The Times of India (Chennai) ·
Divided Kingdom: Why Scotland, Wales and Ireland want to 'leave' the UK
Is the United Kingdom going to become divided? For perhaps the first time in their history, Ireland, Scotland and Wales are led by parties and politicians who want to change their nations’ relationship with the UK, a sort of Brexit, if you will, except this was never how Brexit was supposed to work.
The Partition of India — and before it the Partition of Bengal — were among the most consequential acts of British imperial cartography, with the former leaving countless dead, a subcontinent in perennial trauma and perhaps even helping create some of the geopolitical conditions from which pan-global Islamist terrorism later emerged with a little help from Uncle Sam. Ergo, there is a little schadenfreude in seeing talk of partition engulf the country that facilitated it: the United Kingdom, or should we call it the Divided Kingdom?
The latest shot comes from the person whose logorrhoea has truly upended the world order carefully put in place after the Second World War. Speaking in Ireland, Donald Trump put the fat in the fire by saying he would “love” to see a “united” Ireland, saying it was inevitable and “may as well happen now”. UK PM Andy Burnham – who, if you squint your eye, looks like an AI-generated image of Keir Starmer – pushed back, only for Trump to double down and call it “pretty cool”.
Now, for Trump, saying something is “pretty cool” could be as serious as toppling a Supreme Leader or having regular Coke instead of Diet Coke, but his statement certainly caused some excitement.
