular, Mr. Rajoy decided that the time had come for a final solution to the Gibraltar problem. In a South-American demarche, he proposed to Argentine President Mauricio Macri, that the two sister nations launch two contemporary britzkiegs, to solve the issues they have with Great Britain, over the Malvinas (Falklands) Islands and over Gibraltar.
President Macri demurred, and Spanish Admiral of the Fleet Medina Sidonia offered an alternative plan, one that might avoid a bloody war. Instead of a frontal attack against the best fortified territory on earth, he proposed the invasion of the Hebrides, a chain of islands off the coast of Scotland.
The calculation was that David Cameron is no Baroness Thatcher, and that he would not dare to retake the Hebrides by force. Most important, London would not really mind losing an island in Scotland, in exchange for weakening the Scottish independence movement. The idea was to make the Scots feel that they needed the Royal Navy to defend them from a Spanish Armada.
According to the Medina Sidonia plan, King Felipe VI was to call Queen Elizabeth II, and mention, in passing, that if Cameron attacked the “Spanish Hebrides”, he would be unable to stop his generals from shelling Gibraltar. That, of course, would result in Russia imposing a no fly zone to protect Spain. To avoid such unpleasantries, Cameron could be trusted to keep things very quiet, and negotiations over Gibraltar could start in earnest.
THE CANNA LANDINGS
On Sunday, May 15, at 6 AM, the Spanish navy launched the invasion of Canna Island, population 11; British armed forces were absent and could not offer resistance.
However, the Canna Defense Force (“CDF”), put up a spirited struggle; numerous clashes with the Spanish Navy were videotaped. In one such action, CDF sailor Matilda Brunetti was wounded; she is said to be now in a Spanish hospital.
So far, the plan of Admiral of the Fleet Medina Sidonia has succeeded: 10 Downing Street has imposed silence on the British press, invoking the Official Secrets Act. Telephone lines to the island are cut, and the ferry is “undergoing repairs.”
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