Five bucks says @barackobama butts into the Gibraltar dispute.

And not on England’s side.

Spanish foreign minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo will use a trip to Buenos Aires next month to raise the possibility of forging a joint diplomatic offensive with the South American country over the disputed territories, sources told Spain’s El Pais newspaper.

Spain’s foreign ministry was also discussing whether to take its complaints over Gibraltar to the United Nations, the newspaper reported on Sunday.

The sources did not specify whether Spain would ask the UN to back a request for Britain to give up sovereignty or just adhere to certain agreements.

Not that it matters, since – thanks to the last general planetary war – the organization that Spain and Argentina both want to appeal to happens to give a veto on anything meaningful to… the United Kingdom.  Guess that means that the Franco and Argentine military regimes should have done a better job in choosing sides in World War II, huh?

Moe Lane

PS: Neither the Falkland Islands nor Gibraltar want to change their status, by the way.  I mention this because I suspect that the current administration needs as many things spelled out for it as can be conveniently arranged.

PPS: There’s a reason why I am unconvinced that Barack Obama would be sensible on Gibraltar; he wasn’t particularly so on the Falklands.

19 thoughts on “Five bucks says @barackobama butts into the Gibraltar dispute.”

      1. They have 60% unemployment among young people in Spain. A war could definitely solve that problem.

    2. I would love to see Jay Carney come out and say “The United States supports the terms of the 1713 Treaty Of Utrecht” followed by a moment of silence as the room took that in….

      1. I would normally sneer something like Jay Carney couldn’t even pronounce that, except that, well, I’m not entirely sure that I can, either.

        1. I can pronounce that but Dutch and German was spoken around the house when I was growing up so I have an unfair advantage….

  2. I can’t find a reference to it, but seem to recall there’s a muslim-nationalist group involved in the Gibraltar identity somewhere …
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    I’m sure our idiot-in-chief will find a way to ally with them.. assuming he can find them, of course.
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    MEw

  3. I agree that Obama hates the British… but Franco and Argentina ( at least until 1944 when he joined the Allies ) remained neutral in WWII.

    Conquered Serbia was our ally in WWII while Albania sided with the Axis… but that did not do Serbia any good when we choose which evil entity we would side with in Kosovo.

    1. Quibble – that wasn’t on Obama’s watch, so he may repudiate his predecessors’ decision at whim.
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      Mew

    2. Albania didn’t so much “side with” so much as fall under colonial domination of Italy several years before the war, much like Libya and Ethiopia.

      But you’re right: Obama’s sense of national loyalty is not to traditional allies.

  4. Hmm, the last referendum put to the Gibraltar residents was won by the side preferring to stay British, 17900 to 187. So yeah, I can see Obama coming in on the other side.

    I visited Gibraltar in 1988, and at the top of the rock there’s a colony of monkeys known as the Barbary Apes. What we were told at the time was that Gibraltar was ceded to Britain “for as long as the Barbary Apes remain on Gibraltar”. Reading Wiki, this appears to be a myth, but they were absolutely guarded by soldiers with automatic weapons at that point.

  5. I suspect you would need Archimedes’ proverbial lever and place to stand in order to bring Obama to the place he would give so much as a rat’s patootie about what the residents of Gibralter and the Falklands want.

    1. Why were we in Libya, JustDave?
      .
      Why do we “have to” back a side in Syria?
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      What U.S. interest was there in destroying Egypt’s government, JustDave?
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      Perhaps these are just random flukes, but .. if so, how shall we know that Obama *won’t* decide he indeed does give a rat’s patootie for Gibraltar?
      .
      Mew

      1. He commented that Obama does not care what the residents of Gibraltar and The Falklands want.
        Which is a true observation, if a bit redundant in the light of the original post and subsequent commentary.

        1. Well, to be perfectly accurate, my point was about what it would take to motivate Obama to care about said residents.

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          Reading comprehension. It’s what’s for dinner.

          1. I reiterate my question, JustDave.
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            If we weren’t in Libya for the “oppressed citizens”, why *were* we there?
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            We agree regarding reading comprehension.
            .
            Mew

  6. While Britain has Gibraltar on that side of the straits, Spain own *two* cities on the Moroccan side: Ceuta and Melilla. Maybe Britain should give the King of Morocco a call, they’ll need help prying the plank out of Spain’s eye.

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