Business, Innovation and Sarin

Market forces appear to have let down the Government's war for a better world even more severely than the perfidious Milibeing. In January last year, when Assad was already well along with his Blairite peacekeeping agenda, the Government granted licenses for a British company to export chemicals which can be used in the manufacture of nerve gas. Possibly the Government was trying to preserve the legacy of the sainted Thatcher, who responded to Saddam Hussein's use of chemical weapons in the eighties by doubling his export credits; possibly the Government was thinking of the old bag's Father in Heaven, Winston Churchill, who shared Saddam Hussein's ideas about dealing with uncivilised tribes. Fortunately for the Government, and for the Minister of Business, Innovation and Perfunctory Grumbling Before Voting Meekly Along, Vincent Cable, the licenses were revoked after a mere six months, as a result of interference by the hated European Union. Somehow this was managed before the chemicals could be delivered (doubtless clearly marked Not to be Used for Internal Repression), although the Government considerately waited for six weeks after the EU ruling before bothering to apply it.