Sometimes the best ideas come from ordinary people, rather than official organizations. Norwegian fishermen revolt against Russia.
In January last year, the Russian Navy brushed aside pleas from Dublin by announcing a major military exercise slap bang in the middle of Ireland’s fishing grounds. The country’s fishermen had other ideas: they refused to leave waters to the south of the country and maintained a round-the-clock presence, thus preventing the Russian warships from carrying out the drill.
Now it’s happened again. Norwegian fishermen have pulled off a similar victory against the might of the Russian Navy. Their successful efforts are a reminder that national security involves the whole of society — and that the best ideas don’t always come from the government or think tanks.
The Dogger Bank incident (also known as the North Sea Incident, the Russian Outrage or the Incident of Hull) occurred on the night of 21/22 October 1904, when the Baltic Fleet of the Imperial Russian Navy mistook a British trawler fleet from Kingston upon Hull in the Dogger Bank area of the North Sea for Imperial Japanese Navy torpedo boats and fired on them, also firing on each other in the chaos of the melée.