David Cameron wanted to bomb Syria two years ago but suffered a humiliating defeat in a vote before Parliament. Let us be clear about one thing: if Cameron and others had got their way two years ago, the so-called Islamic State and a range of Jihadi groups would be in control of Syria today.
And if ‘control’ is too strong a word, it would be in as much chaos as Libya is today. The Libyan enterprise by NATO to overthrow Gaddafi was firmly backed by Cameron who used British Special Forces to train and guide Islamist rebels in attaining this objective.
After the chemical attack in Ghouta, a dubious event which was likely perpetrated by either Saudi or Turkish intelligence in order to provoke President Obama to make good on his ill-fated assertion about “red lines”, the idea was to bomb and ‘degrade’ the capabilities of the Assad government which the West and its Middle East Sunni allies were keen to blame.
Now Cameron wants to bomb Islamic State insurgents.
A few British fighter jets have been part of the patently phony war waged against Islamic State for over a year by the US and its Middle East allies. The Russian effort in two months has shown this to be the case.
Need it be reminded that it was Cameron who one day was supporting the Mubarak regime and then when it was toppled, visited the newly installed junta to sell it military weapons.
But it is not only about the hypocrisy of Cameron the man and politician. It is about the hypocrisy and double-dealing of the Western powers specifically in regard to Syria and generally to the Middle East and North Africa geo-political theatre.
The turmoil in Syria was the creation of the Western powers acting in concert with Turkey and the Sunni Gulf monarchies who seek to overthrow the secular government of Bashar al Assad. This is the bottom line reason why the Islamic State and other Jihadi groups have grown so powerful.
But after the tragedy of Paris, Cameron is confident that the United Kingdom’s public outrage along with the media’s whipping up of the drums of war will get him the Parliamentary rubber stamp to intervene in a conflict which according to former French foreign minister, Roland Dumas, was planned and orchestrated years in advance by British officials along with other Western powers.
Cameron’s motives are far from benign. They bear the vestiges of the ‘humanitarian bomber’ with an insidious agenda. He wants to be part of a campaign which would justify a British presence in Syria which along with French involvement would be utillised in a manner that would in the future attempt to effect the desired overthrow of Assad as well as the dismantling of the Syrian state.
The unquestioning media along with the gullible electorate are complicit in allowing leaders like Cameron to continually get away with such fundamental dishonesty.
Adeyinka Makinde is a writer based in London, England.
