Should parliament endorse UK air strikes in Syria?

First topic message reminder :

David Cameron made a characteristically fluent case on Thursday. But he did not actually answer the two critical questions that must precede any decision by Britain to initiate hostilities within Syria: namely, what is the political end game and what is the military plan to achieve it?

The first is incredibly difficult but not impossible. We need to drag all the interested parties around a table and hammer out a mutually acceptable solution.

If we are still a long way from a consensus, it is because most of the main players seem more intent on destabilising their enemies than stabilising their friends.

Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states have a history of enabling financial support for any jihadi group that attacked the Shia – including Isis. Turkey has facilitated the sale of up to a billion dollars of Isis oil, has held open the border for jihadi groups and their intelligence agency has supplied arms to jihadis in Syria.

We need to bang our supposed allies’ heads together and stop this nonsense. It can be done. The Arab nations are waking up to the dangers of their own activities, with the sacking of some of their pro-Isis ministers. Similarly, the Russians need to grip the Iranians.

And we have to stop obsessing about Assad. His regime is vicious, but so is nearly every active player in this conflict. The British government’s line smacks of a retrospective wish to justify its abortive 2013 attempt to bomb him. But the Syrian government still controls most of the cities and is the only plausible guarantor of the safety of all the non-Sunni communities threatened by a jihadi victory. The wisest course is to start negotiations on the future of Syria and Iraq without any preconditions.

The second unanswered question is even harder. What is the military plan? Since we cannot win with air alone, this reduces to “where will we find a pro-western army?”

David Cameron asserted that the “Free Syrian Army” commanded 70,000 troops. What this probably refers to is a disparate range of up to 1,500 different tribes and villages, in possibly 40 loose associations. Many of these operate under the control of Isis or the two essentially al-Qaida affiliates. Only the Kurds are in truth independent of the jihadis.

Exellent article by David Davis along the lines of what I have been saying. You can read the full article here....

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/29/should-parliament-endorse-uk-air-strikes-in-syria

David Davis is the Conservative MP for Haltemprice and Howden. He is a former shadow home secretary

Cass wrote:Hey Didge


J just typed out a long reply, got up to use the facilities and one of my cats walked across the kindle!!!!!!!! No idea what happened to my post. Good thing she is so damn cute!

Anyways I appreciate your view points but sorry I just don't agree. We cant save everybody - that sounds horrible and callous eand goes against everything I believe in my heart BUT its not realistic. We need to pull out and let them sort themselves out. Its heartbreaking situation but there it is.

I'm full of cold and been in bed and not feeling 100% so talk later.

Night all x

Totally agree about pulling out completely.

But unfortunately our governments are engaged in (a)Moral Imperialism, where they pretend to go to war to save lives but with the sole ambition to secure/steal the resources of another country.

They will never admit that their moral imperialist adventures (cutely known as foreign policy) is actually putting "our lives" in danger.

Night. Xxx

Cass wrote:Hey Didge


J just typed out a long reply, got up to use the facilities and one of my cats walked across the kindle!!!!!!!! No idea what happened to my post. Good thing she is so damn cute!

Anyways I appreciate your view points but sorry I just don't agree. We cant save everybody - that sounds horrible and callous eand goes against everything I believe in my heart BUT its not realistic. We need to pull out and let them sort themselves out. Its heartbreaking situation but there it is.

I'm full of cold and been in bed and not feeling 100% so talk later.

Night all x

Its fine to disgaree Cass, the point is this is not about trying to save everyone.
This is about trying to save people who we can save and the view to walk away is just self defeating in the lomg term to an ever growing problem that exists in the Middle East. If this was about trying to save everyone, we would have invaded North Korea and China long agao, but that is not pratical or realistic. If we allowed them to sort this out then you will only see a continued growth of the extremist movement. For one contrary what Zack claims, has nothing to do with oil, imperialism, they are just absurd naratives which are fundementally the problem. What is a problem is if we backed out now onced we are involved in will send the worst submissve defeatism to a group that has not been defeated or checked. That to me spells disaster. The Muslim world is facing what once was faced in the west change. It is very much fighting against this change, hence the disaster of the Arab springs because they came way to early a generation too early. If we back down now, then more powers within the region will fall, of that I have no doubt, as the extremist groups will have been seen to back down the worlds biggest powers. That is what you call a propaganda coup. Lastly yes we can do something to where thousands have suffered and still suffered and to do nothing when we can do something is morally and ethically wrong.

P.S hope you feel better soon.
Some Irish potcheen is always what the doctored order, when full of cold.

xx

veya_victaous wrote:

No, again this is yet another wrong being done for $$$$ and personal gain of which many of us are well aware of.