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I'm against us bombing Syria on balance. I'm not sure it will have much effect for good or for ill expect to cost us some money, of which we are short, and to make us, rather than ISIS, directly and personally responsible for the death and maiming of civilians. So, given there is a certain financial cost and an uncertain moral cost but I can see it making little difference I'm against.
We are already bombing ISIS in Iraq. Many other people are already bombing ISIS in Syria. It's not clear to me that us spending my pension on additional jet fuel to join in in Syria will make that much difference in Syria or against ISIS. If it does, I'm not convinced that is a clear cut good thing.
The situation in Syria is very complicated. About the only thing that I'm clear on is that ISIL are utter bastards, anti-moral violent sociopathic ideologes who wish to export themselves at gun point and I'd more than happily kill as many of them as we can. This is a bit of an ususual position for me. I'm usually against extra-judicial capital punishment and against the death penalty at all and in favour, even in war, of the minimum necessary force. I'm making an exception for these people.
That said, I don't think killing them in large numbers will do much to improve the security of the UK or our friends, old or new, around the world. The Paris attacks used 9 people. ISIS has somewhere between 30,000 and 200,000 fighters. Assume perhaps that number again in sympathisers around the world who could be converted to active fighters if the conditions and the conditioning were right. So the numbers needed to attack a European city in a similar way to the Paris attacks is a very small proportion of ISIS available war-making capacity. As the US demonstrates on an almost daily basis one or two people who have taken themselves beyond morality and armed themselves with modest firearms are able to kill large numbers of people fairly easily. Bombing ISIS now won't, I think, prevent them having the resources to launch attacks in European cities over the coming ten or twenty years. Rather than bomb them to no effect we might as well put the time and effort in to removing the economic, ideological and political causes and basis for their support.
We find ourselves in a strategic trilemma. Perhaps a double layered one. Assuming we want a winner in the Syrian civil war we'd rather the Free Syrian Army and the Kurds won but the only think stopping Assad defeating them is that if he attacks them vigorously then he opens himself up to being beating in turn by ISIS. By bombing ISIS, if effective in damaging their conventional capabilty in Syria, we stop them pressuring Assad and the Free Syrian Army probably gets beaten and the Kurds beaten up. That assumes that we actually want the war to end with a clear winner. We may favour partition. We may favour a continuing war on the grounds that many of the states and non-state actors in the region seem keen on having a fight and we might as well contain that fight in Syria for 30-40 years until all the bastards and ideologes on all of the sides are dead. (In which case, we ought to be doing a much, much better job of finding new homes for the Syrians who are leaving. It's unfair to turn someone's living room into a boxing ring and then not offer somewhere else to go.)
So, by bombing ISIS we might indirectly help Assad beat the FSA and the Kurds. At meddling regional, global and super power level by bombing ISIS and helping Assad we might support a combination of outcomes that are not to our advantage or which are unhelpful to our allies or which lead in the medium term to a larger, wider, state on state conflict.
So, I'm not convinced that bombing ISIS in Syria will be effective in stopping them attacking us or effective in weakening their position in Syria and if effective in weaking their position in Syria I'm not sure this is an unalloyed good thing.
The causes of the conflict seem complicated. There are issues of democratic deficit. Issues of conflicting religious doctrine, both inter and intra faith, there are proxy considerations for neighbouring states who are concerned about the role Syria can play in bolstering their flanks or keeping their own internal political situation. There are issues of class conflict. There are issues of economics, trade, mercantilism and fundamentally, agricultural policy and water shortages.
(And I should add that my working model for what is happening in the Middle East is largely based on what happend in Europe during the 30 Years War. Which lasted decades and only really ended when all the various sides were dead. I am very sceptical that any diplomatic efforts will result in a lasting, binding peace. Too many people are looking for a fight in a context of too much bad faith and not enough money for any peace to hold. That's my guess.)
I tend to favour my brother's view that one of the most effective ways of preventing conflicts like the one in Syria is to give the citizens of those countries access to all the material goodies and opportunities for betterment that we in the West enjoy. Coca Cola and jeans, clean water and clean energy will cure more ills than our bombs can address. This requires us to give them access to our markets as a buyer and a seller, allow their young people to move here with relative freedom. Support their institutions in becoming as robust and transparent and governed by the rule of law as our own aspire to be. There is also a salutory lesson that if we in the West forget that our own security is built on a model of shared prosperity, freedom and opportunity we will create our own versions of ISIS and our own civil wars. Our polities are not exceptional except that we have done the right thing, more or less, for the last 200 years and we would be well advised to keep doing the right things.
Maybe bombing will help. I think not but it might. As I say, the situation is complex and deep. Weighing an uncertain outcome if we act and uncertain outcome if we don't act I'm for not acting. Evidence suggests that similar behaviour in the past has not helped either them or us. Evidence suggests that jet fuel and bombs cost money that we claim not to have. For me to support more bombing I'd need to be persuaded that either (and probably both) it would lead to a more or less certain improvement in the situtation in the short term and / or was part of a coherent plan to stabilise the region which even if not fully successful at least failed in a way that made things better. I'm not convinced of those things - so I weigh the certain cost of money spent on jetfuel and bombs that could be spent on my children's schools or my sister's health care and the uncertainty of any good coming of us intervening and I'm against us bombing Syria.
We are already bombing ISIS in Iraq. Many other people are already bombing ISIS in Syria. It's not clear to me that us spending my pension on additional jet fuel to join in in Syria will make that much difference in Syria or against ISIS. If it does, I'm not convinced that is a clear cut good thing.
The situation in Syria is very complicated. About the only thing that I'm clear on is that ISIL are utter bastards, anti-moral violent sociopathic ideologes who wish to export themselves at gun point and I'd more than happily kill as many of them as we can. This is a bit of an ususual position for me. I'm usually against extra-judicial capital punishment and against the death penalty at all and in favour, even in war, of the minimum necessary force. I'm making an exception for these people.
That said, I don't think killing them in large numbers will do much to improve the security of the UK or our friends, old or new, around the world. The Paris attacks used 9 people. ISIS has somewhere between 30,000 and 200,000 fighters. Assume perhaps that number again in sympathisers around the world who could be converted to active fighters if the conditions and the conditioning were right. So the numbers needed to attack a European city in a similar way to the Paris attacks is a very small proportion of ISIS available war-making capacity. As the US demonstrates on an almost daily basis one or two people who have taken themselves beyond morality and armed themselves with modest firearms are able to kill large numbers of people fairly easily. Bombing ISIS now won't, I think, prevent them having the resources to launch attacks in European cities over the coming ten or twenty years. Rather than bomb them to no effect we might as well put the time and effort in to removing the economic, ideological and political causes and basis for their support.
We find ourselves in a strategic trilemma. Perhaps a double layered one. Assuming we want a winner in the Syrian civil war we'd rather the Free Syrian Army and the Kurds won but the only think stopping Assad defeating them is that if he attacks them vigorously then he opens himself up to being beating in turn by ISIS. By bombing ISIS, if effective in damaging their conventional capabilty in Syria, we stop them pressuring Assad and the Free Syrian Army probably gets beaten and the Kurds beaten up. That assumes that we actually want the war to end with a clear winner. We may favour partition. We may favour a continuing war on the grounds that many of the states and non-state actors in the region seem keen on having a fight and we might as well contain that fight in Syria for 30-40 years until all the bastards and ideologes on all of the sides are dead. (In which case, we ought to be doing a much, much better job of finding new homes for the Syrians who are leaving. It's unfair to turn someone's living room into a boxing ring and then not offer somewhere else to go.)
So, by bombing ISIS we might indirectly help Assad beat the FSA and the Kurds. At meddling regional, global and super power level by bombing ISIS and helping Assad we might support a combination of outcomes that are not to our advantage or which are unhelpful to our allies or which lead in the medium term to a larger, wider, state on state conflict.
So, I'm not convinced that bombing ISIS in Syria will be effective in stopping them attacking us or effective in weakening their position in Syria and if effective in weaking their position in Syria I'm not sure this is an unalloyed good thing.
The causes of the conflict seem complicated. There are issues of democratic deficit. Issues of conflicting religious doctrine, both inter and intra faith, there are proxy considerations for neighbouring states who are concerned about the role Syria can play in bolstering their flanks or keeping their own internal political situation. There are issues of class conflict. There are issues of economics, trade, mercantilism and fundamentally, agricultural policy and water shortages.
(And I should add that my working model for what is happening in the Middle East is largely based on what happend in Europe during the 30 Years War. Which lasted decades and only really ended when all the various sides were dead. I am very sceptical that any diplomatic efforts will result in a lasting, binding peace. Too many people are looking for a fight in a context of too much bad faith and not enough money for any peace to hold. That's my guess.)
I tend to favour my brother's view that one of the most effective ways of preventing conflicts like the one in Syria is to give the citizens of those countries access to all the material goodies and opportunities for betterment that we in the West enjoy. Coca Cola and jeans, clean water and clean energy will cure more ills than our bombs can address. This requires us to give them access to our markets as a buyer and a seller, allow their young people to move here with relative freedom. Support their institutions in becoming as robust and transparent and governed by the rule of law as our own aspire to be. There is also a salutory lesson that if we in the West forget that our own security is built on a model of shared prosperity, freedom and opportunity we will create our own versions of ISIS and our own civil wars. Our polities are not exceptional except that we have done the right thing, more or less, for the last 200 years and we would be well advised to keep doing the right things.
Maybe bombing will help. I think not but it might. As I say, the situation is complex and deep. Weighing an uncertain outcome if we act and uncertain outcome if we don't act I'm for not acting. Evidence suggests that similar behaviour in the past has not helped either them or us. Evidence suggests that jet fuel and bombs cost money that we claim not to have. For me to support more bombing I'd need to be persuaded that either (and probably both) it would lead to a more or less certain improvement in the situtation in the short term and / or was part of a coherent plan to stabilise the region which even if not fully successful at least failed in a way that made things better. I'm not convinced of those things - so I weigh the certain cost of money spent on jetfuel and bombs that could be spent on my children's schools or my sister's health care and the uncertainty of any good coming of us intervening and I'm against us bombing Syria.
