I’ve done a story that is at once a local Dundee row about a single uni course being suspended, symptom of Scotland’s horrifying “cultural Brexit” and a big scary warning about Scotland’s capacity to handle the internationalisation which independence would bring. https://twitter.com/leaskyht/status/1282939318617673729

Set the scene. It’s the mid-to-late and a new Scottish state comes blinking back in to the world after its long sleep. Its first job: navigating the complexities of an EU where Germany prevails. How many of our leaders would have the cross-cultural skills to figure that out?

Which of our businesses will have the nous to switch to German markets? Which of our engineers will be able to read all the technical documents of one of the world’s most advanced technological nations? Which of our policy-makers will lug in to German seminars?

We keep insisting on trying to understand languages policy on one far or another. But there are strategic capacity issues here. It’s as important as having soldiers or nurses. A stare need a cadre or linguists. A Scottish state would need a pile of German speakers.