GENERAL LORD DANNATT is calling for troops on the ground in
Iraq, after the fall of Ramadi to ISIS. It is a plea that he knows will go
unheard, but he has secured for himself the opportunity to say 'I told you so',
if, as I suspect ISIS will grow in strength the longer we do nothing to stop
them apart from dropping millions of dollars of high-tech munitions on trucks
that cost a few hundred dollars. Bombing alone was never going to suffice it
never does in war. Blood has to be spilt, and this is where the liberal politicians
suffer palpitations.
The
public, as far as we know, still feel the same way about venturing once more
into the Iraq quagmire today as they did after Blair produced his cynical 'dirty dossier'; which is what ISIS hopes and
expects is the case. They do not fear the West because they see us as weak and
degenerate, more concerned about whether or not gays have the right to marry
than their advancement toward a caliphate that will eventually encompass Iraq,
Syria and beyond – if, that is, as seem likely, there is no one there to spill
their blood to stop them.
Our
Western politicians are impotent to act. They are demoralised by their extensive
past failures in the region and sensing their electorates exhaustion with what
Blair called 'liberal-interventionism' whereby Western democracies engage with
dictators, and seed a democracy afterwards – well, that worked out well. Saddam,
Gaddafi, were got rid of, but in both Iraq and Libya democracy is as far away
as ever.
By their
actions the West has managed to conjure from the deep far worse monsters in the
form of ISIS and other terrorist groups. Now the disillusionment of the Western
public with sending ground forces into these regional hot-spots will come back
to haunt them. Burying ones head in the sand is not however a safe option: as
we see almost daily from the ramshackle boats full of refugees crossing the
Mediterranean to Malta and the toe of Italy.
We have
no idea how many ISIS members have taken this journey in the hope of infiltrating
the continent. Belatedly the EU has chosen to act on this front by targeting
the boats before they leave the coast of Libya – are yes, Libya: the country
both Cameron and Hollande visited in triumph after their successful bombing
campaign that decisively 'freed' the Libyan people from Gaddafi. They were both
surrounded, as I remember, by grateful Libyans…what followed however is to
depressing to recount, in light of the advances by ISIS.
No
doubt Cameron meant well; but he fashioned himself on Tony Blair and the New
Labour project, and replicated Blair's stratagem in Iraq, within Libya. What we
now need today is another Churchill[1]
. We are however left with itinerant politicians who follow the polls and can
change policy at a moment's notice to serve the fashion of the day. Principle
is now dead in democratic politics.
IN IRAQ AT THIS very moment, as Dannatt suggests, Western
armies need to intervene on the ground to stop ISIS before they become so great
in numbers following accumulative victories; that the West will find it harder
and more costly in our young soldier's lives to act. ISIS must be stamped out
before more and more European Muslims set off to join them. Each ISIS victory
and each lack of a Western response to such victories will only encourage more
of the European Muslim youth throughout Europe to join them.
In Iraq
today the city of Ramadi has been conquered by ISIS; a force comprising a mere
few hundred combatants have once more driven out a far greater number of the
Iraqi army who fled from the city once more, leaving a stock pile of American
arms behind to be used by ISIS.
The
Americans are effectively arming ISIS. The Iraqi army has proved themselves so
useless that the Iraqi government has now been forced to allow the Shia
militias to help retake the city. Yet still Obama promises the Iraqis more
armaments including rockets. This is an act of pernicious cowardliness never seen
before in an American politician. By pouring evermore arms into Iraq instead of
American feet on the ground, will only add to the ISIS armoury.
After the taking of Ramadi; president Obama
still refuses to put American armed forces on the ground to spill their blood
on behalf of the West's survival. Obama is a liberal, and a guilty conscience
matters more to him than the survival even of the West that he is supposed (as
the leader of the West's greatest military power)to be the protector of. But it
seems that all he wants is to be exonerated from his part in its extinction by
his inactivity. He only wants to leave office with the prospect of garnishing
millions of dollars on the lecture circuit. Obama's manifesto for his second
term has been titled 'The Quiet Life'.
All
Obama wants from his second term is to leave office with a clear liberal
conscience that he began his first term with; and all his foreign policies have
been designed to achieve this aim. He sought personal popularity, by not having
to make hard decisions that would make him unpopular. In his first term, he was
driven by the opportunity to serve a second term, which he succeeded in
achieving. Now he wants to make money
from his retirement, and he can only do this by turning his back on hard
decisions that may compromise his presidential achievements and undermine the
lucrative possibilities on the lecture circuit.
WITHOUT THE USA Dannatt's proposals for feet on the ground
will come to nothing. As he knows the UK and the whole of Western Europe have
needed America to defend their borders. The American taxpayer has subsidised
European military spending, which has allowed hundreds of thousands of armed
American servicemen to (in their own self-interest) defend Europe from
communism – but thankfully communism has now departed the stage.
The UK
and the rest of Europe have leached off the American taxpayer for far too long
regarding our defence (with very little appreciation for their efforts). It is
about time we in Europe came off American welfare and sought to defend
ourselves. All of Europe's military spending has been paired back, since the
end of the Cold War, because of the continents reliance on the American
taxpayer to continue to subsidies our defences. For instance, our own defence
spending would have had to triple if it were not for America, thus allowing us
to pour our billions into the NHS – something the American taxpayer does enjoy.
The
West will not even consider feet on the ground in Iraq or anywhere else, until
Obama signs out. Who comes next, I do not know; but Lord Dannatt is whistling
in the wind. The British public prefers wigs and false teeth to a strong
defence.
[1]
Yes, laugh if you will. But Western Europe, I fear will not take matters
seriously and use the brutality needed before it is too late to do so to save
itself.
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