Maybe I was wrong. It seems
that David Cameron failed in achieving his ambition of war after losing a vote
in the Commons on the matter by just 13 votes. Now though morals are torn;
nobody knows whether this is a good thing or a bad thing.
There are plenty of people who
have argued against intervention into Syria and their reasoning has mostly been
justified and understandable. They don’t want another war.
As Ed Miliband has made quite
clear, the “shadow” of Iraq is still looming large in the consciousness of the
UK and that is a fair point. The invasion of Iraq a decade ago was at best a
botched job and at worst an unmitigated legal, political and humanitarian
disaster and it is now clear that lessons have been learnt in the intervening
ten years.
Technically, the Prime
Minister has the power, under Royal Prerogative, to deploy UK forces wherever
and whenever he sees necessary, but to do so would be nothing short of
political suicide. Military action without a Parliamentary mandate has not been
taken since the sinking of the Belgrano at the start of the Falklands War in
1982 and the controversy of that incident has still not passed so one can only
imagine the fury that would inevitably follow if Cameron went ahead with a
Syrian deployment irrespective of Parliament’s objections.
Cameron has suffered great
political damage, in terms of credibility, following his defeat on this issue.
After he had fought with such strong words, backed by some initial action at
the UN, he must surely have thought that he had accurately gauged the mood of
the public and of his party, clearly, he had not. It is always damaging for a
Prime Minister to lose an important vote in the Commons but, as the BBC’s Nick
Robinson has said, it is without modern precedent that a PM has lost control of
his foreign policy.
However, considering that it
seems Cameron had misread the national mood, it has to be asked if he will
actually suffer or benefit from this turn of events. After all, if Cameron
believed that the public had wanted to intervene then if he had won in the
Commons and had intervened then that would have been a political success. But
now that it seems the public mood is against intervention it could be seen as a
political success that Cameron showed restraint and has not intervened.
Meanwhile, the US’ own
position seems a little less sure after the UK committed to not intervene. John
Kerry gave a speech on Friday in which he states that US intelligence reports show
that the chemical weapons attack was definitely carried out by the Assad regime
and that it killed 1429 people. These numbers are 1100 more than the initial
figure presented by the Syrian Rebels and are strongly challenged by the Syrian
and Russian Governments.
Now that his claims are being
questioned and his allies are rapidly leaving his side Obama seems to be losing
his own determination for action in Syria. The US President says that there is “No
decision yet” this is completely in contrast to the words of him and his team
earlier in the week when US forces were said to be “Ready to go”.
And as the great game of
Politics is being played across the World the very reason for it all appears to
have gotten lost. People are dying in Syria. Civilians are being killed, mostly
in the crossfire but probably by both sides. Regardless of who is killing who
and with what one thing is clear; Bashar al-Assad is overseeing a bloody civil
war in which tens of thousands of people have been killed and millions have
been displaced.
All this could end if the
present regime stepped aside, but I say, if that is not going to happen then
regime change is justified. That will be the only way to prevent further
civilian casualties and that is what must be achieved. The death of those who
support neither side and just wish to live their lives safe from harm must be
protected and if we are the ones who must protect them then I say that we must.
I would urge the UK Parliament
to reconsider. I for one feel deeply uncomfortable knowing that my Government
is currently doing nothing to prevent the death of innocent people. I know that
not everyone shares my view that we are the ones who should do something. But
if not us, then who?
I’ll leave you with these final thoughts. If we were caught in civil war and it was our children who were
homeless, our young brothers who had to fight highly trained and well-equipped
armies, our mothers and grandmothers who had been killed with chemical weapons
wouldn't we want help? Wouldn't want to be protected? Wouldn't we want to be saved?
Think on
that, please.
