DUPLICITY AND DELAY

The beginning of a beautiful friendship

The delays in the publication of the Chilcot Report are a telling indictment of the duplicity of those involved in making the decision to spin a web of lies to make the case for war in 2003. The inquiry was somewhat reluctantly set up by the then New Labour Government in 2009 - the hearings were completed in 2011. 

Disputes over the publication of evidence and the right of advanced rebuttal by those included in the report then followed, including arguments over whether or not memos between the then Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George Bush could be published or not also followed. 

No matter how much spin was spun to add weight to the reasons for the invasion, the toppling of Saddam Hussein, the costly occupation of Iraq, etc - it is impossible to get away from the idea that the then New Labour Prime Minister simply lied to the House of Commons and the rest of us. The whole wretched process is yet another very public demonstration of the abject failure of the Westminster institution to call them to account and the lengths to which the so called elite will go to to protect their tarnished reputations. 

THE WAR OF THE WORDS

The war of the words, despite last evenings vote against military action without parliamentary approval, continues, while the war on the ground in Syria (and body count grows ever higher). Clearly the experience of Iraq and Afghanistan weighed heavily on MP’s minds in Westminster yesterday. Whatever the merits of the intervention or not with regard to the conflict in Syria are, we are all somewhere different to where we were in 2003. The fact that Blair favoured intervention swung some of my relatives to a position of opposition to intervention. Armed intervention in Syria with or without UN approval (which is unlikely with the Russian and Chinese veto) would be a risky business.

The Syrian situation is far more complicated than was the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan – in theory Saddam could have fled to exile, but, Assad has nowhere to go and neither does his constituency of support amongst the sizeable (and well armed) Alawite minority.  Last evenings vote of Westminster MP's against military intervention in Syria may send sizeable shock waves through the Obama administration. Whereas previously the Brits have tended to march in step with the US, this rejection of President Barack Obama's argument may well upset the special relationship for some time to come.

It can be argued this key event has been a long time coming, and save for Harold Wilson’s refusal to commit UK ground troops to Vietnam in the 1960’s (which was duly punished) it has largely been avoided (at least since Suez). Certainly before last night’s vote, the US administration appeared relatively relaxed about David Cameron's problems and any delays in the Brits joining the new collation. Now in the cold light of day things may be different, it may to too early to say whether or not the Brits have finally cast of their adoptive mantle of Uncle Sam’s poodle.

The trigger for any intervention has been the alleged use of chemical weapons against civilians by the Syrian regime, the latest of possible 14 instances of chemical weapons use,  may yet trigger a US-led military response. The UN route may be blocked with Russia and China very publically opposed to any military action, which means that the UN Security Council will be unable to give its backing to any intervention which may raise some questions about the legal basis for military intervention.

Any desire for intervention may relate more to Syria (and the strategic situation in the Middle East) than it does to the use of chemical weapons as such. They have been used before (on some scale) by Saddam Hussein, against the Iranians (during the Iran – Iraq war) and later against the Kurds. On both occasion the Western Allies (and the USA) said next to nothing as Saddam was their boy - he was only to become a problem later when he invaded Kuwait (triggering the first gulf war back in 1991).

Last evenings cross-party amendment on Syria called for legal evidence and UN inspectors reports to be presented before any decision is taken on military action are taken, something that most reasonable people would probably agree with as a reasonable and rational response to the crisis. Judging by the look on David Cameron’s face last night as the debate concluded in a government defeat there may be trouble ahead and the one sided ‘special relationship’ may be on hold for the foreseeable future. 

Perhaps finally the lessons of Afghanistan and Iraq may have sunk in and days of the UK  strutting the stage and over extending itself by pretending to be a global player are over - it may be too early to say. That said, something needs to be done to bring an end to the increasingly bloody conflict in Syria – doing that will require UN approval (which is unlikely) and a plan (which may well be nonexistent if recent experiences in Iraq are anything to go by).  

So as the war of words continues in the West, the war on the ground will continue in the Middle East, the refugee crisis will get worse and the body count will grow ever higher. There was as far as I could perceive last evening only as slight if faint whiff of Munich wafting through some of the MP's in the House of Commons last evening - perhaps prompted by some of the friends of Syria (Assad); that said  the vote should not be an excuse of inaction or indifference to the plight of the people of Syria, as something still needs to be done. 

HALABJA, NEWPORT, DAMASCUS...

Halabja

I had just finished a session in the gym last evening, when I caught the headlines last night about the suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria. The changing room fell silent as people took in the news and the grim footage. The Kurdish man standing next to me watching the TV broke the silence saying that he had survived Saddam’s chemical weapons attack on the Kurdish city of Halabja (16^th March 1988) but had lost his father and other close relatives.  For those who have forgotten back on the 16^th  March 1988, Iraq dropped bombs containing mustard gas, Sarin and Tabun on the Kurdish city of Halabja.  UN experts estimated that the number of civilians killed range from 3,200 to 5,000, with many survivors suffering long-term health problems.

Now this was not the first time that Saddam used chemical weapons against the Kurds, they were also used during Iraq's ‘Anfal’ offensive. This seven-month scorched-earth campaign in which an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 Kurdish villagers were killed or disappeared, and hundreds of villages were razed to the ground. The UN had confirmed in 1986 that Iraq had contravened the Geneva Convention by using chemical weapons against Iran. Iraq also used the blister agent mustard gas from 1983 and the nerve gas Tabun from 1985, in the face of human waves attacks from Iranian troops and poorly-trained Iranian volunteers. A UN Security Council statement condemned Iraq's use of chemical weapons in the war in 1986. The US, UK and other western governments still looked upon Saddam as ‘their own boy’ so continued supporting Baghdad politically and militarily until the closing stages of the Iran – Iraq war. 

Now chemical weapons are being used in the Middle East again, this time in Syria. UN officials have said that the alleged chemical weapons attacks which Syria's opposition says killed hundreds near Damascus was a "serious escalation". Jan Eliasson, UN Deputy Secretary-General, made those comments after briefing an emergency UN Security Council meeting about Wednesday's incident. The Security Council also said that clarity was needed over the attacks. Some 35 UN member states (including the US, UK and France) have called for the UN chemical weapons inspectors that are already probing three sites of alleged chemical weapons use in Syria to be dispatched immediately to the scene to investigate. UN inspectors arrived in Damascus on Sunday with a mandate to investigate three locations including the northern town of Khan al-Assal, where some 26 people were killed in March. 

Syrian opposition activists have said that more than 1,000 people have been killed after government forces launched rockets with toxic agents into the Damascus suburbs in the Ghouta region early on Wednesday. The Syrian government has denied the allegations, describing them as "illogical and fabricated" and the Syrian army says the opposition made up the claims to divert attention from the huge losses its forces had suffered recently. The areas said to have been affected included Irbin, Duma and Muadhamiya. Syrian opposition footage shows dozens of bodies with no visible signs of injuries, including small children, laid out on the floor of a clinic. Videos also show people being treated in makeshift hospitals, with victims, including many children, having convulsions.

President Obama’s administration has expressed its "deep concern" over the alleged chemical weapons attacks on Wednesday and formally requested the UN to "urgently investigate" the incident. The alleged attack comes a year after US President Barack Obama warned the Syrian government that using chemical weapons would cross a "red line". UK Foreign Secretary William Hague said that if confirmed, the attacks would mark a "shocking escalation in the use of chemical weapons in Syria". The Russian foreign ministry noted that the reports had emerged just as the UN chemical weapons inspection team had arrived in Syria, saying that "this makes us think that weare once again dealing with a premeditated provocation". The official Syrian Sana news agency said reports of the latest attack were "baseless", describing them as "an attempt to divert the UN chemical weapons investigation commission away from carrying out its duties". China and Russia (along with their fair weather friends India, South Africa and Brazil) have repeatedly backed the Syrian government since the crisis began have blocked a stronger Security Council press statement which supported by the 35 states. 

INTERESTING TIMES

We live in interesting and fast moving times - today the Con Dem Foreign Secretary, William Hague said the UK will recognise the Libyan rebel council as the "sole governmental authority", and then promptly expelled all the Gaddafi-regimes diplomats. The Libyan charge d'affaires was summoned to the Foreign Office beforehand and told that he and other diplomats must leave.

The UK has rightly (in my opinion) asked the National Transitional Council to appoint a new diplomatic envoy. Recognition followed similar earlier moves by the US and France. Oddly enough the UK Government had previously stated that it recognised "countries not governments".

So now we have two Libya's and two Libyan governments. We have come along way very fast (diplomatically) not that long ago the former PM Tony Blair and other Western Leaders were busy snuggling up the repressive Libyan leader and his spawn.

Here's hoping that what we are seeing here is Western recognition of the wind of change that's blowing through the Arab world. And here's hoping that Gaddafi (and his ilk) and the rest of the repressive bunch end up in Court and after due process spend a seriously long time in goal answering for their crimes.

When Saddam went far too much was swept under the carpet (the Kurds amongst many others never did get their day in court) and we never did find out which Western Governments (and the rest) and which companies had been quietly breaking the sanctions because after all he was 'our boy'.

Heaven forbid that the current Libyan crisis drags on and Gaddafi continues to cling on to power in and around Tripoli. No doubt there may be calls for an arms embargo which would harm any prospects of an outright opposition success as with Bosnia. I mean like Gaddafi does not have enough stock piled already, no doubt previously sold to him at cost by British Arms dealers (under New Labour and the Con Dems)...oops..

And if it's not asking too much while we are at it lets have a long hard impartial look at just who's been profitably tooling up the forces of repression around the globe and shine some light on the UK's at times dubious foreign policy and exactly what decisions have been and are being made on our name?

TOOLED UP!

News that the UK is training Saudi Arabia's national guard (the elite security force deployed during the recent protests in Bahrain) in public order enforcement measures and the use of sniper rifles should come as no surprise. Plaid's Jonathan Edwards MP, who has tabled parliamentary questions to the Ministry of Defence about its links to Saudi Arabia, has done excellent work exposing this questionable but no doubt lucrative business to the cold light of day. The UK Government has spent may years tooling up the forces the of repression across the globe and signing lucrative arms deals with some of the worlds most repressive regimes.

Depressing though this news is, we would do well to note that this is relatively old news - in that the UK has been quietly supplying and training up some pretty questionable people's security services for years. Even David Cameron took arms dealers on a recent tour of Middle Eastern states - no doubt we can off a good discount of rubber bullets and tear gas in exchange for ensuring that more than a few pints of the dark stuff (and we are not talking about Guinness here) keep flowing. Mrs Thatcher in here time oversaw the the sale directly and indirectly of more than enough weapons to Saddam Hussein when he was our boy, some of which broke the sanctions that were imposed during the war between Iraq and Iran.

A WIND OF CHANGE?

Small stones can start large avalanches, opposition to Muammar Gaddafi and his murderous repressive regime is not new, it has a long history both inside and outside of Libya. Not that former PM Tony Blair and other Western Leaders who were busy snuggling up the repressive leader and his spawn would have noticed, but courageous Libyans defying the repressive Gaddafi regime took to the streets not a month ago, but more than two years ago. They risked torture and death sentences and their protest largely passed unnoticed by most of the world, a small group of families began to hold weekly demonstrations in Benghazi, the city that has become the epicenter of the uprising that swept across Libya.

In less than three months Gaddafi has gone from being the West's best mate to billy no mates. The UN Security Council has twice in three weeks done the right thing, initially by referring Libya to the International Criminal Court, then, by authorizing military force to protect civilians from Muammar al-Qaddafi's crazed wrath. Qaddafi is in many ways the perfect stage villain complete with an iffy dress sense, madness and way over-the-top threats to "show no mercy" to the people of Benghazi, along with his regional meddling and megalomaniac ideas, left him few friends or defenders.

Now What's even more amazing aside from the fact that China and Russia decided not to vote or even to abstain in the UN, is the fact that the Arab League (which has long promised much and delivered little for the Arab peoples) has also played an key role by abandoning its usual position of opposition to Security Council action against some of it's more repressive members. Previously the league has watched silently as Sudan's Omar al-Bashir committed crimes against humanity in Darfur, somewhat less recently, Saddam Hussein (Iraq) massacred Shia and Kurds, and Syria's Hafez al-Asad destroyed the town of Hama.

Now the question are the winds of change wafting through the Middle East and North Africa or is the ground literally crumbling beneath the feet of a whole host of iffy and repressive regimes - with popular dissent and demonstrations in Algeria, Syria, Yemen and Bharain - where next people may well wonder? What's embarrassing for Western leaders in particular is that they now find that many of the despots they have feted because they brought 'security and stability' to the region (and also lucratively armed to the teeth) are now busy repressing their own people in what appears to be a series of increasingly bloody and brutal (and hopefully futile) attempts to stay in power.

Gaddafi and friend (AFP / Getty)

Western leaders are 'discovering' that 'their boys' are a pretty grim and repressive bunch of (hopefully) no hopers. I suppose that we should all be grateful in that at least we have been spared the embarrassing suggestion that they did not no what they were like or what they were doing. Certainly the former New Labour Government and no doubt the Con Dem's spent plenty of time being nice to Gaddafi regime (the sight of Peter Hain (Labour MP for Neath) defending a long line of arms sales to Libya recently on BBC Question time comes to mind). Now the people are taking to the streets throughout the region, risking their lives for freedom, democracy and human rights against autocratic leaders that have long denied them for so long.

Here's hoping what we are seeing is the wind of change and here's hoping that Gaddafi (and his ilk) and the rest of the repressive bunch end up in Court and after due process spend a seriously long time in goal answering for their crimes. When Saddam went far too much was swept under the carpet (the Kurds amongst many others never did get their day in court) and we never did find out which Western Governments (and the rest) and which companies had been quietly breaking the sanctions because after all he was 'our boy'.

And while we are at it lets have a long hard look at just who's been profitably tooling up the forces of repression around the globe and shine some light on the UK's foreign policy and exactly what decisions have been and are being made on our name? Now this wave of revolution has been fuelled by the courage of ordinary people who are prepared to stand up and be counted, aided and abetted by Facebook - the blocking of which by repressive regimes is a key sign of unrest and dissent- incidentally I wonder if Facebook is blocked in Cuba, Venezuela, Zimbarbwe and Iran all of whom have expressed their support for Gaddafi?

NO FLY?

David Cameron, the Con Dem PM, says that Britain is working with its allies on a plan to establish a military no-fly zone over Libya, because of the threat of  "further appalling steps" being taken by Col Muammar Gaddafi to oppress his own people. This seems a sensible solution (but for historical reasons without US involvement if possible), which is one step away from having to put boots on the ground and direct military intervention.

Perhaps Western leaders may have finally learned the lesson that its relatively easy to commit troops on the ground, but, a much more difficult and often costly in human terms to get them back out again. By way of coincidence Cameron's predecessor Conservative PM John Major went along with the establishment of 'No
Fly' zones in Iraq in 1990 / 1991.

Lets hope that this solution is decidedly more effective than the farcical and selectively effective 'no fly zones' that were established to protect the Kurds and the Marsh Arabs from Saddam. This time lets make sure that ground attack helicopters are covered by the 'no fly' rules - they weren't last time. At least for the Libyans (unlike the Kurds) they will not be periodically subjected to ground attack by Turkish planes operating from the same airfields as the NATO aircraft that were protecting the Kurds from Iraqi attacks.

Heaven forbid that the Libyan crisis drags on and Gaddafi ends up clinging to power (in and around Tripoli) for that will mean that there will be an arms embargo which would harm any prospects of an outright opposition success as with Bosnia. I mean like Gaddafi does not have enough stock piled already, no doubt previously sold to him at cost by British Arms dealers (under New Labour and the Con Dems)...oops...

MAKING THE BEST OF IT

It's interesting that David Cameron, has said that Egypt has had a "precious moment of opportunity" to move towards "civilian and democratic rule". Obviously trying to make the best out of the situation, Mr Cameron makes these comments following the resignation of Hosni Mubarak as Egypt's president after 18 days of continuous and largely peaceful (at least on the part of the anti-Mubarak demonstrators) protest. Mr Cameron goes on to say that the UK was a friend of Egypt and stood ready to "help in any way that we can". I wonder how that squares with thirty years of warm support for Mubarak when it comes to repressing the Egyptian people? Mubarak was as much a favoured son of the West as much as Saddam Hussein, oh how the time change. Former New Labour PM, Tony Blair, described Mubarak as "immensely courageous and a force for good" (2nd February 2011), previous British Prime Ministers and other Western Leaders have been equally gushing over the years, quietly brushing the Human Rights violations under the carpet, so to speak, when it comes to supporting Mubark. Lets hope that the Egyptian people have short memories...and don't ask awkward questions about the UK's relationship with Mubarak, especially if Cameron goes to visit.