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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » If Mrs May does back military strikes against Syria it will be in the face of public opinion
There is no doubt that this is going to be a tricky one for the prime minister. After gathering of the consensus of nations in relation to the Salisbury attack she’s now in a position where there’s an expectation that Britain could support action against Syria particularly because of the use of chemical weapons.
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Call it backside covering.
Nothing else and no regime change
Riiiiight
It's also why there's no benefit to parliament being brought in. It would just be a chance for lots of grandstanding for or against, then maybe a lost vote, with no political or public gain from having done so even if the vote were to succeed. I don't think it would cover her backside like Sandy says - we don't give other PMs a pass even if they had parliamentary backing for actions, if it turns out bad.
And then at the end of it any escalation is likely to be small.
WiFi cards in new pc's replaced and all is well with the world. :-)
https://twitter.com/ShellyAsquith/status/984420240690950144
I don't doubt this will trigger off the usual sneering, but I'm neither very young nor very left wing. And yet I find the guy strangely likeable. Something's going on that I don't understand, and it might be something good.
May needs to lead the nation.
Wales labour response 'fantasy economics'
https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/984523184916582405
"fantasy economics"
what a bunch of clowns to left and right
As I said earlier this cannot be about morality because we already crossed that particular moral line decades ago when we helped our chosen son in the Middle East to use chemical weapons against his neighbours.
Bravo
I certainly don't - haven't learned a thing since 1998, it just gets in the way.
I’m not sure there’s anything particularly unique about it. There have been many leaders like Corbyn in history who inspired just as much fervour, before they took power.
I think the idea that no-one should ever use chemical and biological weapons (yet alone again) is rather a good one. Do you disagree?
I don't quite see how refusing to make a personal statement would help him avoid letting the government off the hook.
Even accepting a smidgeon of a point that he does often face a hostile media, bits of it at any rate, one thing that I don't get about the most intense of Corbyn fans (I don't know if Osamor is one of those in fairness) is that his ability to communicate is meant to be one of his strengths, but he seems to get in a great big muddle and need spokesmen to clarify what he actually meant a lot. That is, he apparently communicates what he means very poorly. Not that Osamor is making a point any better.
(My being a poor communicator is different; I'm an amateur, while Corbyn is a decades long professional politician,albeit of a different stripe than some recent examples)
This got to such a pass that his press officer was reduced to pleading 'Don't quote what he says, quote what he means.'
The Republicans blamed their huge defeat on a hostile media. They were very reluctant to admit a large part of the problem was that they had picked a candidate who really did say what he meant - and that was a load of nonsense.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/04/12/leaked-eu-files-show-brussels-cover-up-collusion-putins-gazprom/
Its a lot less personal than people imagine, its about policy.
There is absolutely no upside to what you are proposing and it certainly won't stop either Assad or anyone else using Chemical Weapons in the future. What matters here is that Assad is sheltered by the Russians and the Iranians. As long as he has their support there is nothing we can do short of full scale invasion that will cause him any military grief.
Sometimes we have to accept that situations are beyond our control. This is our Kobayashi Maru moment.
Does 'half-hearted hawkishness', mean there is a 'half-hearted hawk'?
That must be a very rare and peculiar bird; I wouldn't let @MarqueeMark know about its existence, or he'll probably go chasing it down with his binoculars ...
Even the MPs who so decisively rejected him before seem to have been totally quiet (and therefore content) on his domestic policies, and its only been foreign issues and anti-semitism which caused ructions (which seem to have passed) for him, so the Corbyn fans who are so passionate because they fear the left being pushed back into a corner really don't have a reason to be fearful I should think. If Corbyn should fall outside of an election for some reason, the MPs are already signed up to his programme and the members will surely back a lefty candidate now.
I've yet to see a compelling argument that anything we are ready to do as a nation or collectively via NATO will come anywhere near the goal of preventing Assad and other rogue nations from using chemical weapons.
The era of the British and American public being willing to spend blood and treasure to defend civilians in the Middle East is well past. The polling above supports that view as well.
"and it certainly won't stop either Assad or anyone else using Chemical Weapons in the future."
I disagree. And neither will your apparent preferred solution of ignoring when treaties prohibiting their use are broken, which will render those same treaties worthless. In fact, I think it's obvious that'll make the situation and world security much worse.
Anyway, I've got to get up early in the morning to go for a walk. Have a nice night everyone.
The only way Assad will stop using chemical weapons is if he completely wins or completely loses. What you propose will not result in either of those scenarios.
I have been a great defender of the power of parliament, but I get wary at people ascribing to it power that is not necessarily theirs as a 'must' action. I would find such a demand more compelling if it was definitively stated as establishing a new convention, based on recent examples, rather than acting as though the government are acting in an entirely improper way for not following a non-existing requirement, even if creating a new convention would indeed be a good idea.
He did what Thatcher never had the balls to do and privatise the Royal Mail.
Plus Sir Vince is the expert about WMD, he's possessed a nuclear weapon since 2010.
We did nothing in 2013, and we've ended up having a chemical weapon attack on our own soil. Perhaps Richard is right and acting in 2013 would have made things worse - or perhaps he is wrong.
But what is also obvious is that doing nothing also carries risks, just as it proved to in 2013 with the continued attacks in Syria and the spread of the war. If you advocate doing nothing, then you should at least be willing to accept the risks that will come from that decision.
Or, preferably, offer an alternative. Please, please do, for I'm finding it blooming well difficult to think of any workable ones.
As you say there are no good answers, and you have helped me to gain some understanding of the issues involved.
Thank you.
I admire your knowledge of Assad's mindset. An answer to that is that hes not mad, and he'll do what's best for him. And if not using them is best, he won't use them. Then there are the Iranians and Russians who are propping up his regime. If they tell him not to use them on pain of being replaced by someone more malleable, he make damned sure they can't be used.
Anyway, I really must be off to bed. Good night.
If, as the trend seems to be, that it becomes convention parliament is consulted on such things, then I am not intrinsically opposed to that. But nor do I see that there is actually any political or public benefit to May consulting them here. If everything goes super great and it is even meaningful, she's get the same response whether parliament is consulted or not, and she won't get any cover from consulting them if it should not achieve anything or be a disaster.
So it boils down to whether such action as is agreed is in any way a good idea, regardless of whether parliament would agree or not.
I can disagree with the likes of Eddie spheroid or James purnell at the best way forward, but they ain't thick.
Ultimately this is a Middle East problem and it needs to be solved locally.
I think the question that needs to be answered is "what will firing a few cruise missiles into Syria actually achieve", you and I both know the answer is "bugger all". That being the case, the follow up question is "what would it take achieve a lasting victory or at least preventing the use of chemical weapons" and the answer to that is quarter of a million NATO troops on the ground, billions of pounds and 15-20 years worth of our blood being spilled.
I don't foresee any circumstance where Parliament or the public would support such a strategy. I certainly wouldn't.
There is, however, a New Zealand bird that rejoices in the name of the Rough-faced Shag.
How about a new Solvite commercial where we stick both of them on the front of a cruise missile.
Some of May’s officials think that quitting the customs union in order to win the power to strike free trade agreements with countries such as the U.S. or Australia is not as desirable as passionate Brexit supporters believe.
Such trade deals with third countries can take a long time to negotiate and end up mired in litigation, while measures short of formal FTAs can still deliver significant benefits, one person said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the discussions are private.
Added to this, the growing view in May’s office is that, after a narrow referendum result and a close general election, she has no mandate for an extreme Brexit, according to an official.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-11/may-s-brexit-red-line-on-customs-union-could-be-next-to-go
https://dashboard.securingdemocracy.org
And so ends the Hunt as leader speculation?
https://www.thedailybeast.com/russian-trolls-denied-syrian-gas-attackbefore-it-happened?ref=home
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2018/apr/12/bbc-to-air-reading-of-enoch-powells-rivers-of-blood-speech
The Tory Party literally now has a black MP with the surname 'Bad Enoch'
Says right there - critique it.
Isn't this just the 'we cannot trust the public to hear terrible things, because they are all racists waiting to happen' argument we got when Nick Griffin was on QT?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87SNuJU2cl4
Vanessa Beeley, who I have met, has done tireless work on the ground in Syria, and has been there in the past week, unlike many mainstream media reporters who do their reporting on Syria from Beirut.....so how would they have prime source evidence of yet another alleged chemical weapons attack? Why would it be in the interests of the Assad regime to launch a chemical weapons attack when they're winning the war?
I personally would put a million times more trust in Vanessa's account of events in Syria. Once again the old adage applies - follow the money. Another great article by Martin Armstrong today on why tragically the West needs war:
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/war/war-is-coming-because-we-need-it/
We've been here in history before. With the idiots that we have in charge of things right now, they seem destined to repeat the same mistakes that have been made throughout history. Many people should be asking why is the UK government supporting this vile abuse going on in Syria?
And I quote from the following article:
"The White Helmets, the Free Syrian Police, the Local Councils in terrorist held areas of Syria – are all being financed, promoted, equipped and supported by the UK FCO in its campaign to undermine the Syrian state, its people & its leadership. Money that is taken under false pretences through taxation is almost certainly funding terrorism that has undergone various branding, and rebranding schemes in order to conceal this nefarious activity.
Questions must not only be asked, they must be answered, and a full investigation into what has been “done in our name” should be demanded, so we may stem the flow of cash-for-terror into Syria, before we too, are implicated in the criminal, rogue-state foreign policy of our morally bankrupt government and its allies in the imperialist War Bloc."
http://21stcenturywire.com/2017/12/02/white-helmets-local-councils-uk-fco-financing-terrorism-syria-taxpayer-funds/
And to think that the government has stooped so low that it says it doesn't require Commons backing for action in Syria. It is utterly obscene what this government is doing with regards to Syria right now.
Instead it is now being built up into some massive test case and could end up being extremely expensive.
One US outlet reports a target scope of around 8 locations, some of which are probably empty of anything useful. Thats unlikely to put a dent in Assad regime's interest in using chemical weapons.
Either these different but consistent reports proves 100% or someone is in for a very rude shock.
Is Assad pro or anti Corbyn?