IMAN Chairman welcomes Lord Ashdown remarks on situation in Middle East
Domingo, 15 Junio 2014
The Rt. Hon. Lord Ashdown
Sky News interview between The Rt. Hon. Lord Ashdown and Dermot Murnaghan on the Iraq crisis
15th JUNE 2014
DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Let’s talk to a former Lib Dem leader, Paddy Ashdown, good to talk to you. So let’s take that head on, so Mr Blair, it’s not boots on the ground he said but he is still firmly interventionist, is he right to be?
LORD ASHDOWN: I’m firmly interventionist because I believe unless we are prepared to intervene internationally to preserve the wider peace when it’s threatened, the world will be a much more turbulent place but I don’t believe it’s right in these circumstances in the way that Tony suggests. I mean there are other ways you can do it and we might come on to talking about that. Look, I’m sorry Dermot, I’m having a bit of a difficulty getting my mind round the idea that a problem that has been caused or made worse by killing many, many Arab Muslims in the Middle East is now going to be made better by killing more with Western weapons. I just don’t think that’s the solution. Look, let me go back I think it’s a couple of years actually or thereabouts, we were talking about Syria and I was talking on your programme and I was saying the problem is not Syria, please don’t get distracted, the problem is that we are at the beginning of a widening Sunni/Shia religious sectarian conflict that is going to be spreading across the entire Middle East, it will go to Iraq, it will go to Egypt, it will go to Libya, it will go to Mali and that’s exactly what’s happened. This is more about the preparations, funded by the way by our so-called friends in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, to capture and unify the Sunni community, the Sunni umma, for a Jihadist cause in preparation for a widening Shia war and unless we understand that and unless we understand also, Dermot, that we have pretty limited means to influence the progress of that, then I think we are going to get every calculation wrong. I mean let me put it to you pretty straightforward, personally I think ISIS has over-extended themselves, the next thing I think you’re going to see is ISIS being beaten back in some form or another but that does not alter the reality that in all probability what you are seeing now is the wholesale rewriting of the borders established in the Sykes-Picot Agreement and set in the Versailles Conference of 1918 of the whole Middle East in favour of a new complex of borders which reflect sectarian differences between Sunni and Shia and that’s the danger. If that is the prelude, and I think it is, to a widening regional war – actually we think we are the targets because we always do but I think actually we may get drawn into this in some form or another but I think the targets are now not the great Satan of the West but the great heretic in Teheran. My final point here before we talk about what should be done is this, we need also to recognise that the Russians have a concern about this and a very legitimate one because what they are seeing in those Islamic republics of Dagestan, Chechnya threatening the cohesion of the Russian Federation is exactly the same radicalisation of the Sunni community and the real danger of this, unless we are very careful, is that we are drawn in on one side, on the side of the Sunnis, and Russia is drawn in on the other. Then you have a regional war with the great powers engaged. Now I don’t say we are there yet but that at all costs is what we must avoid.
DM: So you are firmly interventionist you say, you agree with Mr Blair on that, you disagree strongly on killing more Muslims even presumably if they are Al Qaeda supporters?
LORD ASHDOWN: ISIS is far worse than Al Qaeda, ISIS makes Al Qaeda look like a vicarage tea party but the question isn’t what can you do, the question is what can you do to make this better? So when you talk about intervention, remember you are also talking about diplomatic intervention. Let me take you back, and this is maybe a slightly off-centre thought to start with but during the 19th century Britain was faced with tremendous turmoil and wars in Europe. We always followed a policy that played to the balance, Britain would always act so if Paris got together with Bonn or Berlin, we got together with Rome and Vienna to create the balance. Now I have a suspicion that diplomacy has a role to play here and that diplomacy is to ask ourselves in real terms whether our true allies here are the unreformed Saudi Arabian monarchy and the Qatari monarchy that is funding these extremist movements or whether reformist Iran isn’t somebody we should be playing, so I think we could diplomatically always try to make sure we played to the balance. The big thing we mustn’t do, and this is the danger of getting involved with bombs and guns again, is for us to be instrumentalised on the side of the Sunni and then for the Russians to be instrumentalised on the other side. I think there is much more diplomacy to play here than there is straightforward military intervention with guns and aircraft and air support and so on. I think that is clumsy and I think it will exacerbate the situation in all probably rather than improve it. So a little more subtle diplomacy here might be quite helpful.
DM: So you’ve delved way further back in history but let’s just go back to 2003, Mr Blair says debating what happened in 2003 in Iraq is an irrelevance because he fast forwards to 2011 and the Arab Spring and he says that would have done for Saddam anyway, there would have been huge instability.
LORD ASHDOWN: Well the what would have happened if’s of history, who knows? Mr Blair will not be the first politician who has tried an act of self-justification. The idea that you can translate this highly complex thing into utterly predictable circumstances that would have happened in Iraq at the time of the Arab Spring I think is a little far-fetched to be honest. I’m much more interested in what happens next and how we got here, if you have a highly difficult case to argue to be very honest, but if you say the intervention in Iraq has nothing to do with us I don't think you can cogently argue that what happened afterwards, our stupidity in stripping out the instruments of the Iraq state, of closing down the army, of giving it less capacity of being able to run itself because we thought we could do it better, there cannot be any doubt that the chaos that ISIS and the extremist movements are making use of, was a function of those stupidities but let’s deal with what happens next. Dermot, just let me say this to you, we obviously have a threat that will come out of this as it gets worse, home grown Jihadis fighting in Syria, fighting in Iraq will be a threat to our internal cohesion but I have to say a threat which is far, far, far less than a regional war based on Islamic differences, similar to the 30 Years regional wars in Europe which went for 30 years into which the great powers are drawn and the moment we see this simply as an Iraqi problem rather than as a wider problem and understand the connections, not least with Russia, for as long as we do that we’ll go on miscalculating what ought to be done. It’s a time I think for much more thought about what we play and I ask again, is it really the case that our allies in this are the unreformed Saudi and Qatari governments who have funded this or should we be thinking about a more appropriate relationship with Shi’ite Iran who seems to be under President Rouhani on a reformist path. That’s the way we should think and if we think that way I think we can bring about a better construct which will lead to balance rather than one which will lead to constant warfare.
DM: Those are considered, subtly and as you say, lengthy approaches but in the short term as President Obama ponders his options as he said, and he’s moved an aircraft carrier into the region, if there are to be air strikes, drones, aircraft on that carrier and others, should Britain stay well out of it?
LORD ASHDOWN: I just don’t think they would be very wise in the present circumstances. What would you do by using that? Of course you want to use all the instruments you can, very often the movement of an aircraft carrier is more about sending a political message than a military one but I return to this thought, I cannot see a problem which at the very least has been made worse by using Western guns and bombs to kill hundreds of Arab Muslims is about to be made better by using more Western guns and bombs to kill hundreds of Arab Muslims, I think there’s a different way round this. Can we prop up the Malaki regime? I wonder whether it’s possible to prop up the Malaki regime given how dysfunctional it is. I think there is a much bigger role to play, for us to use Teheran as a mechanism to try and stabilise the Shi’ite side, to ensure that we don’t get drawn into this on one side or another and therefore Russia isn’t either, that we play these diplomatic cards which in my view have a greater chance of success in the long term than any further strong and dramatic military action using Western forces will have in the short term.
DM: Last thought, Paddy Ashdown, on domestic politics, the Lib Dems role and as we approach that general election I know you are playing a key role in planning for that with the Lib Dems and we’re going to hear more about the manifesto a bit later this week. After the rows we’ve had between the Lib Dems and their coalition partners about education and things like that, aren’t we reaching the point at which in effect you are going to detach, say come the party conferences in the autumn there, that that’s it, you are going to go your own way and become really distinctive?
LORD ASHDOWN: No. If the question you are asking is will the coalition break up, then no. The coalition will last right through the polling day, that’s when governments last until and in 2015 if we are to be judged by our actions in government and I hope we will be in the context of the next election, then we are judged by our actions in government until it finishes which is polling day. Will both sides maintain the utter cohesion about the heart of the coalition which is about economic recovery from the appalling mess this country was left in largely but not exclusively because of the failures of Labour economic policy, that heart of the coalition must stay intact, will stay intact. Will both parties as the election comes on the outer rings of their co-operation beyond that core economic core, will they seek to begin to foreshadow their manifesto, show their distinctions? Of course they will but the coalition is not at risk, will not be at risk, will last until polling day and as a result of it I think this country is now looking forward to an economic period of growth and jobs growth of which both parts of the coalition can feel proud and can take to the British electorate saying this is what we’ve done for you and we’re proud of it, please vote for us.
DM: The question wasn’t really about whether the coalition would continue to exist but will it co-exist like a soon to be divorced couple living in the same house?
LORD ASHDOWN: Well I think all of those analogies about divorce and marriage have always been wrong so I don’t intend to get involved in them now. Will both sides, Dermot, to answer your question straightforwardly, will they move in directions outside the heart of the coalition which is about economic policy which shows greater distinctiveness, will the Tories do that? Yes. Will the Liberal Democrats do that? Yes. Will that threaten the working relationship of arguably the most successful coalition that has existed in Europe for the best part of fifty years? Answer, no.
DM: Paddy Ashdown, always a joy and a joy to witness that magnificent garden, thank you very much indeed.
Responding to the interview, Chairman of the Iman Foundation, Ribal Al-Assad said:
"I welcome the view expressed by Lord Ashdown on the current crisis in Syria, Iraq and the Middle East, diplomatic intervention is imperative if we are to avert a major regional sectarian conflict.
Lord Ashdown is absolutely right when he states that more guns will not help restore peace, the only avenue is a dialogue driven approach with all those who have a genuine belief in freedom and democracy.
There is absolutely no place for extremism at the table - groups like ISIS and all those who share their narrow and perverted ideology have no role in modern society.
Let us learn from the mistakes of the past, only then can we achieve a lasting peace in the Middle East."
