Our Kith And Kin From Cape Town To Kirkuk

Today's Telegraph piece, on which comments are welcome over there:

If Britain looked after her Diaspora the way Russia looks after hers, then the world would be a much better place. I don’t mean that as any sort of disrespect to the Russians. Quite the contrary. We should make it clear that if you mess with the Anglo-Africans, or with any of the distinct mixed-race peoples with which we peppered the earth, then you mess with us.

No war need be necessary, although the possibility must not be ruled out. We were right to take in the East African Asians, and may yet have to exercise a similar responsibility in relation to South Africa in general and Natal in particular.

The white Zimbabweans blotted their copybook with the UDI, and poured a whole bottle of ink all over it when they purportedly abolished the monarchy while removing the Union Flag from their own. By contrast, the Boer Republic’s creation was opposed by the English-speaking whites, and even it never removed the Union Flag. But black sheep and prodigal sons are still sheep and sons all the same. Through whatever representative body they have or can devise, Zimbabweans should declare their allegiance to the Queen as Head of the Commonwealth, explicitly placing themselves under the (in principle, reciprocal) protection of all those who declare likewise.

And considering that the Queen is Head of State from The Bahamas to the Solomon Islands, and remains Paramount Chief of Fiji, the Matabele should make a similar declaration. They would then be as much our kith and kin as the Bahamians and the Solomon Islanders, the Canadians and the Australians, those Fijians who look to the Great Council of Chiefs and those white Zimbabweans, or other Anglo-Africans further south, or Cape Coloureds, or Anglo-Indians, or whoever, who chose to acknowledge a comparable relationship with the monarchy.

Nor is this our only kinship and affinity. We are in some way related to everyone whose culture is defined by the synthesis of the Old Israel, Hellenism and the Roman Empire in Jesus Christ and His Church, objectively the basis of our own state. We must therefore have a particular concern for those who are persecuted or living as a minority. The Chaldo-Assyrians of Iraq are enduring profound victimisation as a result of the invasion and occupation of their country, whereas the Iranian Assyrians have a reserved seat in Parliament. There are two such seats for Iran’s Armenians, and their several thriving churches in Tehran contrast strikingly with the absence of any such in Ankara, Istanbul or other cities of our dear NATO and putative EU brother, Turkey.

Likewise, there are Christian-majority provinces and Christian festivals as public holidays in Syria, while one of Lebanon’s official languages is European (French) and her President must be a Christian (a Maronite Catholic). Nothing remotely comparable can be said for a certain other Levantine country, our attitude towards which must always be as articulated by the heads of the eight principal Christian communities there: Latin, Melkite, Maronite, Syrian Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Armenian, Anglican and Lutheran.

We should not forget them. Russia certainly won’t forget her kith and kin, and good for her. She is, as Enoch Powell understood, Britain’s natural ally.