Syria. Are we ready to deal with what they might do and how they might respond? I need to know before I vote for any strikes, and I think the good people of Essex would like us to know whether the Government know what they are doing before we vote to sanction such action.
The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have argued with great passion and determination that we in the west must take a stand for democratic values, and I agree. The Arab spring of 2011, like Europe’s spring of 1848, saw the hopes of liberals and reformists raised. However, the autocrats fought back in Egypt and Syria as they once did in Italy, Paris, Poland and Austria. As we once did in the 19th century, so we must do again in the 21st century. We must promote the liberal and reformist cause, and the constitutionalist one where possible. As in the 19th century, where possible we must avoid war with the autocrats.
Democracy and liberalism will one day seem as firmly rooted in the south and east of the Mediterranean as they do to the north, but if spreading democratic values is to be the cornerstone on which we are to build British foreign policy, let us do so consistently. We cannot act in defence of democratic values in Syria two months after we failed to speak out in defence of the democratically elected Government in Egypt. We cannot act when hundreds of civilians are murdered in Damascus, but continue to arm the Egyptian junta that slaughtered a thousand in Cairo. We cannot champion the right of self-determination in one part of the Arab world, yet ignore those who seek basic human rights in another, including the Gulf.
I am unconvinced that the Government’s intended course of action in Syria is part of a coherent strategy, and I will not support military action until I am convinced that it is part of such a strategy. I am still undecided whether we should support the motion, oppose it, or abstain. I am fearful of being seen to back military action, I am unwilling to abstain, yet I find there is little in either the Government or the Opposition motion with which I can disagree.
6.34 pm
Mr Dai Havard (Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney) (Lab): A lot has been said already in this debate for those who come in at this late stage, but I agree with the powerful points made by the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt), who talked about the context in which individual decisions are being made. Let us be brutally honest. The Americans were not really interested in the middle east; they were going to look to the far east, and Syria was contained in a number of different ways.
We see on television one brutal reality on the ground, but there is another reality that has not come out, because we never really debated properly how we would arm the rebels. The rebels are already being armed. We know about the Saudi and Qatari money; we know about buying Croatian arms and how they pushed through Jordan. We know about a whole series of grading operations, not by official US forces—no, but there is a lot of “brigadier, retired”, “general, retired”, who are there helping to do what the Americans needed to do, which is to try and find out who could and could not be properly armed. There is a lot of mythology about where we are in terms of the reality of how the Syrian conflict has been contained.
Let us look at what has been proposed today. What are we going to do? Apparently we are going to send in a few Tomahawk land attack missiles to give Assad a bit of a spanking because he has used chemical weapons. That is nonsense and a ridiculous proposition that will lead us to the position that a lot of people have already begun to explain. We cannot write Assad a letter and say, “By the way, the TLAM missile was only to give you a spanking over chemical weapons. It didn’t mean that we were interfering in your conflict in any way, shape or form.” Frankly, that is nonsense. We cannot compartmentalise such activities in the way suggested, and there will be an effect. What will that effect be? Well, there is lots of information about why we are trying to do this. “He has used chemical weapons.” Who has used chemical weapons? The hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) dealt with that point earlier in a powerful contribution. It could have been a rogue commander. Assad is not necessarily directing. It could be that the regime’s assets are being used, but who is using them?
I remember being involved in all sorts of discussions about Iranians kidnapping British forces when we were in Iraq—hon. Members may remember that exercise. That was not sanctioned by the central regime in Iran— whatever that might look like—but it was a rogue operation by an Iranian guard commander who saw an opportunity when everybody was on holiday to nick the boat. They obviously took advantage of that as best they could—why would they not?—and we got into all sorts of mess. Do not imagine that under such circumstances, and particularly in a war situation, Assad and his people are so monolithic and well-organised that there are no differences among them. This is difficult information to try to grade out and decide who was responsible on any day for any particular activity.
Mr Arbuthnot: The hon. Gentleman is making a good point. Does he think that if a rogue commander under the Assad regime made use of chemical weapons, the fact that that regime has those detestable and illegal weapons puts responsibility for their use, if they have delegated responsibility, on the Assad regime itself ?
Mr Havard: I do not disagree. Those responsible should be punished, although I am not sure that sending TLAM missiles is a punishment. People have mentioned the International Criminal Court, and I agree. These people must be held to account for their actions at some point. We do not now have an immediate almost knee-jerk reaction—it was going to be knee-jerk but it is a week late now—to the situation. The strike is apparently “targeted”, but I do not know what that means. It is targeted in the sense that we know where we will throw the missile, but it is hardly a surgical, contained or compartmentalised activity. Will we do that, or will we have a broader constituency of people who can start to prosecute the idea of bringing those people to account at some time or another?
The idea that if we do not do something now for those stated reasons we will not do anything is nonsense. There are lots of other things that can be done that we should probably have been doing for a long time and will have to do now. We must accept one thing: we will not get anywhere towards resolving the problem for the
Syrian people unless and until we grapple differently