Matthew Parris, the Times columnist, sometime BBC presenter, and former Tory MP, has claimed Brexit is worse than Suez and the Iraq War.
The liberal journalist has previously written that he “felt ashamed to be British” in the wake of Britain’s historic vote to Leave the European Union, and he agreed that the country’s 17.4 million Brexit voters are “deep down, racists” shortly afterwards.
Parris was no stranger to controversy prior to the EU referendum, either, writing “White is just wrong for skin … It looks inbred” in an infamous, self-loathing 2015 article titled ‘If I had a choice, I wouldn’t be a whitey’ in 2015 — which, ironically, was widely denounced as racist.
His claim that Brexit is “worse” than Suez or the Iraq War struck most observers as hyperbolic, if not offensive.
Suez, an Israeli-supported Anglo-French intervention against General Nasser in Egypt in the 1950s which had to be aborted under heavy American pressure, was widely regarded as the death knell for Britain’s status as a world power.
The Iraq War, meanwhile, is probably the most controversial British foreign intervention since Suez — widely regarded as having been foisted on the public based on fraudulent intelligence, incredibly costly in both blood and treasure, and helping to foster some of the instability which led to the rise of the Islamic State.
Parris writes:
[Anthony] Eden lied about Suez and his government concealed its purpose; but he believed in that purpose and believed it to be in the national interest. Blair dissimulated about Iraq and his government used dark arts to clear its path. But he believed in the adventure and believed it to be in the national interest.
Brexit is worse. The means are the same as with Suez and Iraq but half the cabinet and most of the parliamentary party don’t even believe in the ends. I seriously doubt whether Boris Johnson does. A terrified, paralysed prime minister leads a seasick party and doubting government towards she knows not what.
Read the rest of Parris’s article on The Times website here.
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