THE TRUE STORY BEHIND THE CHAGOS BETRAYAL

To understand the full madness and idiocy of Starmer's Chagos surrender you need to know the history of the islands. So here is everything you need to know:

The history

In 1513 the Chagos Archipelago – consisting of some 60 islands, the largest of which is Diego Garcia – was discovered by Portuguese explorers, who named it. The islands were uninhabited and of no interest to anyone, so were promptly forgotten about until 27 April 1786 when Britain claimed them. We were the first to do so but did not, however, establish a colony there. France, which already controlled both Mauritius (which they called Isle de France and which they had taken in 1715 after the Dutch - who had first landed on the then uninhabited island in 1507 - had abandoned it in 1710), and the Seychelles (which was uninhabited when France seized them in 1756), decided that they rather fancied the islands too. France cheekily started issuing permits for coconut plantations there and in 1793 they established a colony on Diego Garcia and transported African and Malagasy slaves there. Both the Chagos Islands and the Seychelles were administered from their base in Mauritius.

During the Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815) France used their naval base in Mauritius to attack British shipping in the Indian Ocean. We got rather fed up of this impudence so decided to take the island. Our first attack in August 1810 was unsuccessful, and France was so elated at their victory that they commemorated it on the Arc de Triomphe. Britain's second attack a few months later was successful however, and Mauritius was formally surrendered to Britain on 3 December 1810. Oddly enough, there is no monument in Paris to commemorate this historic event! The Treaty of Paris, signed in May 1814 after Napoleon's defeat, abdication and exile to Elba, officially ceded Mauritius, the Seychelles and the Chagos Islands to Britain.

In 1835 Britain abolished slavery on the islands described by British hydrographer James Horsburgh as “one of the wonderful phenomena of this globe”, and all was well in this little corner of paradise. Until 1963. Then, concerned about the prospects of Soviet expansion in the Indian Ocean, the United States asked Britain's Labour government to find an uninhabited island where the US could establish a naval base. In return, the US offered to waive their research and development fees related to Britain’s Polaris missile programme, valued at $14 million – which is the equivalent of about £110 million today.

Initially the island of Aldabra (north of Madagascar) was selected, but this turned out to be a breeding ground for rare giant tortoises. This led to protests from the environmental lobby, supported in parliament by the MP Tam Dalyell, and this option was therefore abandoned. In 1966, Labour Defence Secretary Denis Healey observed: "As I understand it, the island of Aldabra is inhabited - like Her Majesty's Opposition Front bench - by giant turtles, frigate birds and boobies."

So Diego Garcia was chosen. Fortunately the Chagos Archipelago only had some 1,500 or so (nobody is clear about the precise number) Chagossian human beings living on it; these were considered far less important than turtles and were dismissed by one British diplomat as “some few Tarzans or Man Fridays” and by another as people with “little aptitude for anything other than growing coconuts” who were “unsophisticated and untrainable”. The US insisted that they wanted them all removed (not just the ones on the island of Diego Garcia), with American Admiral Elmo Zumwait making this very clear: “My own personal desire was to have no “indigenous” labourers on the island because I could foresee the kind of political complication that the Soviets always make when you have that kind of “indigenous” population. Therefore, I strongly advocate that there be none there when we take over and establish the base”. Note, by the way, the unambiguous statement that the US would “take over”!

This is when the Chagossian “population problem” (as the Foreign Office described it at the time) began - a long, tortuous and sad story that was all so unnecessary and that has created all the problems that we have today. [The story of the Chagossians is too long and complex to go into here, but they were shunted from pillar to post, had their pets killed and burned in front of them, and were rendered stateless, homeless and poverty stricken]. We should simply have told the US that while the population of Diego Garcia would be evacuated, those living on the other islands of the archipelago would be allowed to remain. Instead, the Labour government, under Harold Wilson, decided to force all the Chagossians to leave. Meanwhile, just to exacerbate the problem, there was a growing political movement for independence – and to claim as much from Britain as possible. Labour, then as now, were only too happy to divest Britain of its imperial legacy, and therefore went along with this.

As we have seen, there was no natural historical link between Mauritius and the Chagos Islands. Although the latter were administered by Britain from Mauritius, this was just for our administrative convenience. Indeed, so were the Seychelles, until 1903. There is no link between the people of the two islands, as neither were native and both were introduced by Europeans. Although most Chagossians were sent to Mauritius some also went to the Seychelles. Mauritius and the Chagos Islands are not even close – they are some 1,300 miles apart! Indeed, Chagos is closer to the Seychelles, the Maldives, Sri Lanka or even to India. Mauritius’s claim is obviously utterly spurious.

In 1965, the independence discussions, Mauritius actually wanted the Seychelles (which are not only larger and more valuable than the Chagos Islands but also much closer). Unfortunately, there was a separate, growing independence campaign in the Seychelles too, so this wasn't possible politically. Instead, Mauritius was promised the Chagos Islands, if and when we no longer needed them for defence purposes, as well as a sweetener of £3 million for agreeing to this arrangement – which they did. [Note that in 1972 we voluntarily paid Mauritius a further £650,000 and in 1982 yet another £4 million.]

Following agreement with Mauritius, and in order to prepare for the administrative split, Britain created the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), which consisted of the Chagos Islands as well as a few others (including Aldabra – the turtle island). [When the Seychelles were granted independence in 1976 these other islands were given to them, and BIOT was left with only the Chagos Islands.] In 1966 we leased Diego Garcia to the US for 50 years (extendable for a further 20 – which occurred in 2016) for the princely sum of $1 per year, on the basis that it would be made available to meet the defence needs of both governments, and in 1968 Mauritius was granted independence.

All sorted, then? Not a bit of it. By agreeing to eventually give Chagos to Mauritius, and paying them compensation for not receiving these islands right away, Labour had stupidly accepted and agreed that these territories were linked, and the UN General Assembly objected to the establishment of BIOT, claiming we should have immediately given the islands to Mauritius, stating that "Any attempt aimed at the partial or total disruption of the national unity and the territorial integrity of a country is incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations".

The General Assembly does not have any formal power, and the UK has a veto over any actual decisions, so we ignored this statement. In 2010 however Britain decided to create the Chagos Marine Protected Area (MPA) – a massive marine reserve (the 3rd-largest in the world) encompassing all the waters around the islands. Although purportedly this was done for environmental reasons, a leaked diplomatic cable between the US and UK revealed that the FCO asserted that restricting fishing in the MPA would be the "most effective long-term way to prevent any of the Chagos Islands' former inhabitants or their descendants from resettling."

The fact that this political motive was the real one was confirmed by the fact that, as the cable went on to say that "the terms of reference for the establishment of a marine park would clearly state that the BIOT, including Diego Garcia, was reserved for military uses” and that the British government sought “no constraints on military operations” (meaning this could cause environmental damage). Furthermore, while all fishing is supposedly banned, this does NOT apply to the US military on the base, who in 2010 (the only year figures were leaked) caught more than 28 tonnes of fish!

Instead of putting an end to our Chagos problems this actually made things much worse, as it triggered a complaint from Mauritius who initiated a legal challenge, leading to a 2015 decision by the Permanent Court of Arbitration that ruled that the MPA was illegal. This however only related to the marine reserve, not our sovereignty over the islands. The dispute got worse though when, in 2017, the United Nations General Assembly referred the dispute to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in order to clarify the legal status of the Chagos Islands. In 2019 the ICJ found that “that the process of decolonization of Mauritius was not lawfully completed when that country acceded to independence and that the United Kingdom is under an obligation to bring to an end its administration of the Chagos Archipelago as rapidly as possible”. The ICJ did, however, repeatedly make clear that this was only an “advisory opinion”.

The ICJ has NO remit to adjudicate between Commonwealth countries (as both the UK and Mauritius are). The UK therefore initially ignored the judgement, but in November 2022, the Tory government inexplicably caved in and Foreign Secretary James Cleverly announced we would begin negotiations on sovereignty. True, Cleverly suspended the talks, but his successor, David Cameron, started them again! And this is what led directly to where we are now. It's no good the Tories whingeing about Starmer's capitulation: they were the ones who conceded the case in the first place. Everything has followed on from that. If only they had heeded Churchill’s words to Roosevelt and Stalin at the 1945 Yalta Conference: “I will have no suggestion that the British Empire is to be put in the dock and examined by everybody to see if it is up to their standard. Never. Never. Never… Every scrap of territory over which the British flag flies is immune.”

Starmer's Surrender

There endeth the history lesson. So what has Starmer now gone and done? To see the truth let's go straight to the actual text of the agreement:

(i) The preamble says that it is “mindful of the need to complete the process of decolonisation of Mauritius”. So there you have it – right at the start. This is all about Starmer's hatred of the British Empire. And do you remember where the reference to colonisation comes from? Yes, the ICJ verdict which was only advisory! So it is clear that Starmer has accepted this verdict even though there was no need to do so.

(ii) Article 6: “Mauritius is free to implement a programme of resettlement on the islands of the Chagos Archipelago other than Diego Garcia”. Incredible! After decades of saying it was impossible and unacceptable for the Chagossians to return to the islands, guess what? It turns out that this is perfectly possible after all! If the government had agreed this from the start NONE of these problems would have ever occurred. The whole problem is a self-inflicted wound. We didn't just shoot ourselves in the foot – we shot ourselves in the head! And the problem is that while we've said that Mauritius can resettle the Chagossians, Mauritius has an appalling record of discrimination against the Chagossians and has not said that it will do so.

(iii) Article 10: “suitably qualified Mauritian nationals shall be employed as contractors on the Base to the maximum extent practicable”. Note that Mauritius wanted their own nationals to receive preference and excluded the Chagossians! Even British companies that might want to tender for work will be discriminated against! And how secure is it to have Mauritians who support China working on a top secret military base?

(iv) Article 13 sets out the duration of the agreement: 99 years. It can then be extended by a further 40 years, and after that for another indeterminate period. But any extension after the 99 years can be rejected unilaterally by Mauritius. So this crucial defence facility is only secure for 99 years. Modern politicians have no concept of the long-term. But you never know what will be important in the future. After all, we took possession of Chagos 210 years ago, and now it's really important. We look back on the British rulers at the time very fondly. But what will future generations think of what our governments are doing today?

Labour's lies

No wonder Navin Ramgoolam, prime minister of Mauritius, said this was “a great victory” in a live broadcast. The UK is giving away an island it already has and will have to pay to lease it back for 99 years, after which we could lose it forever. In what world does that make any sense? In the world of left-wing liars such as Keir Starmer and Foreign Secretary David Lammy. Just look at what they said:

Starmer said: “If we do not agree this deal, the legal situation would mean that we would not be able to prevent China or any other nation setting up their own bases on the outer islands.” LIES! If we hadn't agreed the deal the whole archipelago would have remained ours and we would have simply repelled (no doubt with the help of the US) any country trying to set up a base.

Lammy said: “Diego Garcia faced the prospect of international court rulings that would have rendered the base inoperable. Even if Britain refused to comply with international rulings, our allies and partners would.” LIES! The only partner we have on Diego Garcia is the US, which does NOT recognise the ICJ. So WHY would the base have become “inoperable”? And WHO would have been able to stop us operating it?

Starmer said: If our sovereignty is challenged the electromagnetic spectrum (which allows satellite communications) at Diego Garcia could be restricted by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), “rendering it practically useless.” LIES! The ITU cannot engage in territorial disputes (it's not in their remit), and Labour was later forced to admit “The ITU cannot challenge the UK’s use of civilian or military spectrum.”

Lammy said: Without an agreement “Our land, air and sea operations would have been compromised. We would have been unable to safely berth nuclear-powered submarines”. LIES! This is drivel. WHY on earth would we have been unable to do this? WHO would have stopped us? This is all just mentally retarded garbage!

But maybe the biggest lie is over the cost of the deal.

OK, here's the costings:

£165m a year for the first 3 years (deliberately front-loading the costs).

£120m a year for years 4-13.

£120m plus inflation for years 14-99.

PLUS:

£45m a year for 25 years for development.

£40m one-off for Chagossian fund.

The government claim that, over the lifetime of the deal, the cost to the taxpayer would only amount to £3.4 billion after adjusting for inflation and economic growth. But at the same time they say the average annual cost will be £101 Million. But £101 million x 99 years is £9.999 billion! But just adding up the actual figures – and without factoring in inflation – the cost comes to £13.18 BILLION. Are they mad??? And bear in mind that they assume inflation will be 2%, whereas this is currently 3.5%! And what “economic growth” are they counting on? We are barely in positive territory!

If you do the calculation properly, and include inflation (and even assuming the 2% inflation target is permanently achieved!) the total cost is actually £30.3 BILLION. And with higher, more realistic inflation, this deal will cost a lot more!

But here's an interesting thing

Article 15 says that Mauritius can terminate the agreement if the UK does not make the payments agreed. But it is the Agreement itself, in Article 1, that concedes sovereignty of Chagos to Mauritius: “Mauritius is sovereign over the Chagos Archipelago in its entirety, including Diego Garcia”. So what happens if a future UK government – say a Reform government – simply stops paying Mauritius and they terminate the agreement? We revert to the status quo ante – ie. the position before the Agreement was signed, when the UK did NOT accept Mauritius's sovereignty over the Chagos Islands! So far from being a negative this is actually exactly what we should do!

The government keep saying that the US and other allies support the deal, but why wouldn't they? They're not paying for it – WE are! The US stay in charge and we pay. And the US is in charge - the US official military website states: “Great Britain maintains a presence on the Island”. Maintains a presence! That's it!

Who else is happy? Well, a certain lawyer called Philippe Sands KC. Who's he? Well, Starmer calls him a “friend” and he calls Starmer a “great friend”. He even helped Starmer when he ran for the Labour leadership in 2020. Yes, they've been close friends for over 20 years. And guess what? Philippe Sands just happens to be the legal counsel advising the Mauritian government on their bid to get control of Chagos. And he's even got Mauritian citizenship. And their highest award - the Grand Commander of the Order of the Star and Key of the Indian Ocean! Isn't that a fortunate coincidence – that Starmer's great mate is so happy with Starmer's unfathomable betrayal of Britain?!

So who isn't happy? Well, firstly, the Chagossians, who have been so cruelly and unfairly treated all these years. Mauritius has been awarded a £40 million fund to help them but who is to say how this money will be disbursed? Mauritius is a notoriously corrupt country. Pravind Jugnauth, the Mauritian prime minister who negotiated the deal with both the Tories and later Labour, has been arrested on money laundering charges! Yes, these are definitely people who can be trusted!

Government lawyers say the treaty is “clear” that Mauritius will “be able to implement a programme of resettlement on the islands of the Chagos archipelago”, but confirm that “it is necessarily uncertain to what extent and how Mauritius may take this up”, adding that the UK will have “no control” of the trust fund supporting the Chagossians and it “will be administered by Mauritius”. Well, that's all very encouraging, isn't it?

And of course the main victims of this fiasco are the British people. Our interests have been betrayed, once again. Richard Tice has said that Reform would want to reverse this deal. GOOD. I want to hear the party repeat that and put it in their manifesto.

The great fear, of course, is what will this treasonous government agree to in the current negotiations with Spain over Gibraltar, or in future negotiations with Argentina over the Falklands? Starmer and the Labour party are ABSOLUTE SCUM. I despise them. Roll on the next general election – we must make sure they are destroyed!

-----------

If you like this article then please share it on Facebook, Twitter/X, and by email to your friends. Spread the word!!

Thank you :-)