In These New Times

Cailean Bochanan

25th August, 2013

William Hague seems to be quite sure that the Syrian government is responsible for the chemical weapons attack last week. Presumably, he arrived at this conclusion through a process of elimination: it couldn’t possibly have been carried out by Al Qaida, alleged perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks. Oh no! They couldn’t have done a thing like that!

And so, completely ignoring the cautious press release by the UN, our intrepid foreign minister points the finger at Assad. Of course, any half-sane observer of the unfolding events in Syria would naturally tend to dismiss such wild accusations and would recoil in horror before the dangers of such reckless diplomacy. Does Hague want WW3?

The arrogance of our government stems largely from their assumption of leadership of the international community. Which international community would that be? Not, of course, Russia nor China nor India and the rest of the BRICS, nor of course, now, Egypt nor Saudi Arabia, hitherto a trusty ally, nor Iran nor Iraq nor Algeria nor the Global South in general nor Germany nor much of Europe. The international community for which we are the self-proclaimed spokesman seems to consist of a particular axis centred around Britain, France and Turkey who happen to be countries who staked all on the demand “Assad must go!” And now they are up in arms against his latest and greatest crime: he has successfully defended his country against a conspiracy to destroy it and, consequently, will not be going anywhere.

I haven’t included the USA in the above axis and that may appear to be a rather startling omission. Well, politics isn’t an exact science and perhaps Obama, after his policy shift away from the Muslim Brotherhood following the Benghazi attack last year, has decided to change policy back again. In doing so he would be burning his bridges to the real international community in favour of an alliance of questionable value with three one-time great powers. He would be entering into a direct confrontation with Russia. He would be risking a nuclear war given that he would likely lose any conventional war due to the superiority of Russian missile systems. He would guarantee the collapse of the US economy without hope of mitigation from partnerships with Russia, China and others. He has no popular support whatever for a war and the military clearly oppose any such reckless adventurism.

Hague must know that he needs the US on board and will try to pressure Obama by trying to crystalize a war party around the likes of McCain. Obama should realize that he doesn’t need an alliance with these senile political forces and that their adventurism is merely the madness the gods visit on those who are doomed