ARMS AND THE MAN

Yesterday's news that security forces in Bahrain have killed three anti-government protestors has prompted a kneejerk reaction from Britain's Foreign Officer Minister, Alistair Burt. Mr Burt wants an immediate enquiry to determine whether any of the crowd control weapons - tear gas, CS gas, thunderflashes and the like - that UK manufacturers sell to Bahrain under formal and legal licenses were used in this recent fight. Well they may have been or may not have been but I don't really see that this matters much.

The key point is whether Britain should allow the manufacture of arms, for if manufactured arms must be sold and the natural sales targets are friendly powers like, until apparently the beginning of the week, Bahrain.

I agree with America's National Rifle Association about very little but I do have some sympathy with that organization's oft repeated mantra that "people kill, not guns".

Some people see arms manufacture as an immoral activity. I have no comment here but I will say that the sale of arms, provided it is conducted above-board, is to my mind amoral. The fact that those to whom arms are sold may turn out to be undesirable rascals is an acknowledged risk but not one that can be dealt with in retrospect.

I leave the last words here to that estimable show, "The West Wing", specifically one of the sixth series episodes about Middle East peace talks. On this occasion the President drives the Israelis and Palestinians to the negotiating table rather than take the popular course of bombing Palestine after a terrorist incident in Gaza leading to the deaths of two congressmen and a former Chief of the Defense Staff.

President Bartlet's refusal to bomb leads to a terminal confrontation with his Chief of Staff, Leo McGarry who in answer to Bartlet's forceful question, "Tell me how it ends, Leo", shouts back even more forcibly, "Sometimes we don't know how it ends".