From The Independent:
The English are blindly driving Northern Ireland to conflict – the fear is that they are too stupid to care. A return to violence is not a worst-case scenario but an inevitability if a hard border returns, as it will if there is a full Brexit.
OK, why's that then?
Focus is often placed on the sheer difficulty of policing the 310-mile border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland because there are at least 300 major and minor crossing points.
But the real problem is not geographic or military but political and demographic because almost all the border runs through country where Catholics greatly outnumber Protestants.
The Catholics will not accept, and are in a position to prevent, a hard border unless it is defended permanently by several thousand British troops in fortified positions.
Sounds like a terribly stupid idea to me, it fails for practicality, so whose idea is it?
The EU could never agree to a deal – and would be signing its own death warrant if it did – in which the customs union and the single market have a large unguarded hole in their tariff and regulatory walls.
Jolly good. Let Them sort it out then, not the UK's problem. What if the UK sensibly refuses to get involved with imposing a 'hard border'?
Debate Magazine
