As a Brexiteer, I hope 2019 will see us put aside our differences and find common ground

With 2019 now upon us, a friend just asked me what wish above all others would I like granted this new year.

I did not need a nanosecond to consider, because it relates to the day we leave the EU on 29 March. But it will not be a day for triumphalism on the part of us Brexiteers: but instead, a day to show magnanimity and help heal our wounded nation.

And we must take a leaf out of Abraham Lincoln’s book: for when the Confederate army surrendered, Lincoln was urged to take savage reprisals on his defeated opponents. But what did he do? Quite the opposite, and urged the band outside the White House to play Dixie, the unofficial anthem of the confederacy.

So as a mark of respect to our brothers and sisters on the other side, our TV and radio stations should play their Ode To Joy anthem, every day for a full week.

Dai Woosnam
Grimsby

In this stramash that we are all in at this moment, I wish you all: left, right, Scots, Irish, Welsh, Leave, Remain, immigrants, residents, Tories, Labour or Lib Dem in England and everyone else in Scotland, Wales and Ireland a happy new year.

We need to remember each other and that we need each other to be strong, happy and together to make our country work.

Enough of the divisive rhetoric of Nigel Farage, Donald Trump and their ilk. We are and always have been better than this as a country.

John Sinclair
Pocklington

I hope the prime minister considers the impact Brexit will have on the most vulnerable

It is a reality that the lower your income the more you are going to feel the effects of Brexit. Those making decisions would do well to remember that. The full effects of Brexit will not actually impact until the end of the transition period.

Given the state of so many matters at home, the “common sense” decision to revoke Article 50 seems the most prudent, but unless there is a People’s Vote, there is no mandate to allow this.

Theresa May needs to be mindful that when the transition period ends and the full impact of these decisions actually registers, she will still carry a hefty responsibility for the circumstances that a large number of people find themselves in.

In a way, and as much as I wouldn’t want it, it would be satisfying if she was still around to answer for her obstruction of the People’s Vote.

It’s quite frustrating that the two people I consider most responsible for this mess, namely David Cameron, and his “caretaker”, will be long gone.

Michael Cunliffe
Burley

I agree with yesterday’s editorial in its thrust. From the comments from the US ambassador, and his president, it seemed clear to me that the desired outcome for them from Brexit is that the UK would not be a vassal state of the EU, but of the US, accepting whatever deal they want us to have. At least he EU is only setting conditions for the deal we are seeking.

Andy Wilson
Somerset

The military history of the Ottomans is complex

Robert Fisk recommended my book Ottomans and Armenians, A Study in Counterinsurgency as required reading in the Saudi military academies in his recent piece.

However, Fisk selectively claims that I wrote the Armenian rebellion was “widespread” and he alludes that it really wasn’t a rebellion at all. What I said, in context, was the rebellion was “small and localised, but widespread” (page 221). The pattern of intelligence reports about these acts in 1915 led the Ottoman decision-makers to believe that a major insurrection was imminent. As I make crystal clear in my book – it does not matter whether this was true or not… what matters is that the Ottomans believed it to be true at the time.

Second, Fisk glosses over the facts that the Armenian revolutionary committees, urged on and supported by the Russians and British, actively rebelled in 1915 in concert with Russian offensive military operations. Moreover, important expatriate personalities in the pre-1914 Armenian diaspora actively inflamed revolutionary tendencies in the Ottoman Empire. There is incontrovertible archival evidence supporting this in Kew, Saint Petersburg, Paris, and Istanbul.

Third, explicitly Ottomans and Armenians, A Study in Counterinsurgency does not address the issue of whether or not the events of 1915 constituted a genocide. I am a military historian and my book addresses how the Ottomans approached the military problem of an imminent rebellion occurring in the middle of a major conventional war, as well as outlining the military history of Ottoman counterinsurgency campaigns (such as the one in Yemen that Fisk highlighted) in the late imperial period. My book demonstrates the mass relocations in 1915 were limited to a geographic area of six eastern Anatolian provinces (and a few key cities located along the lines of communications). My book is about causes and decisions and not about the effects on the relocated population.

Finally, since Fisk brought up my explanation of the Boer War, I would point out that Ottomans and Armenians is a military history and not a social or cultural history. The ill-treatment of Boer civilians was a cause celebre in Britain at the turn of the century – as was the treatment of relocated Cubans by the Spanish in 1895 and relocated Filipinos by the Americans in 1902.

Edward J Erickson, PhD – scholar-in-residence, Clark Centre for Global Engagement, State University of New York at Cortland

Rabbit takes a trip

Hop onto my back said old foxy
Did you know that this mammal has wings?
I can fly like a bird  
Despite what you've heard
And do lots of incredible things.

Are you sure? said young rabbit
I'm quite out of the habit  
Of jumping off cliffs on a nape.
Can we can visit for tea  
Exotic company
Really feast every meal on a grape?

Would you mind if I asked who informed you?
Said young rabbit a little concerned
I feel sure I was told
I would never grow old
If I don't heed the lessons I've learned.

Don’t worry yourself – I have magic socks
Smirked elegant bushy tailed foxy.
I'll just slip them on now  
And you'll soon see somehow
We'll fly over each border and zone.
Shut your eyes rabbit dear
Only then is it clear
There are things that are better not known.

Sing a nationalist song
What could possibly go wrong
We can visit our leaders somewhere
On an island offshore
Where there's plenty in store
Which I'm sure they'll be happy to share.

Hold on tight to my ears
Let's head into new year's
Bold adventures for rabbit and fox.
Such a finely matched pair
Now pop into my lair
And I’ll knit you your own magic socks.

Neil Armstrong
Newcastle upon Tyne