Debate on the Address

The strategy is to go when our job is done. That job is important because if we end up in a situation where we allow those people—the same elements that are fuelling extremism right around the region—to have victory, through terrorism, in Iraq or Afghanistan it is not just a tragedy for those two countries but a tragedy for the security of the world, including this country. September 11 came out of Afghanistan, exactly the same elements that are in Iraq today fuelling the terrorism—[Interruption.] I have to educate the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond). Al-Qaeda is in Iraq, carrying out suicide missions and I believe that our task is to stand up to those terrorists—not, as he would, give in to them. I also, incidentally, fully agree with what the right hon. Member for Witney said about the wider middle east, and of course it is important that we take that seriously.