I was in favour of bombing Islamic State in Syria until very recently. But evidence to the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee and Mr Cameron’s shiftiness in the House of Commons last Thursday have changed my mind.
(1) Two years ago, thank God, the House of Commons voted against bombing President Assad’s forces in Syria. If the vote had gone Mr Cameron’s way, Syria would be in a worse mess now, loss of life would have been greater, Islamic State would be far stronger and there would be far more displaced people queuing up in Hungary. The Christians in Syria would be history, as would the Druze and the Alawites.
(2) The Foreign Affairs Select Committee has heard evidence that airstrikes from Britain will make no difference whatsoever to the collective effort.
(3) The Foreign Affairs Select Committee has also heard evidence that airstrikes must be supported by ground troops. Mr Cameron gave a figure of 70,000 which he said came from the Joint Iintelligence Committee together with the impression that these could be those ground troops. Yet they include some ten groups and literally hundreds of different factions who are all in the far west of Syria. ISIS is based in the east and north. The 70,000, even if they could be persuaded to switch from fighting the Syrian army to fight ISIS and trek all the way from western Syria to the east is frankly preposterous. In short, they are in the wrong place with the wrong focus. It could well be, as Craig Murray argues, that no-one actually believes Mr Cameron, but few have challenged him on the figure, not even the official Opposition. ‘70,000’ wil be Mr Cameron’s ’45 minutes’, a figure which was also stated by the JIC.
(4) The Foreign Affairs Select Committee heard evidence in September that the Free Syrian Army is a ‘busted flush’. The evidence said it would be absurd to try to differentiate between radical and moderate Islamists among the opposition to President Assad.
(5) As David Winnick MP reminded the House on Thursday, the Prime Minister made the same sort of passionate arguments two years ago. He was wrong then and he has not made any case that shows he is right now. It is still the same old bluster.
(6) The Free Syrian Army have either given or sold equipment given to them by the United States to the Al Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda offshoot. I searched Thursday’s debate in vain for any mention of Al Nusra. Does the Prime Minister regard them as moderate or radical?
(7) The Foreign Affairs Select Committee also heard evidence in September that the only guarantor of stability in Syria is President Assad. ‘It’s Assad or the Deluge’, said one.
(8) If oil wells are liberated from Islamic State, whose will the oil be? There is no strategy or understanding.
(9) I noted the Prime Minister said in the debate: ‘(ISIS) … get their money from selling oil to Assad’. As Mr Denis Skinner pointed out, it is well documented that ISIS get far more money from selling oil to well-placed individuals in Turkey. It was duplicitious of the Prime Minister not even to mention Turkey and then when challenged to say that Turkey had ‘taken action’ about that. On the very same day that the Prime Minister made his statement, President Erdogan flatly denied Turkey was buying any ISIS oil at all. But the Guardian reported on Tuesday last week: ‘Turkish businessmen struck lucrative deals with Isis oil smugglers.’ The sum involved is said to be $10m per week.
(9a) One Mr George Haswani was identified in March as the middleman between ISIS and President Assad in an oil deal, but the sums involved in these alleged Syrian deals have yet to be spelt out. I am not actually surprised that enemies are doing deals with one another over oil resources. In one sense, it is better than blowing them up. But when a NATO member is profiting from Syrian oil and denying it, I should expect our Prime Minister to at least acknowledge that fact.
(10) On the subject of Turkey, if Mr Cameron is serious about ground troops including Kurdish fighters, what representations did the UK make to Turkey when Turkish forces attacked Kurdish fighters in July, killing hundreds of souls?
(11) This summer, Turkey sent three hundred air strikes against Kurdish forces fighting ISIS and only three against ISIS itself. What representations did the UK make to Turkey about that?
(12) In early September, Turkey violated Iraqi air space to attack Kurdish fighters and violated the territory of Iraq to pursue them as well. The only ones to gain from that were ISIS. Seeing Britain has an interest in Iraq, what representations did the UK make to Turkey about that violation of sovereign territory?
(13) In ‘The Independent’ on 4th October, Patrick Cockburn reported that the US had betrayed the Syrian Kurds in a deal with Turkey. This is despite the fact that the Syrian branch of the PKK has apparently been the most successful ground ally of the US at retaking areas from ISIS. Are these the same Syrian Kurds who are now expected to be the northern ground troops to follow up UK airstrikes? And will you support removing the UK’s ‘proscribed’ classification of the PKK, who pose no threat to Britain at all, under the Terrorism Act?
(14) Mr Cameron said he had learned the lessons of Iraq and Libya. The Iraq invasion was in 2003 and the first elections were held in 2005. Iraq was well known to be a disaster by at least 2007. The UK intervened in Libya in 2011. No lessons were learned from Iraq to be put in place in Libya, so north Africa is now flooded with Islamists and arms. Why should we believe the Prime Minister now? ‘Regime Change’ is illegal and ends in death and destruction.
(15) The issue of unintended consquences has not been remotely addressed. The most recent direct consequence of our intervention in Libya was the 22 deaths in Bamako in Mali.
(16) There are certain to be civilian deaths in places like Raqqa, violating at least one principle of the ‘Just War’ principle. In the war in Iraq, which was waged for regime change and nothing else, an estimated 165,000 civilians died. Those MPs who voted with Tony Blair for war in 2003 have that blood on their hands.
(17) I recognise that Air Chiefs of Staff want to see how their latest bits of technology work in the field and Mr Cameron wants to appear tough and militaristic when he meets other leaders but these are just positions of vanity.
(18) UK jets have been operating in Iraq, but the only success to date is the liberation of Sinjar. What other success in Iraq can Mr Cameron point to?
(19) At a time of continuing austerity, Mr Cameron has not even presented the cost of a Syrian operation to Parliament. Every two-plane mission with each plane discharging four Paveway bombs and two Brimstone missiles would cost the taxpayer £1 million. The cost could soar into billions all of which will have to be borrowed.
(20) No coherent strategy has been presented, let alone an exit strategy.
(21) United Nations Security Council resolution 2249 ‘Calls upon Member States that have the capacity to do so to take all necessary measures, in compliance with international law’. International law does not allow the United Kingdom to violate Syrian air space. The Prime Minister did not tell the House of Commons how or even if he proposed to seek permission from President Assad to overfly Syria. If he does not, the action will be illegal.
(22) Pursuant to paragraph (3) above, any force wanting to liberate Raqqa or other eastern Syrian towns will need the cooperation of the Syrian army under President Assad. Yet the Prime Minister has ruled out any approach to or support for President Assad, maintaining his ‘Assad must go’ mantra. Without the involvement of the Syrian army, we are wasting our time, as your colleague Dr Julian Lewis has said.
For all the reasons given, please urge your Member of Parliament to vote against UK air strikes in Syria.
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It’s all very interesting and carefully researched. But we need to look not only at reasons to stay out of Syria, but at reasons to go in, which might be quite different.
The USA and Russia are already bombing Syria. Just stop and think what that means, even without enthusiastic help from France. As suggested in (2), what small percentage we might add can’t be expected make much difference, and we could aim at getting away with as little expenditure as possible. These two points tend to invalidate the other arguments against doing it, like no coherent strategy, efforts ineffective, killing lots of people (which Stephen doesn’t seem to emphasise, although it is uppermost in most people’s minds). All this will happen whether we are there or not .
One very good reason to do it, the one which suddenly brought this up, is to be seen to support France and Belgium . It’s quite likely that at some time in the future their help might be useful in dealing with a situation here. What we want to avoid is European countries and the USA being able to tell us in the future that we took no part in defeating Islamic State, which might put us at a disadvantage in all kinds of unpredictable ways in the future. It’s even possible that moderate Muslims in this country might, some of them, expect us to do our bit.
So I say Vive La France, lend a bit of a hand, but don’t overdo it. This is certainly no case for a big war with conscription, a terrible thing, but those who join the armed forces voluntarily must expect, and probably mostly relish, a scrap from time to time. The motive of overthrowing Islamic State is noble one.