Why?

[poliphilo]

My mother keeps asking "Why does Cameron want to bomb Syria?"

How do you answer that?

I'm settling for, "Because there's a civil war in progress and he wants to join in."

Seriously. Two years ago he was all for bombing Assad in support of the rebels. Now he's all for bombing the rebels in support of Assad (though he'd still like to bomb Assad as well.)

No, I don't know what Cameron should do instead. But of all the options open to him bombing is the most facile and futile. We should have learned from our own experience (during the second world war and after) that nothing so strengthens a people's will and enflames their fighting spirit as being bombed.

Comments

[matrixmann]

As long he keeps up the strategy "we decide on our own" without asking the remains of the Syrian government about anything, it will be so. Just another Western interference into foreign countries according to an unrealistic plan...

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Cameron is a smooth PR man- looks good on a podium- otherwise not up to the job.

[howlin-wolf-66.livejournal.com]

Yours is as good an explanation as any. *sigh*

[sorenr.livejournal.com]

I wish I knew what anybody should do, really. I don't, though.

Bombs, however, do have a track record of not only NOT stopping organisations on the ground, but also resulting in vast numbers of innocent casualties.

A retired officer from the Danish defence academy estimates that 100-150,000 land soldiers would be needed to stop Daesh, but after Iraq nobody wants to expose their armies to the losses such an effort would entail - and I can't say I blame anybody for having that point of view.

There is just no easy solution.

The only thing I know for sure, deep inside of me, is that surely we can help those fleeing the bombings of Daesh, Assad, France, Russia, Denmark, the US and so on... Denmark is currently in the process of tendering a contract worth 3 billion pounds for new fighter jets with strategic bombing capabilities. Imagine what even a quarter of that amount could achieve if we used it to provide aid for refugees...

(Instead we are now erecting fenced-in tent camps for single male refugees. Yes. Tents. In Denmark. In winter. Granted, they are good tents with heating etc., but they are TENT CAMPS! In a country with a plentiful supply of empty public buildings. I really want to be proud of my country, but it's quite impossible these days.)

[davesmusictank.livejournal.com]

Yes a thorny issue but one in which western influence has already exacerbated.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I read an article the other day which suggested we could bring Daesh to its knees quite quickly by cutting its supply routes- which run through Turkey. The thing is Mr Erdogan quite likes Daesh because they're his enemy's enemy.

I believe you're doing more for refugees in Denmark than we are. We're not even building tent cities so far as I'm aware.