I will be supporting the motion today. We are right to demand a coherent and effective strategy but on the bigger issue of whether to act at all, the question I ask is this: if we are not prepared to take on monsters such as these when they threaten our citizens, our interests and our entire value system, and if we accept that there can be no accommodation with them at all, when exactly would be prepared to act? I respect the Prime Minister for being clear today that this campaign may last several years. We must authorise action in the knowledge of the lives, military and civilian, that may be lost. But it is right that we strike now, at a time when extremists have made great advances but do not yet have the secure foothold in the region that they need. They control Iraq’s second city but not yet the full apparatus of statehood.
We should recognise the legacy of the botched vote on Syria last year. I know that there are different views on this. But for my part, the failure of US and UK resolve did not magically trigger this chemical weapon breakthrough, as some suggest; it emboldened extremists by showing them that the bar for action against their terror was that much higher.
We must dispel confusion about the forces fighting in Syria. It is demeaning and wrong to hear people say that last year, we were being asked to intervene on the side of ISIL. The moderate democratic Syrian opposition coalition were desperate for help in their two-fronted battle against a murderous dictator on one side, and the evil jihadis on the other. They are now beaten back but they are not cowed, and their forces will play an important part in degrading ISIL within Syria—if we can give them support through air strikes.
It is time for all sides in this debate to match laudable rhetoric with commitment. If we believe that the world must pursue ISIL until it is defeated; if we accept the legal case; if we support the action of other nations operating in the country; and if we think it morally wrong, as has been powerfully expressed today, for us to sit on the sidelines while others confront this evil, we must state our ambition now to put forward a strategy for action inside Syria too.
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