It is truly saddening to read of recent events in Iraq. Seeing the horrific images that have been all over the media for the last few days, it is impossible for your heart not to go out to the millions of people in the region who have suffered for many years at the hands of oppressive governments, violent rebels and misguided Western intervention.
It is therefore maddening to see politicians in both the US and the UK suggesting that we should assist them with military aid including both troops on the ground and weaponry. Ironically the ISIS rebels are some of the people who many were so keen to arm in the fight against Bashar al-Assad. It is all part of a confused foreign policy that seeks to divide the Middle East into Good Muslims and Bad Muslims, ignoring sectarian divisions and failing completely to put together anything resembling a long term plan.
If an alien came to earth and wanted to know about the crisis from a Western perspective, it would no doubt go something like this:
“It all started when we gave some weapons to a man called Mr Hussein because he was fighting the Evil Iranians. This went quite well until we realised that he was also Quite Evil so we asked for our weapons back because we realised he might be using them on people who weren’t the Evil Iranians. He said ‘no’ so we invaded. Meanwhile, we also gave weapons to a man called Mr. bin Laden because he was fighting against the Evil Soviets. This also went quite well until Mr. bin Laden started plotting to blow us all up. We asked the Afghan government to give him over to us but they said ‘no’ so we had to bomb them. Luckily it only took us ten years to find him and kill him so he could stop plotting to blow us all up. Unfortunately, it looks like there are still other people who want to blow us up, which came as quite a surprise.
“There was also an uprising against an Evil man in Syria. We wanted to give weapons to them but we were told we weren’t allowed to. But it turns out that so of the people who we wanted to give weapons to in Syria are Really Really Evil and they’ve moved into Iraq to fight against the new Government, who are Good. So we’ve asked for help from Iran to fight against the Really Really Evil men.”
“Aren’t they Evil too?”
“Yes but they’re not as Evil as the Really Really Evil men. We might also have to ask for help from the Evil man in Syria as well. He has Bad Weapons that he was using against his own people but if we can persuade him to use his Bad Weapons against the Really Really Evil men then that’s probably OK.
“Oh, and then there’s Saudi Arabia.”
“What about them?”
“They’re Evil but we have to pretend they’re Good because they’ve got Oil.”
“Where does Oil come into it?”
“(check watch) How long have you got?”
I’m not claiming to know what the answer is, but surely it cannot be to flood Iraq with yet more weapons.
* David Gray is a musician, actor and writer based in Birmingham. He is a a co-director of Keep Streets Live
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The Iraqi security foces (ISF) comprising the military and police are already armed to the teeth with modern weaponary – so more or less weapons will make little difference to the situation.
Isis are a relatively small fanatical terrorist organisation as were Al Qaeda in Iraq before them. The real military power here is the Dulaim Tribe and other Sunni Militia’s of Anbar province in Western Iraq that shares borders with Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Their power base is in the cities of Ramadi, Fallujah and Haditha. These are the people who were armed and supported by General Petraeus in 2006-08 to expel Al Qaeda in Iraq.
This is a tribal/sectarian civil war between the Dulaim/Sunni and Shia majority in Southern Iraq and as in Syria a regional tussle for influence between Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia.
Churchill put down an Arab and Kurdish revolt against the British mandate after WW1 and installed the Hashemite King Faysal ibn Husayn establishing Sunni control over Iraq that lasted through to the deposing of Saddam Hussein.
The Maliki government that came to power in the wake of the 2003 war is heavily influenced by Iran and has pursued a sectarian policy in removing Sunni and Kurdish officials and military officers from any positions of authority within the Iraqi administration. Therein lies the source of the conflict.
Isis are only one of many problems now as the region hurls headlong into a potentially catastrophic conflict . The military involvement of the US and the West to combat terrorist organisations cannot solve the underlying issues and may only serve to exacerbate what is already a highly charged situation.
Picking sides in what is a redrawing of borders or playing balance of power politics is likely to alienate one or both sides in a civil war. We need to look to our own national interest – countering the threat from British Jihadi’s returning from these regions; encouraging and supporting the Arab league and Iran in dealing with their own regional problems; maintaining diplomatic and political pressure on the Assad and Maliki administrations to form governments of national unity in Syria and Iraq; and bolstering Nato bases in Turkey and the Eastern Mediterranean.
‘In 1984, there is a perpetual war among Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia, the superstates which emerged from the atomic global war. “The book”, The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism by Emmanuel Goldstein, explains that each state is so strong it cannot be defeated, even with the combined forces of two superstates—despite changing alliances. To hide such contradictions, history is re-written to explain that the (new) alliance always was so; the populaces accustomed to doublethink accept it. The war is not fought in Oceanian, Eurasian or Eastasian territory but in the arctic wastes and a disputed zone comprising the sea and land from Tangiers (northern Africa) to Darwin (Australia). At the start, Oceania and Eastasia are allies combatting Eurasia in northern Africa and the Malabar Coast.
That alliance ends and Oceania allied with Eurasia fights Eastasia, a change which occurred during the Hate Week dedicated to creating patriotic fervour for the Party’s perpetual war. The public are blind to the change; in mid-sentence an orator changes the name of the enemy from “Eurasia” to “Eastasia” without pause.
“The book” explains that the purpose of the unwinnable, perpetual war is to consume human labour and commodities, hence the economy of a superstate cannot support economic equality (a high standard of life) for every citizen. By using up most of the produced objects like boots and rations the “proles” are kept poor and uneducated so that they will not realize what the government is doing and they will not rebel.’
This is an interesting article and perhaps we should talk to ISIS, but if an agreement can’t be reached then they need to be removed.
Let Blair send his own kids to fight.
@Alistair
‘Let Blair send his own kids to fight.’
Which is, of course, what political leaders did in World Wars I & II.
Firstly, politicians need to understand that “My enemy’s enemy is not necessarily my friend”.
Secondly, people tend not to like intelligent politicians who realise things are complicated, and instead vote for dumb ones who think there are simple solutions. Well, for every complex problem there is a solution which is simple, popular and … dead wrong.
Thirdly, “Iraqi officials told the Guardian that 30,000 Iraqi soldiers turned and ran in the face of the assault by just 800 (ISIS) fighters.” The soldiers morale must have been VERY low. Also, the local (Sunni) population appears to distrust the Iraqi army more than they do ISIS, and the (mostly Shia) army cannot have felt welcome or supported there. And you can see why: ‘Not all Mosul residents condemned the Isis rout. Ali Aziz, 35, a humanitarian worker, said: “We got statements by them confirming that they won’t cause harm to anyone and all the minorities will be protected by them. They are really welcomed and we are so happy to have them rather than having Maliki’s bloody, brutal forces.
“I feel we have been liberated of an awful nightmare that was suffocating us for 11 years. The army and the police never stopped arresting, detaining and killing people, let alone the bribes they were taken from the detainees’ families.”‘
Fourthly, read this (I don’t know how accurate it is, but it does put a very different light on things):
http://pando.com/2014/06/16/the-war-nerd-heres-everything-you-need-to-know-about-too-extreme-for-al-qaeda-i-s-i-s/
David Gray said
“It all started when we gave some weapons to a man called Mr Hussein because he was fighting the Evil Iranians. This went quite well until we realised that he was also Quite Evil so we asked for our weapons back because we realised he might be using them on people who weren’t the Evil Iranians.”
Care to tell me what those weapons were, David? Evidence would be nice too. AS I recall the situation of the time the Iraqis were running about with old Soviet hardware – very old soviet hardware – and a couple of Chieftons they had captured from the Iranians. Whilst Putins Russia kindly upgraded their material in time for their invasion of Kuwait I do not remember seeing any weapons system that had come from.
Joe Bourke – A similar queston. Can you show me evidence of the ISF being “armed to the teeth with modern weaponry”. The only major sale I can find is of an IAD system. Otherwise the news is showing that the Iraqis are using the same level of equipment as that with which they fought the recent war – soviet era small arms, Soviet tanks from the 50s and 60s and humvees that the yanks couldn’t be bothered to ship back to the US. I can find no evidence of them being armed with the same level of equipment as, say, the Greek army never mind the UK or US.
A Social Liberal,
According to a US inspector general report issued last year http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/2013/sigir-learning-from-iraq.pdf, the U.S. government spent nearly $25 billion on “training, equipping and sustaining” the Iraqi security forces as of late 2012.
The U.S. and its allies invested huge sums in building up and training a new force, renovating and building military bases, and providing hardware — the effort continues to this day, with Iraq set to receive dozens of U.S.-built F-16 fighter jets.
By the time U.S. forces withdrew at the end of 2011, Iraq’s trained security forces numbered more than 930,000. That included a 200,000-strong army, in addition to Iraqi police and other wings.
F16s are an aircraft which is over 30 years old, and in no way can be called modern. Further, 34 aircraft are not anything like ‘armed to the teeth’.
Yes, the US spent the money you indicated but you have to realise that training up 930,000 would eat up a huge proportion of that, the IAD system will also be a huge wack of it.
If respected commentators like Robert Fisk are to be believed, as David Gray says this is a religious war between Shia and Sunni Muslims and can only be understood through the understanding of the origins of the conflict between them. If this is the scenario, then there are parallels with the catholic v protestant Christian conflicts in Europe from the 16th century onwards and which is still continuing in northern island and Glasgow to this day. The Christian religious wars in the main just ran out of steam as people realised that living in peace was far better than continual war.
It seems to me that the primary role of western (Christian) countries is not to take sides unless there is a genuine attempt by legitimate governments to work across the Sunni/Shia divide. British Muslims have a key role in this and I would start by talking to them. Shouting off about jihadists bombing Britain is not helpful at this point. A quiet word that the Security Services are keeping a watchful eye on it is all that is needed.
David,
we should spare a thought for the Christian communities in Iraq that have been caught in the Sunni/Shia crossfire http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/06/18/mosuls_christians_say_goodbye?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_term=%2AMorning%20Brief&utm_campaign=2014_MorningBrief-%20PROMO6.19.14
There are very few of the estimated 1.5m Iraqi Christians as of 2003 still remaining in this war torn country – dispersing a community that has survived 2000 years in this region of the world.