Christopher Hitchens on Malta - Part 2

continued from yesterday, Christopher Hitchens writes:

..Libya, which is the largest Arab neighbor, gave Malta a great deal of economic help in the brave days when oil was expensive. In return, Qaddafi received various privileges, such as the right to broadcast his implausible propaganda from transmitters on the islands. But as the Maltese never tire of saying, they did not expel one master in order to acquire another. When Qaddafi turned nasty over the matter of Malta's right to explore for oil on the continental shelf, Prime Minister Dom Mintoff did not hesitate to condemn him, publicly and roundly, for his arrogance. Malta has appealed to The Hague to uphold its rights and maritime boundaries, and has suspended Libyan broadcasting permits in the meantime. This is an exercise of independence that would have been impossible under colonial rule.

The Soviet fleet in the Mediterranean is, like all other military forces, prevented from using Valletta as a base. There is, however, a "bunkering" arrangement, whereby Soviet commercial vessels may refuel here. It is said that this fuel is often transferred to the Soviet Navy once the ship is outside Malta's territorial waters, and no spokeperson for the government will deny that this is the case. As I was told: "We cannot control end-users--any more than Mr. Reagan can insure that American wheat does not feed the Red Army. But we have offered the very same refueling facilities to the United States, and could not prevent them from benefitting the Sixth Fleet." The Maltese press, which is still predominantly controlled by extreme conservative interests, can fog this distinction but it cannot completely obscure it.

During my stay, a British warship paid a courtesy call--the first since the eviction of the Royal Navy, in 1979. Large crowds turned out to greet it, causing ecstasies of sentimentality and Churchillian reminiscence among the English tax exile community and the Maltese conservatives. (And, to be honest, in my own breast: boyhood glories are hard to shake.) Among the enthusiasts was an old worker who told me, with an equal measure of pride, "We used to need their permission to use our harbors. Now they have to ask ours."

In a sane world, Malta's desire for self-determination would not be an occasion for hysteria. But the Reaganites and their clones among the European Christian Democrats are incapable of seeing the point of nonalignment. To them neutrality is a debased product of the theory of moral equivalence. I'm reminded of a famous "cultural freedom" conference held in New Delhi at the height of the first cold war. An American speaker, inveighing against Indian even-handedness, said that it was senseless to be neutral between the shepherd and the wolf. This thunderous righteousness was punctured by an Indian who pointed out mildly enough that his country had experienced many wolves in its time, and it needed no lectures on the subject. Did the American, he inquired, wish to liken the United States to the shepherd? After all, shepherds existed not to protect sheep from wolves but to arrange for their regular fleecing and butchering.