To think we should not get involving in bombing Syria / Iraq

[WetAugust]

Enough is enough.

You cannot change an idealogy with bombs dropped from 10,000 feet.

We have no end game. Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya are still in a mess from our last efforts at 'helping'.

We have spent decades lending support, training etc to neighbouring oil rich States that are very well equipped with the latest in war machinery. Why have all that kit if they never intend to use it and are content to leave the fighting to other powers?

This is essentially a civil war driven by religious hatred and weak, cynical governemnets in Iraq and Syria.

If there really is this threat to us in the Uk let's spend some of this money we have so readily for war and beef up our entry and exit points to the country.

I don't want us to take part in any more wars in the Middle East

I hate to say it, but the repulsive Galloway had a point - why aren't Saudi doing this?

I know hedgehog. I don't disagree

But what is the alternative? I wake up at night thinking of these people....

Saudi Arabia are involved in military action against ISIS One of their pilots is a prince and another is their first female pilot. Full on diversity in action.
And so they should be with their fleet of fighter bombers supplied by us and the US and they are trained yo use them as we have been providing training and support to them for decades. They used their oil wealth to spread this pernicious version of Islam into mosques and madrasahs world wide. It's only right that they should strangle the monster they created. But we should also be insisting that they stop funding the spread of Wahabbism that is subjugating women and providing ISIS with its own twisted validation of the atrocities it's perpetrating.
But Saudi boots on the ground? Never.

Intervention needs to happen and it needs to hit hard. This group are absolute savages. I don't care much for conflict. My husband is ex military but in this case I would happily push the 'drop' button myself.

I agree cantbelieve. Awful, awful what is happening over there.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing"

It would be nice to say, "This has nothing to do with us - let's just strengthen our borders and look after ourselves." But it does have something to do with us. Our earlier actions have precipitated it to a certain extent, so we should take responsibility. Most importantly, though, they're doing horrible horrible things and someone needs to try to stop them.

Can you really blame the Saudis for this? Many of them are home grown, in the UK....

Yes, you can blame Saudi. They have exported this version of Islam. Many of the Muslim countries were far more liberal until Saudi oil wealth spread this hatred. Bin Ladens wealth came from his family's Saudi based building company. The 9/11 hijackers were predominantly Saudi . Saudi permits State beheadings in case you wonder where ISIS got that idea from.
The threat is now greater to us living in the UK now these idiots have voted for war. We should be concentrating on ridding ourselves of home grown radicals and protecting our borders against the entry of prospective terrorists.

OP
So because Saudi beheads people every Friday, the widescale beheading and burying of women and children is suddenly not as significant?

You may hide behind the idea that people in these areas are supporting ISIS/not getting off their backsides because what's happening isn't sufficiently extreme [frown] if you wish. It is completely comparable to the events of WW2 and your logic is deplorable. It's like saying that what Hitler did to the Jews doesn't matter so much because lots of Germans supported it. It's like saying that if Hitler had become sufficiently extreme (!) he could have been kicked out by the people he was leading. If those events showed us anything, it showed us that there is no limit to the depravity that can take place when the world is willing to allow it.

If you had ISIS in your home city it wouldn't seem so simple to articulate a different point of view.

I agree that the videos are being shown to motivate a response. But these things are happening and the world has to see it. Also, just because a certain response is anticipated by ISIS, it doesn't mean that it's the wrong response. Many a coward suggested a fight and got licked.

You haven't really said what you would like to happen if your child had been beheaded. Would you honestly be in agreement with world leaders who decided they didn't have a moral responsibility to help put down the people who did it? And who said you obviously weren't sufficiently motivated to stop them yourself?

I agree with you in your prescription...but you seem terribly disinterested in other people's opinions. Struggling to see why you started the thread, other than to squash everyone who thinks differently and tell them what to think.

Your post us a masterpiece of conflation and calumny.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing"

This

I honestly don't think you seem to understand much about the Holocaust, OP, especially about the rhetoric among the Allies during the 1930s. So many of the things I've seen on this thread were common arguments against intervention as well, especially the idea that it's not our problem, it's probably all propaganda, we need to worry about our own country's affairs.

And at least in World War Two we were fighting Hitler - if we don't do our utmost to stop ISIS we are even worse than the Allies in World War Two who didn't do as much as they could have.

If you don't think we need to intervene, fine. But if so you also have to realise that had you lived in 1930s/early 1940s Britain you probably would have advocated non-intervention in the Holocaust as well, and need to have a think about how you feel about that.

(BTW am aware have triggered Godwins Law, but do see it relevant in this case)

whatever we do will be used against us, it will be like Vietnam because who will be the enemy.

I think you make valid points wetAugust

but those poor people stuck there at the mercy of these lunatics.

You misread my posts. I do think that something should be done about ISIS. I don't think that us bombing them is the solution I set out what I would do down thread.

You have to ask yourselves why countries that are even closer geographically like Turkey are not bombing thus group. Turkey is a NATO member, like us.

It's a regional problem based on religious and ethnic sectarian hatred and those ideologies will not be changed by bombing.

And as for asking how I. Would feel if my child was beheaded. - what a puerile question.

He has as much, if not greater chance, of being beheaded on the streets of London, like Lee Rigby.

In WW 2 we had an enemy and an endgame I.e. Overthrow of T hire Reich.

can someone please tell me what the endgame is for this adventure? I doubt you can

YABU- when we invaded Iraq the last time Paul Bremer carried out de-Ba'athificatin, the ruling Ba'ath party was dismantled, anyone in a position of power was a member, in the government, army, police, power stations, oil refineries, universities etc etc. It never occurred to him that people might only be members because that was the only way to get a decent job, as far as he was concerned they were the enemy. There was nobody left to run anything, there was water shortages, food shortages, no electricity, even a petrol shortage. He then disbanded the army, he basically destroyed the country single-handedly.

Perfect conditions for groups like ISIS to thrive, we created these conditions and have a moral obligation to try and defend the ordinary people being brutalised and murdered by these extremists. The endgame is to destroy ISIS by providing air cover to the newly reformed Iraqi army and Peshmerga as they fight ISIS on the ground.

lurker

The end game you derived is not achievable. The Kurds may be able to clear them from the Kurdish areas of Iraq. It would be a stretch of the imagination to believe the Iraqi army will clear them from the Sunni areas of Iraq but let's stretch our imagination and believe that this will happen due to air cover we provide.

ISIS will just hop over he border to Syria. Cameron has no mandate to bomb Syria.

What next?

The end game you derived is not achievable.
Like other posters, I think your points are valid. Could you clarify the experience these valid points are coming from? Obviously not someone who knows how to use a word like calumny but I'll let that go :) You are so arrogant that I'm wondering if you actually have a reason to be. I have a family member who knows much, much more about these issues than I think you do; something I've noticed is that real knowledge is comfortable with accepting there's no 'definitely right' or 'definitely wrong' when it comes to a situation like this. You assess what's expedient, responsible, supported, possible. You chart a best-fit course and hope history shows it to be everything you hope.

Regarding the question of what you'd do if your own child had been beheaded. This isn't puerile. It gets to the heart of the morality of this. You're looking at a big problem. Fine. When atrocities become sufficiently appalling to individual victims of war, their individual stories start to have more sway. Not so much the Brits and Americans who are being tragically killed to make a point, but the mothers who were buried alive and the children who were literally torn apart limb from limb. Military intervention may not be all that's needed, by a long chalk, to eradicate ISIS. But it protects those people left in the areas from which ISIS will have fled. For many people, especially knowing our part in how this came about, that's enough for now. The fact that we created this problem doesn't necessarily mean the answer now is not to intervene further in that manner. It's not that simple. And of course, the reality is that your child is not as likely to be torn apart on the streets of London. We're not in the kind of danger they're in, not at the moment. Don't minimise their plight.

You have not answered the question.

Once you have cleared ISIS out of Iraq and they have fled to Syria

What next?

Cameron has no mandate to bomb Syria yet, the Americans are already bombing it and don't really need our help to do so, as I'm sure you already know. The endgame I described is what America and its allies plan, whether it is achievable or not remains to be seen but just because something is difficult it doesn't mean we shouldn't try! If we succeed in pushing ISIS out of Iraq we will have won a small victory and helped protect the people living there. Or do you propose we stand by and do nothing while they rape and murder their way across Iraq because it might be a bit tricky?

I strongly think we need to not become involved in this dispute - it is not our war.

That's not to say we should take a 'not my problem' stance. We should be hugely sympathetic in regard to the humanitarian disaster unfolding, but that would involve sending aid not bombs.
We have been bombing Iraq and meddling in other middle eastern disputes, including delivering billions in resources (weapons, equipment, training) for their army, for over a century and it is still not resolved.

I have yet to hear a truly coherent objective, or plan, for the current military intervention, it seems we're sending 6 bombers. It will make not a jot of difference.

The other question is why are we so keen to step up and help in this particular problem. Is it really driven by a moral question? In which case why are we not also sanctioning air strikes against Boko Haram? Surely it can't be because the Mid East is very very rich, due to its oil reserves. And if that us the real reason why don't we just go the whole hog and go to full scale war?

Wet I don't agree with the bombing as who are Isis and where are they but don't necessarily think we should do nothing

glossor - please do not confuse religious fanatics that use Islam as their excuse to kill and torture with the religion itself. You do not need to combat Islam (I am a muslim and have never killed anyone and had no desire to do so), we need to combat the extremists who are using my religion to spread fear and act in this horrendous, awful way.
But I think something has to be done, ISIS is evil and if the bombings will do the job then so be it. I also firmly believe that the 'west' should have intervened in Syria long time ago, the killing has gone on for too long by the Assad regime.

Don't really think bombing will achieve much though.
We are playing into the hands of ISIS and they will end up with more support and not less when hospitals and civilians are killed

And you have not responded to the points raised, OP.

It's a regional problem based on religious and ethnic sectarian hatred and those ideologies will not be changed by bombing

I totally agree - as I've said on other threads, the hatred comes first and a target needs to be found to provide an outlet for diseased minds. I understand the argument for bombing, but really don't feel it will make any long term difference

Sooner or later I'm quite sure it will be claimed that it's all "the west's fault" ... to some, it always is. In the meantime I believe that security measures within the UK should be massively strengthened as an absolute priority

The problem is trying to get mainstream Muslims to back any action. It won't sit easy with them to side with the great satan while they're attacking Muslims, no matter how vile and twisted they are.