The Colossus That Was Rhodes: Britain's ur-imperialist not only dreamt of constructing a railway from "Cairo to the Cape", but also of expanding the dominion of the Anglo-Saxon powers to encompass the entire planet. A century on, the United States, aided by the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, has indeed become the global hegemon. The GCSB spy-base at Waihopai is part of that hegemony.
WHAT DO CECIL JOHN RHODES and the Waihopai Spy Base have in
common? The answer is: the maintenance of a world in which the Anglo-Saxon powers
continue to play a dominant role. Rhodes, the great nineteenth century British
imperialist, could not have imagined the raw technological power which
installations like the GCSB’s Waihopai Station have added to the imperial
mission, but he would have approved – wholeheartedly.
He would also have felt entirely vindicated by the current
disposition of global economic, military and political power. His vision of the
future was one in which the might of the British Empire and the United States had
become fused in an Anglo-Saxon imperium to which the rest of the world paid
homage.
Naturally, Rhodes foresaw the British Empire taking the lead
role in this geopolitical drama. In the late nineteenth century, when he was at
the summit of his remarkable career, the power of the USA remained veiled. (Although,
the exertions of the Civil War, 1861-65, should have alerted Rhodes to America’s
prodigious potential.) Even so, his most enduring legacy, the Rhodes
Scholarship, was intended to create a special brotherhood of Anglo-Saxon
leaders, drawn overwhelmingly from the British Empire and the USA, into whose
hands the grand mission of bringing as much of the world as possible under Anglo-Saxon
control could be safely reposed.
At the heart of Rhodes’ plan to create a global elite lay
Oxford University – among whose dreaming spires the Rhodes Trust’s carefully
selected scholars were expected to imbibe that noxious mixture of classical idealism,
medieval obscurantism and contemporary chauvinism from which the British Empire
had been fashioned.
Just how toxic this amalgam could be may be judged by
Rhodes’ own justification for the creation of Anglo-Saxon hegemony:
“I contend that we are the finest race in the world and that
the more of the world we inhabit the better it is for the human race. Just
fancy those parts that are at present inhabited by the most despicable
specimens of human beings what an alteration there would be if they were
brought under Anglo-Saxon influence, look again at the extra employment a new
country added to our dominions gives.”
Rhodes was by no means the only statesman in the British
Empire to evince such crude and unabashed racism, and he certainly wasn’t the
most peculiar. Not only was New Zealand’s Prime Minister from 1912 to 1925,
William Ferguson Massey, a bigoted Orangeman and fervent British imperialist,
but he was also a “British Israelite” – a believer in the absurd notion that
the inhabitants of the British Isles are descended from one of the lost tribes
of Israel and, therefrore, as God’s chosen people, destined to rule the world!
It is one of history’s ironies that when men felt free to
believe in and give voice to such ideas, full Anglo-Saxon hegemony remained an
imperial dream. A century later, with Anglo-Saxon hegemony an accomplished
fact, only the most foolhardy British or American statesman would consider
drawing the world’s attention to it.
Just occasionally however, the world’s reminded of the
hegemon’s existence – as when our Prime Minister, John Key, spoke openly of the
price of membership of “the club”. He was, of course, referring to New
Zealand’s participation in the UK-USA (“Five Eyes”) Agreement alongside Canada
and Australia. Although, helping the British and Americans to spy on the rest
of the world is very far from being the only “service” members of the
Anglo-Saxon “club” are required to provide.
Regardless of whether the power contributed is “hard”
(military) or “soft” (financial and cultural) members of the Club are expected
to keep their subscriptions current. Indeed, it is highly questionable as to
whether resignation is even possible. Like the Hotel California, the
Anglo-Saxon Club can be a hard place to leave.
Contributing To Anglo-Saxon Hegemony: The Waihopai Spy Base.
And yet, every January an apparently indefatigable group of
protesters gather outside the Waihopai Spy Base to demand its closure and New
Zealand’s withdrawal from the Five Eyes Agreement. The sub-text of their annual
protest, however, is this country’s long association with the sins of
Anglo-Saxon imperialism.
The protesters mission is to persuade New Zealanders to
disentangle themselves once and for all from Rhodes’ vision: to cease and
desist playing even the tiniest role in exerting Anglo-Saxon hegemony.
It’s a big ask. Who resigns voluntarily from the club that
rules the world?
This essay was
originally published in The Waikato Times, The Taranaki Daily News, The
Timaru Herald, The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 8 January 2016.
