The Sunday Ishmael: 20/07/2025

“I am speaking to you from the Cabinet Room at 10, Downing Street.

This morning the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German Government a final note stating that unless we heard from them by 11.00 a.m. that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us. I have to tell you that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany."

 Neville Chamberlain, Prime Minister, 11.15 on September 3rd 1939 addressing the nation via radio.

They did things differently then, the past being a foreign country. I've been thinking about this war business recently - specifically, how do the ordinary people - not those employed at GCHQ or the Ministry of Magic Defence, or the Government, know that a state of war exists, if they are not told?  Told as firmly as Neville Chamberlain told his people on that Sunday morning 86 years ago. As you know, I am fairly convinced that Britain is at war - which is why I found the sabotage of two of our fighter jets at RAF Brize Norton by Palestine Action to be treasonous and the action of a Fifth Column representing the interests of a foreign conglomeration of nations opposed to Britain's interests. I'm rather pleased that the perpetrators are being prosecuted and that their organisation is proscribed as a terrorist organisation. If you go on their website, you will read this: "Palestine Action is proscribed in Britain. For that reason, the website has been transferred to others in the global movement who are not active in Britain or British nationals."

Note that. Global Movement. A movement opposed to the stated  foreign policy aims of Britain.

The useful idiots, of course, who combine their anti-Semitism with a set of woke liberal-left, Metropolitan elite, middle-class ideologies, are still turning out at weekends to protest against the proscription, and being arrested in droves. 

A minor performer at the Royal Opera House staging his own protest last night during the curtain call while management shouted at him from the wings. Hope that's his career fucked.

I suppose Neville Chamberlain could so confidently tell his people that they were now at war and it was going to be tough, because the British were pretty much united as one people, with a shared cultural identity. This allowed Churchill to confidently deliver these remarks  in the House of Commons on the declaration of War: "there is .... a feeling of thankfulness that, if these great trials were to come upon our Island, there is a generation of Britons here now ready to prove itself not unworthy of the days of yore and not unworthy of those great men, the fathers of our land, who laid the foundations of our laws and shaped the greatness of our country."

Nobody thinks like that these days, especially our Prime Minister, whose island of strangers speech was criticised but who has rebutted his initial apology, saying: "We must get control of immigration, the basic argument that we need a cohesive society, an integrated society, where we can walk towards the future together as one country, as neighbours and communities together. That does really matter to me.”

 86 years ago, there were divisions in Britain, of course, but politicians  believed that the people would pull together and endure hardship and death in support of Britain's foreign policy aims.  And they were right. But the Second World War changed that Britain. The people threw out the Conservatives who had taken them into war and the new Government created a welfare state that would care for its people from the cradle to the grave. It worked, too - average life expectancy was 60.5 years in 1939, whereas it is now 82.06. We're living ourselves out of house and home.

Something rather significant was lost during the journey from 1945 to the present day - a sense of nationhood, to the point where politicians can only hint at just how much trouble Britain is in internationally, for fear of a large section of the population cheering.

Enoch Powell, much demonised, in his 1968 speech,  warned of the "kind of action which is hardest for politicians to take, action where the difficulties lie in the present but the evils to be prevented or minimised lie several parliaments ahead." 

Short termism is the inescapable corollary of party politics, in which unpopular measures are never taken, because whichever set of politicians it is in power want to be re-elected in a handful of years' time. As mr ishmael said: "for evil to prosper, it needs only for good men to think to their careers".

So, having failed, quite predictably, to do anything to minimise future evils, we now find ourselves living in the future, alongside Bob Vylan, Palestine Action, and the useful idiots. They (the useful idiots who busied themselves knitting sunflowers and collecting old clothes and bandages to drive across Europe) seem to have forgotten about the invasion of Ukraine, which was all the go a handful of years ago. Which is comfort to President Putin, I guess. Not that he needs it, as he is winning his war, now that Ukraine is falling apart.

In a war of attrition, the side that has the most men wins. Russia is big, has lots of men and is friends with countries who are helping out by sending more men. Ukraine has full conscription of all men over 26 who are not in reserved occupations. Those men who remain in Ukraine are press-ganged on the streets - 6.8 million Ukrainians got out since the Russian invasion, to avoid war and conscription, despite men aged 18 to 60 not being allowed to leave the country since February 2022 without special permission.  8 million have been internally displaced. The war has not inspired heroic self sacrifice amongst soldiers: in the first six months of 2025 Ukraine’s Prosecutor’s Office opened 107,672 new criminal cases for desertion. Since 2022 some 230,804 such criminal cases have been instigated. 

The war is not popular: In October 2022, 88 per cent of Ukrainians believed that they would be a ‘flourishing country inside the EU’ within a decade (Bless). Now 47 per cent think that ‘Ukraine will be a depopulated country with a ruined economy’. A separate survey found that 70 per cent of Ukrainians also believe their leaders are corrupt. Minister for National Unity, Oleksiy Chernyshov and Minister for Reconstruction, Oleksandr Kubrakov, have been investigated for embezzlement and treason. Zelensky, whose term of office expired in May 2024, is rumoured to be clinging to power in order to avoid charges of corruption himself. His political enemies are sacked, charged with corruption or other criminal allegations -  Vitaliy Shabunin, one of Ukraine’s most prominent anti-corruption activists, was charged with evading military service and fraud. More than 5,000 Ukrainians have come under sanctions and had their property frozen. This device is now widely used to silence opponents of Zelensky's regime.  Sanctions have also led to the closure of three YouTube channels belonging to Zelensky’s critics in the past month.

Whatever had Ukraine to do with us? Why did Boris and subsequent Prime Ministers dive right in to support Zelensky against Putin - who did have a point, I thought, considering how appallingly ethnic Russians were being treated in Eastern Ukraine? It seemed downright offensive and interfering of Britain to make an enemy out of Putin, not to say self-destructive in the extreme. The result? Putin does now regard Britain as an enemy of Russia.

The bien pensants seem to have abandoned Ukraine in favour of getting upset about Gaza. One day they were knitting sunflowers, the next they were stitching Palestinian banners. Quite apart from the injustice and inconsistency of supporting one country invaded by its  neighbour whilst supporting the invaders of another country,  a country, moreover, aligned with and allied with Britain, the question asks itself - whatever has that got to do with us?

Now if Scotland invaded England or vice versa, I could see the sense in knitting a few roses and stitching the cross of St. George.

Then there's the whole Afghan resettlement debacle and the super injunction to suppress the truth of the incompetent data leak by a junior official (the take-away from this is to make sure you check your emails before sending them out, particularly when hitting the reply to all button). That was a bit of a mess. The operating principle here seems to be the deep fear by Government of the mob. Hide the truth as long and deep and far as possible, because we don't want the French revolution played out in Birmingham. Rest easy, political elites - because, in factional Britain, nobody can agree on who the enemy is. 

Ukrainian Borscht

Russian Borscht

Marinate chicken thighs, peel potatoes, make a chocolate cake, whip up a crab sauce, vacuum, dust, cloth up, get out the good china, set the table – why on earth did I invite them round? Going out would have been so much easier and would have supported the local high street. Entertaining isn’t a hobby for single people living alone – it takes at least two people to host a dinner party. There's the cooking, serving, keeping the chat going, steering a course between not getting falling down drunk and yet being sufficiently lubricated to present a few anecdotes and opinions whilst not courting controversy. However, social obligations require one to reciprocate hospitality, despite all experience and foreboding to the contrary. 

When my first husband (we'll call him Jeremy) ran off with an optician's assistant from Bromsgrove, I continued going to Marriage Guidance. Why not? He'd never accompanied me to the sessions anyway. I was getting lots of positive unconditional affirmation and my Marriage Guidance Counsellor had taken the view that I was better off rid. Newly single,  my counsellor suggested a divorce party would celebrate my new reality. I hosted a dinner party for 8 – all people I thought were my friends and supporters. As usual, my menu was over ambitious, and kicked off with Borscht. This rendered the teetotaller drunk and invited the opprobrium of his friend upon me. The reformed teetotaller called for more and more Borscht, which was running low. His ravenous cries, like a baby bird demanding more worms, prompted me to throw a bottle of red wine into the Borscht pan, to eke it out. As there wasn't time to boil the alcohol off, it came to resemble warm, beetroot-flavoured wine. This was followed by pirozhki, salads, cheeses and a fancy pudding. Everything got out of hand, what with too much red wine and the reformed tee-totaller, me not producing the food promptly and not clearing away quickly on account of being pissed. So, Trisha, who was always a difficult kind of friend, collared me in the kitchen and told me that things were so much better when Jeremy was with me. So much for a divorce-celebration party. I’m not in touch with any of those people now. I think the reformed tee-totaller is dead.

Right, on with the motley -

Borscht - as prepared by me back in the past, which is a foreign country, where we did things differently, so don't complain to me about authenticity, for fuck's sake.

Ingredients

1 pound of beef - sirloin steak is good

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 big onions thinly sliced

2 bulbs of garlic, squeezed through a garlic press

1 large carrot - grated

2 beefsteak tomatoes  cut into small cubes

1 red bell pepper cut in 1/4 inch squares

1 tsp sugar 

2 cooked beetroots, peeled, quartered and sliced

2 large potatoes cubed

2 tsp salt

Loads of black pepper 

2 teaspoons of paprika

1 teaspoon of flakes of chili 

2 tsp tomato paste

1 bottle red wine and another one to make your Borscht go further (not recommended)

2 Bay leaves

To Serve

sour cream or Greek yoghurt

spring onion or chives

freshly ground black pepper

Method

Take your Big fuck-off knife and cube the meat

Throw the beef into a huge pot, together with the first bottle of red wine. 

Let the pot simmer over medium heat for 1 to 1.5 hours. 

If the meat pot starts boiling, reduce the heat and add water, so that  the meat remains covered.

keep skimming the broth.

In a separate pan, gently fry the vegetables in olive oil, then add them, together with seasoning, tomato paste and spices, to the meat pot.

Simmer it all up until the potatoes are soft.

Serve in individual, warmed, bowls, topped with sour cream/Greek yoghurt, a sprinkle of green chopped spring onions or chives, maybe a chive flower, and black pepper.

If your guests demand more - which they probably will, resist the temptation to throw the second bottle of red wine into the pan, serve it separately and get the cabbage rolls out of the oven. That will shut them up.

Here's some more cooking tips from Stanislav: 

Go in garden, taking dog, Buster, for piss at same time, have to go on lead because naughty old dog is and run back in house for piss instead of do in garden, like good boy does; is only sometimes but pain in arse is. Old bloke now, Buster, and gets confused.

Go down in garden admiring last of Lupin and Highland daisy, pulled up from A9 and spread now, like fear and loathing in Cabinet.

Locate some garlic among weeds and maverick potato and not worry, is not so bad as it looks

Pull up garlic from ground. n.b. is easy thing to grow garlic, just break big bulb in little clove and stuff in raised-up bed and forget about while writing blog and doing plumbing, come back in few months and pull up by neck. Can leave longer and bigger will be, but nice and young is sweetest and best, like this.

Take up in house, chop from stem with big fuck off knife and wash off from dirt, taking good care to put waste bits in compost bin.

Split in cloves and crush a little with big fuck off knife and drop precisely good handful in bottle of olive oil, any sort will do and leave for ten days, infusing to do.

Rosemary infused oil and garlic one, too

Can do exact same process – Go down garden, pull-up from ground etc with Thyme, for frying or roasting chicken and stanislav favouritest of all is Rosemary, just do exact same with handful of fresh picked Rosemary and is good for Roast Potato a la Cardiac Arrest, Roast Lamb and almost any white or oily fish, only not smoked, can use any herb-infuse oil for oil-an-bread -  Oh, fuck me, do try some oils and breads, is very sophisticated. And cheap, too, for miserable jumped-up dinner partying sonsoffuckingbitches. Have some bread and dip in oil and for dressing-up salad leaf, either alone or in combination with other stuff. Can pour in mashed potato and fry up cabbage and stuff like that, cover with black pepper, ground up in mill, like Dago waiter does and say Enjoy, cheeky fucking bastard, get punch in fucking mouth off stanislav, enjoy or not enjoy is stanislav business and not oily fucking Dago in apron.

If not garden has just buy stuff from TESCO and make up as before. But garden is best and anyone herbs can grow, on windowsill even, only not hemp or Old Bill come in will bashing down fucking door and retrieve few grammes of weed with street value of ten billion pounds. All that shit. Fucking wankers.

Anyway good happy cooking from stanislav. Herbs taste good, are best medicine, look good, taste good and by Golly, does you good. Granma’s pharmacy was hedgerow, innit.

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There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:

Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.

IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps 

please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.

Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr

Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4

At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.

With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.