Let's Start a War For Peace!

OK, it's time to get back to business.  I've just about kept this place ticking over for the past couple of weeks while I was on holiday, but Summer's over now and it is time to start making some proper posts again.  (It is also time to finally getting around to completing another podcast).  Whilst I've been busy enjoying the sun, it's all been kicking off with regard to Syria, most notably, David Cameron's attempts to rush us into participating in US-led military action has been roundly rebuffed by Parliament.  Now, normally you would expect a Prime Minister having suffered such a defeat to face a subsequent vote of no confidence, but thanks to the Tories' blatant rigging of the constitution to keep them power, that can't happen now without, I think a two thirds majority in favour of the motion.  Instead, we are saddled with this 'fixed-term' Parliament which favours the governing party.  But that isn't really the issue here - the question is whether we are morally, politically or strategically obligated to respond to the Syrian government's alleged use of chemical weapons against its own people.  President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry are certainly laying it on thick with the moral and political arguments, stating that the international community has decided that the use of chemical weapons represents a 'red line' and as that line has been crossed, we have to respond.

Which is fine, except that there is no reason why that response should be military.  Indeed, it is unclear what the proposed action of missile strikes could actually achieve.  Moreover, whilst no one would disagree that a line has been crossed, it isn't the first time.  Back in the 'good old days' when Saddam and Iraq were our allies against Iran, I seem to remember him using chemical weapons against his own people.  Were we and the US shouting a about a line being crossed then and demanding military action?  Furthermore, why, apparently, is it only crossing a line if you kill your own people with chemical weapons?  The current military regime in Egypt - which deposed a democratically elected, if unpopular, President, has killed as least as many innocent, unarmed citizens as the Syrians are alleged to have done with chemical weapon attacks, simply because they had the audacity to protest at what amounted to a military coup.  Did Cameron or Obama call for military intervention?  Of course not.  Indeed, the US government even denies that it was a military coup, as if it was, they would no longer be able to sell Egypt weapons. 

Which isn't to say that I would want to see military action in any of these cases.  The fact is that terrible things are happening all over the world all of the time and the sad reality is that, most of the time, there is little we can do about it.  Which doesn't mean we shouldn't try, but we have to ask how we can best approach these situations.  The trouble is that our leaders still seem to be in the grip of the dangerous double-think which says that you can only achieve peace by starting a war.  In spite of the fact that the majority of recent Western military interventions really haven't turned out well.   I'm not claiming to know what the alternative might be, but surely anything is better than dropping bombs on people in the name of 'liberating' them?