Scotland Decides: Och aye, the 'noo' — or Armageddon?

The edge of the union is an angry place to be. With less than 12 hours to go before Scotland decides its destiny — forever if it breaks away, for a generation if it decides to stay — it is clear that the fault lines exposed by the referendum will sear through this country for long after the ballots are counted.

“I can’t have my name printed, not even in an Irish newspaper; the intimidation by the Yes side is unbelievable,” announces a mild-mannered looking No voter, suddenly incensed by the thought of independence.

“They shout people down, call you traitor, they brick car windows with No stickers in them — and for what? My grandfather fought for Britain in the First World War, my father fought in the second, and my son is serving in Afghanistan now, and they want to throw all that away?

“Whoever wins Thursday night, this country is going to explode because the losing side — whichever one it is — simply will not accept it,” he adds in a broad Glaswegian accent. Down the street, Yes campaigner Richard Montgomery brushes off talk of intimidatory tactics.

“It is the No side that is scaring people, not us. Look at Ireland, look at other countries that took their independence — no one’s died here, somebody got egged the other week, but that’s about it.

“The BBC and virtually the entire media are against us, but we are winning because we are a grassroots organisation, and we know our time has come,” he insists.

And all the energy does seem to be with the Yes camp. Westminster, or Westmonster, as the pro-independence movement has dubbed it was so lazily complacent at the polls showing double-digit victory for the status quo, the British government arrogantly admitted last month it had not even drawn-up any contingency plans for a Yes vote.

Those plans are being urgently assembled now as the British establishment goes into panic mode in order to save the union — and its place in the world. Whether Scotland will be better off is an unknowable until the dust begins to settle after the 18-month long divorce negotiations the Yes side have called for after an independence mandate is achieved, But for England, or the Rump of the UK (RUK) as it is being called, it will certainly be a very diminished country.

It is hard to see it holding on to its veto at the UN Security Council where rising economic giants like India and Brazil resent the power afforded to collapsed empires like Britain and France while they are still treated as second-class countries on the sidelines.

A rump state is also more likely to vote to storm out of the EU in a fit of nationalistic rage as pressure grows on Labour to match the Conservatives’ offer of a In-Out referendum in 2017.

A Brexit — or British Exit — would have severe implications for Ireland, as Dublin often hides behind British skirts when the UK growls over changes to national tax rates and regulation of the financial services industries, not to mention the massive levels of trade between the two countries.

Add to that the inevitable run on sterling in the wake of a Yes vote and predictions from some leading economists that the uncertainty generated by a Scottish break-away could plunge the eurozone into recession, and the implications of the referendum will resonate across the continent from Catalonia to Crimea.

The polls turned sharply a fortnight ago as what the No camp thought was a cake-walk suddenly turned into a cliff-hanger as the Yes sentiment soared. While the No side falls back on the politics of fear and sentimentality — economic uncertainty and the loss of the pound, plus the binds of the past, — the Yes camp rhetoric is all about destiny and the future.

London has been forced to finally offer what used to be called Home Rule if Scotland stays in the union, with Westminster responsible for little more than defence and foreign policy, but it may have come too late.

British Prime Minister David Cameron has been outmanoeuvred by SNP leader Alex Salmond at every turn.

Cameron caved in to SNP demands to have an aspirational question: ‘Do you want Scotland to be an independent country?’ Not the more negative sounding ‘Should Scotland leave the UK?’

Cameron also crumpled on allowing 16 and 17-year olds to vote for the first time — and if he is the prime minister who loses the union after 300 years, there will be immense pressure on him to quit as leader of what will be then be nonsensically called the Conservative and Unionist Party of Great Britain.

The pro-independence side is hammering home the rallying cry: “Vote No — Make Scotland History. Vote Yes — Make Scottish History,” and they have the wind of change behind them.

In the late afternoon sunshine outside Glasgow’s royal concert hall, a Yes trad band boomed out their take on (Up All Night To) Get Lucky and other unlikely nationalist favourites and between songs a man with a “Christ Says Repent!” sandwich board around his neck butted in with stern warnings of damnation as the crowd politely giggled.

With everyone from the Pope to President Obama coming out in favour of keeping the UK together, the Irish Examiner asked him what he thought Jesus would do — vote yes or no?

“Jesus does not vote! He saves the souls of those who repent! Armageddon is coming in two years time — did you know that?” the man, who, again, would not give his name, thundered.

Some on the losing side will not have to wait that long for Armageddon — for them it will arrive Friday morning.