Browse content similar to 28/11/2015. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Hello and welcome to Dateline London. | :00:28. | :00:29. | |
Britain's decision on whether to bomb in Syria, after Turkey | :00:30. | :00:31. | |
is Britain's Leader of the Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, | :00:32. | :00:34. | |
capable of leading his own Labour Party in parliament? | :00:35. | :00:36. | |
TaMichael Goldfarb of Politico Europe, Stephanie Baker of Bloomberg | :00:37. | :00:43. | |
News, Amir Taheri, who is an Iranian writer, and | :00:44. | :00:46. | |
There is no more difficult or important decision for a politician | :00:47. | :00:53. | |
than that which puts human lives in danger by going to war. | :00:54. | :00:57. | |
David Cameron tried in 2013 to encourage British Members | :00:58. | :01:01. | |
of Parliament to vote to bomb Syria, meaning the forces of | :01:02. | :01:04. | |
Now he is trying to bomb Syria again, but this time the target is | :01:05. | :01:09. | |
What would success look like in this enterprise? | :01:10. | :01:19. | |
In the case for British military intervention? | :01:20. | :01:26. | |
No, because he did not answer one of the questions that you just posed. | :01:27. | :01:31. | |
He did not really clarify what happens after the bombing. He is in | :01:32. | :01:36. | |
the position where he accepts that the bombing himself will not remove | :01:37. | :01:43. | |
Isis, whatever remove precisely means, that growing troops will be | :01:44. | :01:48. | |
involved, and he leaps from what he regards as the legitimate case for | :01:49. | :01:56. | |
bombing to the installation of a moderate Syrian government who would | :01:57. | :02:01. | |
provide the boots on the ground. The explanation of how we get from a to | :02:02. | :02:06. | |
B is more vague than anything Tony Blair said in advance of the war in | :02:07. | :02:10. | |
Iraq. It makes his objective seem clear compared to this. You point to | :02:11. | :02:17. | |
the other incoherent element of all this, to three years ago he wanted | :02:18. | :02:22. | |
to bomb targets associated with President Assad. Now he wants to | :02:23. | :02:28. | |
bomb one of Assad's internal enemies in presumably short-term alliance | :02:29. | :02:34. | |
with Britain and Assad, before trying to remove Assad. The whole | :02:35. | :02:40. | |
thing is a complete mess. Could you see that bombing Islamic State is | :02:41. | :02:43. | |
not the same as intervening in Libya or Iraq which was a decapitation | :02:44. | :02:49. | |
strategy to change the regime. These are bad people who do bad things, | :02:50. | :02:55. | |
and they are a threat to us. Yes, who would disagree with that? Or | :02:56. | :03:00. | |
that Saddam was a deeply awful tyrant in Iraq? But that is the easy | :03:01. | :03:06. | |
bit, agreeing on that. How you deal with them is nightmarishly | :03:07. | :03:12. | |
complicated. All we can say so far is the evidence of these Western | :03:13. | :03:17. | |
interventions of various forms, including the latest bombing, the | :03:18. | :03:24. | |
situation in the region worsens, the global threat seems to worsen. You | :03:25. | :03:30. | |
will ask what we should be doing, and, I haven't got an answer. The | :03:31. | :03:36. | |
evidence suggests that what is happening is not working and that | :03:37. | :03:38. | |
this bombing strategy has not been thought through beyond France seem | :03:39. | :03:45. | |
to Britain, join in, and David Cameron saying, I think we should. | :03:46. | :03:51. | |
The first time, a quick question, how big a force is he talking | :03:52. | :03:59. | |
about? Very small. We could save police action against a group of | :04:00. | :04:03. | |
criminal thugs rather than war. One of the things, a quick aside, there | :04:04. | :04:07. | |
is this talk of war like when we went into Iraq with divisions, this | :04:08. | :04:14. | |
is not what we're talking about. Plus the UK is already involved in | :04:15. | :04:23. | |
aiding in Iraq. I was in Kurdish Iraq in September and spoke to a | :04:24. | :04:29. | |
translator on the front line. He is a kid who lives in Middlesbrough but | :04:30. | :04:33. | |
speaks Kurdish as well as English so he was working. It is not the same | :04:34. | :04:38. | |
thing. The big problem, nobody has figured out how to cut this, there | :04:39. | :04:48. | |
is a timeline here. I do not see how advocating coming in on the side of | :04:49. | :04:52. | |
the free Syrian Army three years ago and the bombing now in what seems to | :04:53. | :05:00. | |
be in support of the Assad regime, it does not bother me in particular | :05:01. | :05:04. | |
because you have to realise that the whole country is a complete mess, | :05:05. | :05:10. | |
and I think you have to take a series of short-term decisions. The | :05:11. | :05:15. | |
deeper question is, how long do you allow Isis to carry on? And do you | :05:16. | :05:19. | |
need to find a solution to the Assad problem before you get into a heavy | :05:20. | :05:27. | |
military situation? Project loggerheads with our allies in | :05:28. | :05:30. | |
struggle, it would seem, that is the Russians. More importantly, it puts | :05:31. | :05:37. | |
us in conflict with the Turks, because one effective force against | :05:38. | :05:43. | |
Assad, one thing we can say, if you press back on Isis, whatever you | :05:44. | :05:48. | |
want to call them, on the ground, they tend to give ground because | :05:49. | :05:54. | |
they are just not in a position. The Kurds have been able to seize back | :05:55. | :05:58. | |
territory. The problem is that the Turks do not wonder that, and they | :05:59. | :06:03. | |
do not want that in Iraqi Kurdistan hi there, so it is not so much the | :06:04. | :06:08. | |
Russians, it is the Turks, we need to keep them on side because week to | :06:09. | :06:14. | |
fly from their. Stephanie? I struggle with this because any | :06:15. | :06:16. | |
solution to the Syrian water will be solution to the Syrian water will be | :06:17. | :06:19. | |
messy and protracted and will take time. I am not satisfied that those | :06:20. | :06:23. | |
who are against Syrian air strikes have a coherent idea of how to | :06:24. | :06:29. | |
address Daesh, Isis, in Syria anyway. You stand back and do | :06:30. | :06:34. | |
nothing? Seems to be the alternative that Jeremy Corbyn is proposing. We | :06:35. | :06:40. | |
did that two years ago in the wake of these chemical attacks by Assad. | :06:41. | :06:44. | |
There were not air strikes and Isis was allowed to mushroom. In many | :06:45. | :06:52. | |
ways this reminds me of the Bosnian war. Another war that seemed | :06:53. | :07:00. | |
intractable, that had divisions on the ground along religious and | :07:01. | :07:05. | |
ethnic lines, and Syria is similar in that on the ground it is a defect | :07:06. | :07:13. | |
or partition is operating, -- eight defect or partition is operating, | :07:14. | :07:18. | |
and air strikes could degrade Isis to the point where an TIS Sunni | :07:19. | :07:28. | |
forces, not moderate forces, but anti-IS forces, could fill that | :07:29. | :07:37. | |
vacuum and group degrade them. Take their revenues from oil internally, | :07:38. | :07:43. | |
because you cannot cut off their finances externally because it is | :07:44. | :07:50. | |
being generated from the territory. Amiel, the role of Iran in this. I | :07:51. | :07:57. | |
want to hear what you think. What is Iran's position about outside forces | :07:58. | :08:02. | |
bombing in their neighbourhood? As long as outside forces are bombing | :08:03. | :08:11. | |
anti-Assad forces, they are happy. Couldn't even brought his own food | :08:12. | :08:14. | |
for fear of being poisoned. A wise precaution. He was repeating | :08:15. | :08:26. | |
Stalin's move when he came in 1943, he did the same because he did not | :08:27. | :08:29. | |
trust the Iranians. But at the moment Britain is hitting the | :08:30. | :08:37. | |
enemies of Mr Assad -- Vladimir Putin is hitting the enemies. Only | :08:38. | :08:43. | |
in theory. He has not done anything against so-called Islamic State or | :08:44. | :08:47. | |
Isis. The problem with war is that war is like love, it is something | :08:48. | :08:54. | |
that if you analyse it too much, too much analysis leads to paralysis. | :08:55. | :09:02. | |
Isis or Islamic State, it does not control all the territory that you | :09:03. | :09:07. | |
see on BBC maps. It is present, but there are 18 other groups with whom | :09:08. | :09:12. | |
Isis trades. There is a fantastic book just came out detailing this, | :09:13. | :09:19. | |
written by a Syrian who went there for a year and identified this, and | :09:20. | :09:24. | |
these enemies want to be on the side of the winner. If Islamic State is | :09:25. | :09:29. | |
the winner, they are with them, if Islamic State is the loser, they | :09:30. | :09:32. | |
will go and kill Islamic State people. It is not the question of | :09:33. | :09:39. | |
what is happening tomorrow I'm a do you have a plan, is bombing going to | :09:40. | :09:46. | |
work? Bombing alone does work, it worked in Kosovo. It worked by | :09:47. | :09:54. | |
persuading the Serbs, it worked in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Military works. | :09:55. | :10:02. | |
The beauty of war is simplicity, whether you like it or not. If | :10:03. | :10:08. | |
territory, they would lose whatever territory, they would lose whatever | :10:09. | :10:16. | |
power they have? At the moment I follow their campaign on the | :10:17. | :10:19. | |
Internet, I read their books, and I'm reading five of their books | :10:20. | :10:26. | |
right now, I reviewed one, it is called The Management Of The | :10:27. | :10:30. | |
Wilderness hummer the plan is to turn the whole of the world into the | :10:31. | :10:38. | |
wilderness so that nobody is safe. What happens when the status quo | :10:39. | :10:43. | |
becomes intolerable, you have to go and change that thing. The same | :10:44. | :10:48. | |
thing happened with Thomas Jefferson and the Pirates in North Africa. | :10:49. | :10:56. | |
They started by writing to the Pirates, let's reform Islam, you are | :10:57. | :11:00. | |
believers, they sent them a copy of the courant as well, and it paid | :11:01. | :11:05. | |
tribute to them as well. But stop attacking our ships, they didn't. | :11:06. | :11:11. | |
Survey said a military expedition, they destroyed the Pirates, never | :11:12. | :11:18. | |
heard from them again. That is the best case I have heard for bombing. | :11:19. | :11:22. | |
Partly you make the case by saying, let's not ask any of the questions | :11:23. | :11:27. | |
about tomorrow. But can I ask one question? Let's not question the | :11:28. | :11:35. | |
whole thing to death. Dinner party chat and so on. Before doing this | :11:36. | :11:41. | |
you have got to address some of the questions, and one of the things is | :11:42. | :11:45. | |
that we have been told that this will only be one with ground | :11:46. | :11:52. | |
troops. Who will coordinate that? You mentioned the 50 odd groups who | :11:53. | :11:57. | |
might form some coordinated operation. Who will lead that? Sorry | :11:58. | :12:11. | |
to ask the question, but... I hope it is a rhetorical question. There | :12:12. | :12:18. | |
is no answer. Is a metrical warfare, everything is asymmetrical including | :12:19. | :12:25. | |
the logic of the warfare. You could in theory do what the US did with | :12:26. | :12:29. | |
Al-Qaeda in Iraq, which is the immediate predecessor of that, you | :12:30. | :12:35. | |
can bribe local chieftains and then send in ground forces, you can take | :12:36. | :12:40. | |
out the leader, and then five years later you have got Daesh. You cannot | :12:41. | :12:47. | |
eliminate this incredible cancer which has located itself in the body | :12:48. | :12:55. | |
politic of Islam. Why even define victory in those terms? And in terms | :12:56. | :13:01. | |
of leadership, the biggest problem, this is nothing to do with Daesh, | :13:02. | :13:05. | |
what we used to call the West is any position at the moment of incredibly | :13:06. | :13:15. | |
weak leadership. Anti-banner people who are intelligent will say it is | :13:16. | :13:19. | |
because he is weak and he dithers -- bomber. -- bomber. It has a lot of | :13:20. | :13:28. | |
power, the US, but internally it is written. The EU is riven to the | :13:29. | :13:35. | |
caller with economic issues. There cannot be leadership. And that has | :13:36. | :13:39. | |
nothing to do with Daesh, that is the state we are in. The lack of | :13:40. | :13:42. | |
leadership has contributed to this leadership has contributed to this | :13:43. | :13:47. | |
problem. Barack Obama was mandated to remove us from these costly wars, | :13:48. | :13:50. | |
and he has a hands-off approach, and that will not change. Leadership | :13:51. | :13:57. | |
requires following, and people are not keen to follow interwar. We have | :13:58. | :14:11. | |
entered a met -- MAs into which we cannot except. We have to reform | :14:12. | :14:17. | |
specific and targeted. War is just specific and targeted. War is just | :14:18. | :14:24. | |
aimed at changing a status quo. Changing the status quo means | :14:25. | :14:29. | |
destroying Daesh, it can be done only by bombing. And the perception | :14:30. | :14:40. | |
that these guys are losers, not winners, they sure these beards and | :14:41. | :14:44. | |
the huge out in Western streets, they say we're winning everywhere, | :14:45. | :14:50. | |
America has been fighting us for 18 months, but they do not say that in | :14:51. | :14:58. | |
these 18 months have just bombed them 3750 times according to John | :14:59. | :15:02. | |
Kerry last week in New York, where as in the first day of the war | :15:03. | :15:07. | |
against Saddam they had 13,000 in one day. But... One sentence. | :15:08. | :15:20. | |
Whoever takes up, there is a stat is cool but is intolerable for us, he | :15:21. | :15:24. | |
has to go and change it, by force if necessary. But does nobody ever | :15:25. | :15:30. | |
point out that if the idea of a caliphate were so attractive that | :15:31. | :15:33. | |
would not just be a handful of people entering the caliphate and | :15:34. | :15:36. | |
millions leaving Syria as is happening. People cannot wait to | :15:37. | :15:44. | |
escape from ten mac. -- estate from Daesh. In the past there were just a | :15:45. | :15:54. | |
few demonstrations, the British may be wanted to punish the Ottoman for | :15:55. | :16:02. | |
their pro-German sentiments. You must read this problem not as a | :16:03. | :16:08. | |
cancer, as our friend said, but as diabetes. You cannot cure it. This | :16:09. | :16:17. | |
is why Susan Sontag said you should not use medical metaphors. Jeremy | :16:18. | :16:22. | |
Corbyn's leadership. Read easier going? It is a really interesting | :16:23. | :16:30. | |
moment in the history of the Labour Party, because to say he is | :16:31. | :16:37. | |
culpable, those challenging him is culpable, it is the wrong way of | :16:38. | :16:40. | |
looking at it. He has a fundamental view which he will not change, that | :16:41. | :16:46. | |
this bombing will be a terrible mistake, which is in line with the | :16:47. | :16:50. | |
ridiculous thought for many years. And he has a section of his | :16:51. | :16:54. | |
parliamentary party who are out to remove him and support the bombing. | :16:55. | :16:57. | |
arises in politics for which there arises in politics for which there | :16:58. | :17:02. | |
is no solution. It is a complete nightmare. A lot of people say it is | :17:03. | :17:07. | |
his fault, this is terrible leadership, but I cannot see how | :17:08. | :17:11. | |
brilliant leadership will square the circle that he is opposed to the | :17:12. | :17:17. | |
bombing and has a Shadow Foreign Secretary, a deputy leader who are | :17:18. | :17:22. | |
in favour. It is becoming blurred by the desire of Liberal MPs to get rid | :17:23. | :17:26. | |
of him, and this Syria issue is being used to get rid of them. He is | :17:27. | :17:37. | |
sincere in opposing the bombing, and it is an interesting case of someone | :17:38. | :17:42. | |
who has had the freedom of being on the backbenches to suddenly | :17:43. | :17:45. | |
discovering that leadership makes you less influential in airway than | :17:46. | :17:51. | |
as a weak and hardly non-backbencher because suddenly you are | :17:52. | :17:59. | |
constrained. You cannot speak your mind. It is a nightmare for the | :18:00. | :18:02. | |
Labour Party because there is no obvious solution. What I think is | :18:03. | :18:07. | |
interesting is that even those Labour MPs who agree with him are | :18:08. | :18:12. | |
not happy with his leadership on this issue and the way he has | :18:13. | :18:14. | |
managed things in terms of rushing out this statement, saying he is | :18:15. | :18:21. | |
against the air strikes without consulting or even informing his | :18:22. | :18:27. | |
Shadow Foreign Secretary. That is providing even more momentum for | :18:28. | :18:32. | |
those groups trying to stage a coup against him. Any situation that is | :18:33. | :18:39. | |
without President in British politics, here's a war with his | :18:40. | :18:45. | |
Shadow Cabinet, and vice versa, so in fairness to carbon, he did do | :18:46. | :18:55. | |
that, but half the Shadow Cabinet were briefing about their position | :18:56. | :19:01. | |
even before he had. -- in fairness to Jeremy Corbyn. They are | :19:02. | :19:03. | |
in a way that is not sustainable. It in a way that is not sustainable. It | :19:04. | :19:04. | |
member of an organised political member of an organised political | :19:05. | :19:07. | |
party? And he said, no, I am a Democrat. You could say that about | :19:08. | :19:12. | |
Labour. When a major political party becomes a joke, it is not helpful | :19:13. | :19:21. | |
for their electoral chances. Even in the states, half the country thinks | :19:22. | :19:25. | |
there are public and party is a joke, and the candidate, Donald | :19:26. | :19:29. | |
Trump talks like a right-wing dis- jockey. Republicans will vote | :19:30. | :19:36. | |
Republican. It is not the same with Labour, you have this new membership | :19:37. | :19:44. | |
intake joining last May, and it seems to me that supporters of | :19:45. | :19:50. | |
Jeremy Corbyn in the general membership, he's not playing to | :19:51. | :19:54. | |
them, that is his constituency. The problem is for an opposition party, | :19:55. | :19:58. | |
you have to reach out to others. And his entire career on the backbenches | :19:59. | :20:04. | |
and was free to rebel against the leadership, and that was fine. And | :20:05. | :20:12. | |
in 33 years, in Parliament, I have been here for 30 years, I cannot | :20:13. | :20:16. | |
rumba him successfully persuading large numbers of people who | :20:17. | :20:20. | |
disagreed with him at the start of the debate to his side. And now as | :20:21. | :20:26. | |
leader he has to bring his Shadow Cabinet, and he has none of these | :20:27. | :20:28. | |
necessary negotiating skills to bring people along. This sounds | :20:29. | :20:36. | |
strange to me, you are surprised that Jeremy Corbyn is behaving as | :20:37. | :20:41. | |
Jeremy Corbyn should. Jeremy Corbyn is Jeremy Corbyn. He has sympathies | :20:42. | :20:46. | |
with countries that are against the United States, he has travelled to | :20:47. | :20:52. | |
Iran, he was on the Iranians television for years, he thinks that | :20:53. | :20:55. | |
US imperialism and Western US imperialism and Western | :20:56. | :20:59. | |
imperialism in general has done a lot of harm to the Muslim world and | :21:00. | :21:05. | |
so on, and it is time to do something else. This is how he is. | :21:06. | :21:10. | |
Whether you like it or not, I do not like it personally, but this is his | :21:11. | :21:15. | |
position. Jeremy Corbyn does as he should. If the rest of the Labour | :21:16. | :21:18. | |
Party want to do something else, they should go and do something | :21:19. | :21:22. | |
else, but they should not attack Jeremy Corbyn personally for | :21:23. | :21:24. | |
defending what he has been doing all his life. His position is not the | :21:25. | :21:30. | |
problem, it is the way he has managed the party. Instead of trying | :21:31. | :21:38. | |
to muster support within the parliamentary Labour Party MPs, he | :21:39. | :21:42. | |
has appealed to party members. And there is this fundamental | :21:43. | :21:46. | |
disconnect. That is a revolutionary thing. Lennon says forget about the | :21:47. | :21:51. | |
politburo, go directly to the masses. Years to deliver party | :21:52. | :21:57. | |
members who do not represent the broad electorate. Labour Party | :21:58. | :22:03. | |
members agree with him, and the parliamentary party do not. So not | :22:04. | :22:07. | |
surprisingly, he appeals to the Labour Party membership. It raises | :22:08. | :22:10. | |
all kinds of Shakespearean themes like loyalty, to whom are you | :22:11. | :22:15. | |
rid of him cannot claim at the rid of him cannot claim at the | :22:16. | :22:18. | |
moment they are being loyal to the party membership, as the party | :22:19. | :22:20. | |
membership packs Jeremy Corbyn. Corp membership packs Jeremy Corbyn. Corp | :22:21. | :22:24. | |
and is being loyal to his convictions but in doing so is not | :22:25. | :22:29. | |
fulfilling one of the roles of leadership which is to keep the | :22:30. | :22:34. | |
party together. However, how you keep the party together when it is | :22:35. | :22:38. | |
split on something like Syria, it is impossible. In left-wing radical | :22:39. | :22:43. | |
movements sometimes a leader comes and goes beyond the doctrine, | :22:44. | :22:46. | |
therefore the movement is named after that leader, for example we | :22:47. | :22:56. | |
talk of Leninism, or we talk of Maoism. Here we have Corbynism. And | :22:57. | :23:03. | |
that the that you become a movement that the that you become a movement | :23:04. | :23:15. | |
on its own, and Corbynism will be defeated in the end just as the | :23:16. | :23:21. | |
other ideas were defeated. I wondered about the idea of jihad | :23:22. | :23:27. | |
itself. This may be the dinner party conversation, but what would stop | :23:28. | :23:30. | |
people thinking it is a good idea to go and kill other people in | :23:31. | :23:35. | |
restaurants and so on? What would stop their mindset? I wonder if they | :23:36. | :23:38. | |
are very similar to people who go to family planning clinics in the | :23:39. | :23:42. | |
United States or should people in cinemas in the United States. Is | :23:43. | :23:46. | |
something utterly wrong with these people? If it is easy, everybody | :23:47. | :23:50. | |
for jihad. It is the duty of the for jihad. It is the duty of the | :23:51. | :23:56. | |
Muslim authority to attack the land of the infidel at least once a | :23:57. | :24:02. | |
year. And every caliphs did it until a Byzantine emperor stopped them. | :24:03. | :24:06. | |
For 800 years there was nothing else. If it is easy, everybody is | :24:07. | :24:14. | |
foreign. If it is more difficult, fewer people. But you always have | :24:15. | :24:20. | |
liked the Russian dolls, one within the other, you always have that | :24:21. | :24:23. | |
small final doll who wants to kill you because you are Gavin, not | :24:24. | :24:28. | |
because you have done anything wrong. This guy must be treated, by | :24:29. | :24:34. | |
police work, by military work, by intelligence work. Whatever you | :24:35. | :24:41. | |
like. But if you make all your actions conditional on persuading | :24:42. | :24:45. | |
Batman not to kill you, you do nothing. -- persuading Batman not to | :24:46. | :24:54. | |
kill you. Years ago I made a documentary called British jihad. I | :24:55. | :24:59. | |
spoke to a man who comes from Syria, and this is the funny | :25:00. | :25:09. | |
thing... You can bribe them. That is why he lives in Lebanon. But what is | :25:10. | :25:19. | |
amazing is that the same problems about the same small group, 20 or 30 | :25:20. | :25:29. | |
young men and they have all been penetrated, the security services | :25:30. | :25:33. | |
know about them, they morphed into Daesh, some of them run off to | :25:34. | :25:37. | |
Syria, somewhat a caliphate to go and kill in Iraq, whatever. If you | :25:38. | :25:41. | |
went back ten years from that you would find another small group in | :25:42. | :25:48. | |
Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Bosnia said, go away, we do not want to | :25:49. | :25:52. | |
jihad here, we are fighting for our national identity. And ten years | :25:53. | :25:56. | |
back from that in Afghanistan, it is a small group. We sometimes given | :25:57. | :26:02. | |
far too much credit because once every 18 months it can come into the | :26:03. | :26:05. | |
Western do something terrible, and I think we have to be careful not to | :26:06. | :26:08. | |
give them too much That's it for Dateline London for | :26:09. | :26:09. | |
this week - you can comment on the We're back next week | :26:10. | :26:14. | |
at the same time. | :26:15. | :26:18. |