For the Syrians’ sakes and for our own, we must not intervene
by OWEN JONES
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Whatever the truth behind this unforgivable crime, the likelihood of some form of Western intervention is greater than ever, as David Cameron, Barack Obama and France’s foreign minister Laurent Fabius have made clear. The Cruise Missile Liberals, who casually call for other people’s children to fight their wars and for bombs to fall on the heads of those they will never meet, are beginning to cry for military action. It is perplexing indeed: these are the sorts of people who generally favour bombs to be dropped on the sorts of Islamist fighters taking on Assad’s forces. But it is a perfectly human response to look at toddlers in bodybags and want to do something. No dictatorship is a legitimate form of government – it is a gang of thugs whose violence begins with depriving the people of the right to choose who rules them.
But Western intervention would surely be disastrous. When protesters first took to the streets of Damascus, they were heavily secular and democracy-orientated. There are still such elements, such as the Syrian Democratic People’s Party. But rebel forces have become increasingly taken over by Islamic fundamentalists, bolstered by prestige in their courageous fighting and aid from wealthy Gulf elites. It is the region’s Western-backed fundamentalist monarchies such as Saudi Arabia who have armed the rebels. Remember Abu Sakkar, the rebel commander filmed cutting out and apparently eating the heart of a government soldier while ranting against Syria’s Alawite minority? His forces, the Farouq Brigades, are actually among some of the more moderate Islamist groupings.
There are now two powerful al-Qa’ida groupings operating. One is Jabhat al-Nusra, originally a spin-off from al-Qa’ida in Iraq, a resurgent movement responsible for some of the worst atrocities in the neighbouring country’s sectarian bloodbath. It took the first provincial capital, the city of Raqqa, earlier this year, giving it huge sway in the country’s north-east. It swiftly imposed strict Islamist laws, intimidating women and smashing up shops selling alcohol. Then there is ISIS, an even more zealous al-Qa’ida formation that has fired on secular protesters and harassed the civilian population of Aleppo. A “civil war within a civil war” beckons: members of the Farouq Brigades have spoken of a second revolution against al-Qa’ida if Assad falls, and Free Syrian Army Military Council member Kamal Hamami was allegedly killed in July by such elements. No wonder many of the secular Syrian activists who first took the streets now fear the revolution has been hijacked, and even fear the fall of Assad.
There is a frightening precedent. In the 1980s, Western arms to Afghan jihadis were funnelled by the Pakistani secret services to the most radical groups. When the Soviet-backed Afghan regime fell in 1992, the victorious rebel groups collapsed into internecine conflict, reducing Kabul to rubble and leading many to welcome the Taliban as restorers of order.
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