Episode 6 The Big Questions

Today our The Big Questions: The war in Syria. Can only ground troops

defeat The? And Buddhism, is it too much about the self and not enough

about others? -- can only ground troops defeat Isil? Good to see you

and thank you for joining us. I am Nicky Campbell. Welcome to The Big

Questions. Today we are live from Leicester in Britain's most

multicultural city. Welcome, everyone, to The Big Questions.

Friday's multinational agreement signed in Munich promised a

temporary cessation of hostilities in Syria but it is already looking

extremely fragile. This 70 member in Syria but it is already looking

Syrian support group did not tackle the

Syrian support group did not tackle fight on until he had retaken the

entire country. Last week, right here, we debated what the moral

response to the refugee crisis should be. The biggest push back to

making people leave Syria is the past five years of civil war. This

week we will debate whether there is a moral case for more outside

intervention on the ground to stop that war and deal with the wider

threat of Isil's caliphate. Does defeating Isil mean boots on the

ground? General Lord Richard Dannatt. Good morning. There will

never be public support, will there, for British boots on the ground

because of what happened before, the bitter experience of Iraqi? The

death, the destruction, the lies, the lack of future planning. Maybe

the time has gone for British and the time has gone for British and

know better than many of us. Is there a

know better than many of us. Is countries? Looking at the lessons of

Iraq and Afghanistan, you can get distracted and

Iraq and Afghanistan, you can get ground in somewhere like Syria, but

I think a quick ground in somewhere like Syria, but

live on the ground and it has got to be soldiers acting on the ground

that brings a resolution. But within a diplomatic and political framework

and that is what is essentially missing in Syria at the present

moment. We know that so-called Islamic State, Isil-Daesh, has got

to be defeated, that is the international strategic objective,

and it will only be done with military defeat. From the air, it

can help, but also on the ground. Just look at what is going on at the

present moment. The Russians are coordinating with the Assad regime

and being very successful, because in the air and on the ground they

are working in a coordinated fashion. Our problem is that we

think Bashar al-Assad should go and we will not work with his troops. We

are working with the opposition and they are losing and this is the big

conundrum the West has got to get its head round at the moment. I want

to come to you because you were disagreeing with that. Disagreeing

that is the way to beat Isil. Why do you think troops on the ground

should never be an option? I passionately disagree because there

are other options that are not exhausted. First of all, why didn't

we try out the financial resources that supported Isil or Isis for the

last three years? Four years? Secondly, why didn't we challenge

Turkey when it opened its borders for thousands of Jihadi is to pour

into Syria and Iraq? Remember, Turkey is in NATO. Third, Isis

exports oil and they have been exporting oil for the last three

years. Where have the western countries been? Fourth. Isis have

been exporting artefacts, Syrian and Iraqi artefacts, with billions, so

all these resources... Went back with whether they are not smashing

up for Western media consumption, for the cameras. Yes, all those

veins running support to Isis, the West has done nothing for that.

Plus, the satellites observing Isis. Tell me something, General, when

thousands of Isis troops crossed the desert from Raqqa, in the desert,

where weather satellites -- were the satellites hovering around every 24

hours? And after the attack, suddenly a satellite published two

pitches, one of the temple before the destruction of Isis and the

second picture after from the satellite. A lot of points there.

General, I will come to you in a second. Michael Clarke, former

director of the royal services institute. You were grimacing as

well and taking mental issue. He says what was the worst thing?

Everything he has raised is being done, maybe not fast enough or in a

big enough way. The bombing, the British bombing, has been to cut the

pipelines that Isil-Daesh are using. They have bombed the place in Mosul

where they have their cash, they have physically bombed the cash.

They are doing something about Turkey. It is an independent country

and this has been going on for three or four months. Yes... Yes, we could

see what was going to happen in that attack because it was Bashar

al-Assad's troops who walked away and no one was going to do anything.

The idea that the West has done nothing is foolish. The West has

actually addressed every single one of the things you have raised but

not vigorously enough. How do we defeat Isil? Somebody on the ground

has got to go toe to toe with Isis and somebody has got to occupy the

ground they are presently occupying and militarily that is not so

difficult. Isis and most have 30,000 fighters. Which ground troops?

Exactly, that is the point. For political reasons it will not be

Western ground troops, so realistically other Arab ground

troops. These other troops that could make a difference, but to make

a difference, they would have to be backed up intensively by Western

logistics, intelligence and technical expertise. The Saudis come

from an extreme Sunni position. But not as extreme as Isis. In terms of

human rights, it is a matter of degree but... It is a civil war and

there are no easy options in civil war. Director of the Middle East

programme at the Oxford research group, good morning. Well, you might

win the war with ground troops but you will not win the peace, that is

the problem. What we saw in Iraq was that it took three weeks to

overthrow Saddam Hussein. We overthrew his statue. In 15 years on

we have an insurgency with 500,000 people dead. We have to get much

smarter in what we do. At this point, Islamic State is a secondary

cancer. The first cancer, the first problem, is the war between the

Government and the opposition. At this point, you have Saddam Hussein

killing eight times as many people with bombs as Islamic State is

doing. President Assad. Rain yes! Yes! There is a difficult point in

the future involving Russia and the USA working closely together. Moving

away from where the President Assad should go or stay, what you might

have to see is a horrible political fudge. But what really matters is

how you end the violence. Until you do that and people are protected,

whatever you do with Islamic State, you are not actually dealing with

the core problem. Islamic State has been created out of the monstrous

effects of war. Who is most responsible for the emergence of the

Islamic State? Rain that is a big question! That is what the show is

called! There are many components and tragically the West has played

its part. Have we played our part? General, I will be back with you in

a moment. There is an element. The way that Iraq went wrong in the way

that it did, especially in 2011, created a vacuum. But there is also

the Arab Spring, which is the route. Somebody set fire to themselves in

Tunisia, it spread around the Arab world, which had nothing to do with

Al-Qaeda, the Cold War, Arab -Israeli relations in the Levant. It

came out of something else. The fact there was disruption across the

Levant made it worse, but it did not create it. I think the roots go much

deeper, to the Iraq war, the Sunni Shi'ite conflict that emerged. And

then the proxy wars between Saudi Arabia and Iran. One of the reasons

that Syria is such a mess as they are both acting out their vested

interests there. But if we go back to Sunni -sheer-macro tensions, it

goes right back to 1979. Yes, but they at least something which

absolutely made it worse in the Iraq war. They actually ended up

enlarging Shi'ite power in Iran at that point but it was going to be

acted out regionally. That is why Syria has become such a nasty war.

Peter Ford is the UK ambassador to Syria for a number of years. Hello.

A couple of interesting points from Gabrielle. We need to bite the

bullet for want of a better phrase on President Assad and have a whole

new strategy and we have wasted five years having a desire to destroy

that regime. And also the moral situation, our obligation to the

region because of the situation, our obligation to the

helped create. First of all, situation, our obligation to the

President Assad, is he part of the solution? I think sadly, but

inevitably, solution? I think sadly, but

President Assad is not going to solution? I think sadly, but

overthrown. This becomes more clear solution? I think sadly, but

with every day that passes. Western analysts have been indulging in

wishful thinking for five years. It is time to get real. We owe it to

the Syrian people who have been much more realistic and hard-headed about

this. The West has got to stop more realistic and hard-headed about

propping up the so-called moderate opposition which is not moderate at

all, by the way. And it has opposition which is not moderate at

the Syrian army, backed possibly by the Russians, to deal with Islamic

State. And in Iraq of course, a the Russians, to deal with Islamic

local problem that should be dealt with by

and they stand a much better practical chance of doing so. But

first, as Gabrielle said, there has got to be some sort of ceasefire and

overall peace between the Syrian Government and the opposition.

Sadly, our own British Government couldn't wait to start undermining

the Munich agreement. The ink wasn't dry on the paper before our Foreign

Secretary started to bad-mouth it and give the opposition and opening

to reject it, which is what has happened. This will be a dreadfully

missed opportunity. happened. This will be a dreadfully

have a moral duty to act in Syria? Yes, absolutely we do. We have

helped to fuel the conflict by indulging in propping up the

opposition, giving them so-called non-lethal assistance, political,

diplomatic, propaganda assistance. This is just prolonging the agony.

What should we have done? We should have backed off. We should not have

tried to overthrow the regime. But what about the atrocities in the

regime? We are still working for regime overthrow. There are failures

in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya. It is like a dog returning to its bonnet.

We go back. We have never seen a secular leader that we did not want

to overthrow. Should we have turned our back on President Assad and say,

that is what happens? Sadly we have got to deal with the situation as it

is today. The Assad regime has been brutal and there have been dreadful

mistakes. At the end of the day, they are secular regime, the only

force in the field that is likely to keep Syria as a pluralistic, secular

society that respects women. The people who call for the overthrow of

President Assad need to answer this question. What will take the place

of this Syrian regime which controls, despite everything, over

60% of the population? The areas may be small, but still 60% of the

population live in areas that are under the control of the Syrian

Government. If you take away the Syrian Government, there will be

implosion, massacres, a situation even worse than today.

General Lord Dannatt, Peter raises the situation, sometimes it is about

the lesser of two evils. We've seen this before with Gaddafi. We saw it

with Saddam Hussein. What came after was worse. Keeping the strong man in

place, I suppose in European terms, it was true with Marshall Tito as

well. What Peter has done is moved the conversation correctly on the

regime change. If we've learned anything from Iraq and Libya, when

you take a regime away and you haven't got a plan immediately to

replace it with something sensible you get chaos and enter a vacuum, as

we saw in Iraq in 2003, when we saw Al-Qaeda and others come in. The

issue I think in Syria, and there may be an element of my enemy's

enemy is my friend and choosing the least worst of several unattractive

options, it is possibly probably to say, if that regime falls there'll

be chaos. Let's work with that regime. The Russians have made that

decision. That's why they are effectively working quite

successfully. Maybe there's a compromise to be made there. The

West wants Assad to go, but let his regime stay so the stability is in

place. Unlike what happened in Libya and Iraq after Saddam Hussein. The

other lesson... Is he going to agree to, that I'm off to live in a Dacia

outside Moscow? Who are you to decide the fate of other countries,

to change this or that regime? He's killed tens of thousands of people.

Dialogue is not created for friends. It is created for enemies. So the

British way of stubborn, in refusing to dialogue with the regime, but we

have to understand that dialogue is specifically created for enemies,

not for friends. I don't call my friend and say, shall we go from a

dialogue. It is funny, but I call somebody who I am in dispute with

and say, shall we talk about it. Omar, audience in a minutes, put

your hands up, I would love to hear what you are thinking with this

situation with so-called Isis, Syria, the inextricably complex

multi-layered, multi-dimensional conflict. Omar, Peter made the point

about the chaos that would follow the removal of Assad. It would be an

absolute vacuum of hell. Do you buy that? Well, historically, if you are

going to use history, yes, maybe that happens if you destroy a whole

government. That's probably what they did in Iraq. But this is

underestimating the Syrians. It is as though the Syrians, there are 22

million Syrians and there is only one who can rule them. The Syrians

are a well educated people. To underestimate and say that they

can't rule themselves, it's the Syrian society that live in harmony.

It wasn't Assad that made them live in harmony. If he did, they wouldn't

be revolting against him. The main issue, and this is my experience

through my charity, Hand in Hand for Syria. Delivering aid into Syria.

I've watched how the battle lines have moved. I've seen the

destruction of what has happened. If we are going to use the humanitarian

groups' statistics, and look at Assad's CV and his troops, who are

not Syrian troops any more, he is using militia from outside. Sorry

that is incorrect. Over half the fighting forces on the Government

side are Syrian forces. That is not true. Are you counting the Shia as

non-Syrian? May I ask what you are yourself? I am Syrian. And what is

your religion? My religion is Islam. Which part of Islam? I don't look at

it like that. We need to know where you are coming from. As a Syrian we

do not look at this difference. That's how I was brought up in

Syria. You don't want to say that you are Sunni. I am Sunni and I'm

proud of it. Second, now we can see where you are coming from. Peter...

Wait a second, Gabriel. I will come to you. Why is this relevant, what

form of Islam? Because the bottom line of all this is the demographics

of Syria. Syria is about 60% Sunni and about 40% minorities, Shia,

Alawite, Christian. The Assad family are Alawite. Omar is right that

historically they have tended to live in harmony, but this has been

disrupted, and very sadly what the fighting comes down to now is

whether there is going to be a tyranny of the Sunni majority, all

the jihadis are Sunnis. That is not true. Not one Shia among them. Sorry

Peter, this is not true. You underestimate... Excuse me! Gabriel

in a second. You say it is not true. I'm going to break it up a little

bit with Gabriel who wanted to come in. I will come to the audience in a

second. Gabriel? You are highlighting the complexity of war

but we need to be respectful to you when you say, I don't want to

identify myself as a Sunni or a Shia. We also need to be respectful

that the opposition is not only al-Nusra and others. There's a

moderate opposition who don't have power on the ground. Power on the

ground is Armed Forces. What's your definition of moderate here? There

are secular groups or groups who've a vision of how people are going to

live together. I'm sure you are part of that. It is going to be really

essential that they're part of any kind of final deal. So when we are

saying we have to do nasty political fudge with Assad, we also have to in

the end establish an inclusive process that listens to a whole

range of voices. And some of them have a vision for the future that

range of voices. And some of them should be listening to. One thought,

Omar. If you look at the opposition, it is a mixture. It is not purely

Sunni. There are Alawites and Christians in the opposition. There

are Druz. I'm Syrian, I was brought up in Syria. When I was brought up

in Syria I did not, I was not brought up in school to distinguish

between a Christian, Muslim, Sunni, Xiia. You said it, the Shia

between a Christian, Muslim, Sunni, minority, OK? The people who are

fighting for Assad right now are not the Syrians. I have cousins who are

Sunnis. I have cousins who are Sunnis working for the Assad regime.

Half the Syrian Army is Sunnis. This is the inconvenient truth. This

divide isn't one we are going to surmount, clearly. What is

interesting, and this is something to reflect on, the premise of our

debate is whether ground troops, wherever they were to come from,

would be defeating IS. We are talking about what many perceive as

the much greater threat to human life, a moot point as to what Mr

Cameron referred to as the existential threat of IS, but we are

concentrating on Syria. That in itself is

concentrating on Syria. That in all I wish we would just call them

Daesh, because they are neither Islamic or a state. I also

Daesh, because they are neither that although Daesh clearly need to

be defeated because of what they are doing to women and the LGBT-plus

communities in Iraq, but killing the political adherence that are there

rather than the twisted ideology matters. We've known from previous

ideaologists that until you've shown that the ideology is not to be

followed all you are going to get is a new group of people coming up

behind. APPLAUSE. OK. Good morning to you. I

think so far what we've established is that this is a complex problem

and the reason why it is so complex is because everyone has a different

agenda when it comes to Daesh. I think not everyone agrees, we

haven't reached a point that we agree that they are evil because

they are evil. Some people show sympathies towards them. Some

because they are killing Shias, some because they are killing Kurds, some

because it means a better defence contract, some because they are

clinging on to power. We haven't even identified the problem yet.

There are some people yet to recognise that Daesh should be

defeated because they are pure evil. Some people unfortunately have

sympathies towards them. 800 or so people have gone from this country

to join them. General Lord Dannatt, the points which are joined from the

two contributor there is about how we defeat the ideology. Why is this

so attractive to go out and join this so-called Islamic State? I

think there's a general acceptance, for whatever reason, that defeating

Daesh is really important, but the other thing is they must be

discredited. That's what's really important as far as the domestic

market here in the UK is concerned. We've really got to work as hard as

we can with minority populations, with the Muslim population, to make

sure that young people can see a future and have a stake in this

country, in our cities in Leicester, wherever else. But they've got to

feel they have a better future here and not going off on a jihadist

adventure. That's why discrediting Islamic State, Daesh, is really,

really important. Do you discredit them, the most important part of

discrediting them is to militarily degrade them isn't it, or not? You

can't separate these things. They've got to be defeated. Daesh

authorities such as they are are not going to be subject to diplomatic

pressure, economic sanctions. They are only going to respond to

military pressure, which does bring you back to the issue that they've

got to be defeated on the ground, supported from the air. Whose boots

on the ground? That's the big issue that hasn't been settled. But I

hope, and I come back to this point, it is really important from a

domestic point of view that what they aspire to be and aspire to do

is discredited so that young people don't feel a pull to go to Syria and

join it. That's divisional and it is a shame, a tragedy. What tough

questions have to be asked in this country about why people go there? I

think it is opportunity. It's hope. Do young Muslim people feel they

have a stake this is our education system good enough? Our job

opportunities good enough? A whole social thing have got to be improved

so people have a meaningful futures this country and want to be

successful British citizens ant not feel they have to go off on

adventure with elsewhere. But does that not expects bait the tensions

and the narrative they have? I think where we've got to in this whole

debate over the last four or five years is only makes sense to put a

significant international force on the ground into Syria after a

diplomatic framework of some sort, analogous to how the Bosnian war was

ended in the mid 1990s. The Dayton peace agreement had a framework in

place and NATO put an international force in and has brought a measure

of peace to that country. That's the framework for the future in Syria.

How you get, there that's where the diplomats have to work it out. Canon

David Jennings, a man in a dog collar. There's two of us. There is.

Nicky, your question raised the question about the morality. Is it

moral? In one sense no war is moral in strict termses but the issue

facing people now is the death and the destruction that is happening on

the ground. So there's a kind of immediate practical issue as to how

you minimise and protect and prevent that continuing. And then the longer

term political agenda. And the security threat from IS to this

country. As Gabriel said, the whole thing, and Peter alluded to this, is

a mess, and more of a mess recently with Turkey attacking Kurdish people

in Syria. The thing escalates, so there's a need to prevent the

suffering and the death and destruction. I'm not sure boots on

the ground is the way to deal with that. That exacerbates the

situation. Our reputation and achievement in securing regime

change in the regime hasn't been very successful of late. We don't

seek to make regime change in North Korea or Zimbabwe, where you also

have tyrannical rulers... APPLAUSE. We need to be careful. One

thing, Nicky, I haven't heard anybody speak about is, what would

be the legitimate role of the United Nations in this situation? Is there

a role for a United Nations peacekeeping force, if you can come

to some agreement, that prevents the death and destruction on the ground,

and can enable the move towards a more political and stable situation?

Michael? The United Nations is involved, the UN Secretary-General's

representative is in Syria all the time. Last week he said, we are

taking a break from this. We cannot make any difference that will do any

good and he has stood back to see what happens with the Munich

Agreement, the Geneva peace talks are to reconvene on 25th

Afghanistan. If the UN says yes let's have a Australian force, the

first people they will turn to is western troops. Because those are

the troops that can physically do it. It depends which western troops,

because there are western troops that are not part of the people

involved previously and messed things up. I will lay you a bet

they'll be NATO troops. I'm not a betting man. Michael, only western

military expertise will make progress? Almost certainly. We've

had Irish troops, Pakistani troops. There were a range of other troops

that can go under the blue helmet and the United Nations... In certain

situations that is true, but not this one. The point Michael is

making is it is going be difficult. It means well-trained troops, but if

a western force were to go in without a framework, the western

troops should stay present for the minimum amount of time and hand on

to a follow-on force under the UN flag, ideally from... Pakistan. Post

war planning must have been learnt. In this scenario of Western troops

going in, how long would it take to degrade militarily Isil? If Western

troops were put on the ground, which is not going to happen, but if they

were, it would be a couple of months. Isis are not difficult to

roll up. They occupy a lot of territory but... A couple of months?

Yes. If you are talking about Islamic State, you're not talking

about a disciplined force. They are very good at terrorising people and

raping girls but they are not very good at fighting. They are very good

at terrorising but not fighting. This is reminiscent to some people

of 1914, it will be over by Christmas. But perhaps he is right?

It would be great if he is right. If those kind of interventions work,

then of course we want to degrade and we can Islamic State, but our

experience is that once you go to war, there is mission creep and you

can only pull out once you have won and then you get a quagmire. At the

moment what we are talking about is in fact Saudi troops potentially

going. That has been put on the agenda. Saudi Arabia is in a

quagmire in the Yemen. There is a terrible humanitarian crisis. These

are tough and fighters. People who have fought in Chechnya, Iraq,

Afghanistan. They are have fought in Chechnya, Iraq,

cause. But they have the benefit of British military hardware, don't

they, which has been sold to them? In the end it is a bigger problem

than that. You have got to defeat the idea. And how you defeat the

idea... The whole military response the idea. And how you defeat the

that we have had has been part of Islamic State. But the Saudis are

opposed. No. They ran quite a lot of funding in the early days of these

groups. funding in the early days of these

in any way, shape or form? We funding in the early days of these

got to get smart. Within Islamic funding in the early days of these

State, there funding in the early days of these

in the party that was under Saddam Hussein's rule, which is why they

in the party that was under Saddam are so strategic and smart. Then we

have those which have an apoplectic vision. The end is coming

have those which have an apoplectic will hasten it? And we cannot talk

to them. They have a vision that they have to destroy

to them. They have a vision that create a new vision. But within this

there are foreign fighters, many of whom will be disillusioned. With an

opportunity, you could throw them away. There are people on the

grounds aborting them because they are being better paid. -- supporting

them. There are genuine Sunni grievances that need to be

addressed. We cannot talk to them about a caliphate or retaining their

territory but in time, until you address the root causes, Islamic

State, you can do away with it militarily at this point, and then

you will see them in Libya, in Nigeria. You have got to work on how

you defeat the idea. Peter, if President Assad were to be shored up

to an extent that he thought he was in power for keeps, witty return to

the battle against Islamic State? -- would he returned to the battle

against Islamic State or other irrelevant to him? Not at all. He

cannot give much attention to Islamic State at the moment because

he is pinned down because of the West. I want to raise a slightly

different issue. Be careful what you wish for. If you wish for Western

force or Sunni Arab force from Saudi Arabia etc taking land from Islamic

State, you are going to have the issue of to who eventually will they

turn that land over? At the end of the day, this is Syria. Foreign

troops cannot stay indefinitely. In fact it would be creating yet

another quagmire. It would become a vortex for other jihadis, other

countries to come and sees this territory, not least the Syrian

Government. Be careful what you wish for. Better to leave it to President

Assad and the Russians. But getting rid of so-called Islamic State, is

that in Assad's interest? They are at war with the people who are at

war with President Assad. Of course it is in his interest. The Syrian

army is fighting Islamic State. Nobody in the Western media wants to

talk about that. In a city of 200,000 people, they are encircled

by Islamic State, besieged. We hear about Aleppo but not this city, why?

Because it is a government-controlled area and we

are not interested in the suffering of the government-controlled areas,

whether it is Western Aleppo or in Syria. We are suddenly interested

because the Syrian Government has started to make some progress. That

is a really interesting point. This is where it gets complicated. The

Russian have started bombing Islamic State positions there because they

are trying to lift the siege where Assad's forces are besieged, that is

how conjugated it is. That is absolutely right. The lesser of two

evils are got to be thought about very carefully here. The only reason

Assad's troops are successful on the ground that the present moment is

because they are working in harmony with the Russians and we don't like

it but it is succeeding. Back to my original point, if there is going to

be further intervention by Western led Boots on the ground, it can only

be within a diplomatic framework and the purpose of intervention is to

increment that on the ground. It will not be perfect, it will be

messy, but it is what we have got to do. You have had your hand up for a

while. Hello. I think the estimate of a couple of months is to defeat

the traditional military force, but then you have got to consider that

the second they engage British troops in a forlorn battle they will

lose and then become an insurgency and suddenly you are fighting an

ideology and a lesson from Iraq and Afghanistan is we cannot kill an

ideology. It will persist. The best way to defeat Isis is educating

people about Islam, that it is not a violent religion, and stop them

sending out their message. In the black jacket? The West needs to be

very realistic about what they can achieve here. There is not the

wherewithal to put large numbers of forces on the ground. Or even bring

large numbers of local fighters to engage with Islamic State. I think

you realistically use the word degrade, and it is effectively

strangling this movement over a very long, sustained period of time. And

weakening its ability to continue any kind of offensive operations.

Once it finds it cannot expand, it will start to die. As we are edging

towards the end of this, what is the situation like for Christians and

for the survival of Christianity across the region, if you like?

There is very little hope for survival because now Iraq has lost

already 80% of Christianity and Syria is on the move. We have lost

in Syria 400,000 people, dead. And over 11 million people on the move,

displaced, between refugees and other displaced. The minorities are

disappearing. If Christianity disappeared from the Middle East, it

is bad for Islam and it is bad for everybody, because Islam will have

proven to the world that it is not a religion that can live with another.

And this image of Islam, we do not want it. We don't want it as

Christians and the Muslims don't want it. But if the West is doing

nothing to solve the problem of Syria, if Islam is not doing much to

solve the problem of Syria, all are flexing their muscles about troops

on the ground, which is much bigger than that. Nobody is asking the

question or answering the question where is Isis getting their weapons

from? Where is Isis... They have coins now, currency. Where are all

these resources coming from? Instead of battling over the question of

boots on the ground, how can we dry out their resources? Last word,

General. Very pertinent questions. I agree with all the things being said

over here on my left. I think it would be a tragic outcome if

Christians and other minorities were forced out of Iraq and Syria. After

all, Christianity started in the Middle East and seven centuries

later Islam came along. The point is absolutely right that different

people that religions have got to work together but there is no point

sitting here on a Sunday morning debating these things, wringing our

hands and saying how awful. What we need is leadership in the diplomatic

world to come up with a framework, leadership of a strong will to put

in an international force to increment that agreement on the

ground. But also a realisation that if international forces,

particularly Judeo Christian Western forces stay too long, we become part

of the problem and not part of the solution and we need to follow up

with local forces. We have got to get this right and it will not go

away with just wishful thinking. get this right and it will not go

Thank you very much indeed. get this right and it will not go

you can join in this debate, and please do so, by logging onto the

BBC website and following the link to the online discussion. And you

can tweet us. Tell us what you think about the last question this

morning. Is Buddhism too much about the self? Very interesting. If you

like to be in the audience in a future show, please email us. We

will be in Cambridge next week, the Newcastle on the 28th, and Cardiff

the week after that. Tomorrow it is the Buddhist celebration of Nirvana,

when the budget achieved the complete death of his physical body

and was released from a cycle of rebirth when unresolved, passes on

and was released from a cycle of to a newborn. Buddhists only achieve

Nirvana during their life when they no longer suffer from

Nirvana during their life when they greedy. The Buddha

Nirvana during their life when they this state you need to

Nirvana during their life when they self, the eternal, Bliss and the

pure. Is Buddhism too much about the self? Good

pure. Is Buddhism too much about the Deegalle. You are among a philosophy

and ethics as well. This is Deegalle. You are among a philosophy

of no selfishness that we are aiming for. Getting rid of the ego. Tell us

more. I think Buddhism has a purpose that when you do not exist, you get

enlightenment. When you do not exist? The Buddhist problem

having ego. That is the problem. Buddhists are talking about selfless

person is so good of them cannot be selfish because the ultimate aim is

to be selfless. There are three key ideas, the idea of impermanence,

another it is things being unsatisfactory. There is no

permanent self. The cycle of life? There is continuity

permanent self. The cycle of life? discontinuous. We do not exist? You

come to the realisation that you do not exist by meditation and looking

within, yes? That is right. You examine yourself and you try to

release yourself from afflictions and bonds and attachments. You have

detached yourself from your family, haven't you? Everything, even

ideology. We had a lot of discussion about ideology earlier. That is an

important one. How do you detach yourself from your family? What is

that about? If you are attached to your family, you are thinking about

only one section of humanity. If you have an equal mind to everybody, and

if you want to cultivate that for all beings, you cannot be attached

only to your family, because your family are blood relatives and you

have no perspective beyond that. You should be able to go beyond your own

family. Right. Gotcha! It is fascinating but quite complicated.

Difficult for a lot of people to get their head around it. Isn't it

better, rather than sitting on a cushion and looking inwards, to get

out there and do do charitable works and help people and do what many

Christians and humanists and Muslims do? The idea in Islam of reaching

out and helping others and doing charitable work. How can you do that

from your room with incense? I think Buddhism appreciates

altruism, it is very important, but it says you have to prepare

yourself, you have to have proper training, to understand, and if you

get into that situation without any proper qualification you are going

to, you won't achieve that purpose. The meditation is a training for

that. Initially you have to isolate yourself, discuss who you are. Once

you lose yourself you are able to help others. I understand, getting

yourself into a better situation to achieve all those things. Jennings

jerngs it is rather like prayer isn't it, or any form of reflection.

It can be, it can be beneficial, it can be constructive and move outside

of it. I don't want to criticise Buddhism, which I have a great deal

of respect for. What we've heard is admirable. It is one of the great

religion obvious the world and we were in partnership and often

dialogue as well. I would want to argue the point that Christianity in

particular is a this-worldly religion. It looks beyond self. It

is not a self help religion. It is not one that seeks benefit for self.

It is subversive particularly of ideologist, and of religious

orthodoxy where they contradict and contravene justice. We need to go

beyond self improvement, self enlightenment to have a positive

engagement with society and the world and all the ills that surround

that. If I may put words into our friend's mouth, he says you have to

have that self enlightenment to be better equipped to go beyond. I'm

sure that's the case, but it needs to be built into the Dna. Of the

religious view and perspective, so that you are constantly engaging

with other people, other issues and challenging injustice. Are you

constantly engaging? I think in the Buddhist case there is no criterion.

Each person does their bit according to their own abilities. Some people

are very good at working with conflict resolution and feeding the

poor and so on. Some other people are good meditators and some others

are good at writing and doing prayers and so on. I think what is

important for the Buddhist perspective is you do your own bit

very well, sincerely. Is doing your own bit, it is inherently selfish.

You have to get yourself in the right place to achieve anything in

life. You exercise, you brush your teeth, but this self enlightenment

to me is in the same category of that. Altruism is giving of yourself

in service to others. Getting out there and volunteering. The person

who is the recipient of volunteering, if you are giving soup

to the homeless, they don't know if you've med at a timed for 40 years

before doing that or to raise your profile. Or to get par Christ

points. Giving is just giving. It is, Mrs Pleasure in giving. When you

give Christmas or birthday presents you get pleasure from that act of

giving. I found through the volunteering that I've done and

facilitated others to do they've become less selfish. They've become

less greedy. They have had more compassion. So seeing the suffering

of others. This is what it is all about. You find yourself through

volunteering. There is something inherently selfish at discovering

the self and trying to get rid of selfishness. It remind me in the man

in the Life of Brian, who is sitting down the hole for 40 years with his

juniper bush. Is he waiting for that 40 years to be up before he goes out

and does good in the world? Get out there and do good. There are lots of

misconceptions about Buddhism. You can't take away the fact that

Buddhism by its very nature is about self absorption, how we and that the

nature of self in relation to what Buddhism is trying to teach. The

idea that satisfactoriness or suffering as it is often described

in English is the root cause of clinic and craving. Those issues

that relate to our continual striving on the wheel, the Samsric

wheel of life to continue to perpetuate ourselves as self.

Hamsters in a cage. The only way to get out of the wheel is to do

something about the nature of existence. That desire that you talk

about, that passion, if you get off the wheel and say, I'm not attached

to this outcome in anyway, shape or form, we we wouldn't have vaccines,

people wouldn't have discovered that gravitational waves. That's desire

and attachment to the outcome that drives innovation. We would be dying

of middle age diseases if people didn't have that desire to achieve

that. I think the altruism, Michelle mentioned charity or generosity and

the foundation of Buddhist path is generosity. If you take a vow of

charity index, Myanmar is the top of the charity index in giving. Does it

mean that Buddhist people are selfish? It does not. Is this all

about reincarnation and thinking about how you are going to come

back? That's important, but one way of losing yourself is to give away.

So the studies, he gave his blood, his eyes and his wife, children and

so on. The giving away is a very important part of training. If you

have given yourself and that sense of ego has dissolved and you come

back as something else, is it still you if you've lost yourself? It is a

continuum in the Buddhist case. We call it the karma or you move from

one life to another. But it's not absolutely essential to believe

that. Bud has himself said you don't have to believe it, but what is real

is now, the present moment, and you have to live it successfully,

morally, ethically and righteously in the present moment. But is it

still you if you've lost yourself and you come back? Self not lost. We

understand what self is. This is the point. We are not losing anything.

Selfishness? Selflessness. We are not losing things. We are not giving

things away. We are not emptying the mind. This idea that meditation is

about empty minds, people sitting around with emptiness in their

minds. It is about understanding what's happening in the mind...

There's a whole industry around self help. Go to any Boots counter and

will you be able to buy... And the airport, all the books. Most book

shops, the mind, body and airport, all the books. Most book

section is bigger than the religious section. From a Christian

perspective section. From a Christian

want to be just aware people, enlightened people, and even nice

people. Because where there are injustices we are bid on the

challenge and fight against. No matter how much we are in tune with

ourselves, essentially Christianity is about sacrifice and giving. It is

about challenging and putting one self at risk, but also perhaps

making one self unpopular, I know what that's like. David, the you've

been here before, a couple of series ago. The gentleman there. We are

criticising Buddhism because we think that it is not getting

involved within our world. We think we are not getting involved within

charities, but at the same time, volunteering is a great thing and

getting involved with charity and getting involved with research,

creating vaccines, curing diseases, we are doing great things here. But

then again if it wasn't for us getting involved we would not have

wars, we wouldn't have conflict or half the suffering nowadays. The

Buddhist view is more to become one with nature and to become one with

the peace of name. It is not getting involved with everyone else's

business and this I that you are helping, when in a lot of cases you

are really not. APPLAUSE. Gabrielle, there's lot of

violence in Myanmar as well, some of that is perpetrated by Buddhists.

Bud biggests aren't doing that well against the Muslims in Myanmar.

However, I do agree with the whole principle that you need a kind of

political maturity and you do need a reflectiveness which maybe would

help in terms of issues of war and peace. I shouldn't think Assad's

doing touch mindfulness at the moment. Back to conflict resolution.

How far is he thinking about the consequences of what he's doing to

his people? I'm sure he has remained utterly blind and cut off. The point

about, we all need a bit inner reflection. Is that the message of

the Buddha? Not only inner reflection but parents beyond that.

It is understanding the nature of existence. What is it about mind?

What is it that's going on in mind that drives us towards greet, hatred

and delusion? What is it about how we hang that process in order to

function in the world? There's a worldwide movement of socially

engaged buttists socially engaged Buddhists that take a great deal of

care with environmentalism. How much on meditation? That doesn't detract

from the idea. You are working with the world within the world. You are

doing altruism all the time. This idea of giving in Buddhism is the

first parameter. The most fundamental idea is giving. It is

the first one. Michelle, it is not self absorption but action. Action

is directiven by emotions. If you get fired up by something, a leaflet

came through my door for Water Aid, the picture of a little boy with a

dirty bucket. It made me angry and want to do something about this.

Those emotions of sympathy, empathy, anger, at situations that other

people less fortunate are in, that makes you get up off your bottom and

get out there and do something about it. Buddhists are doing stuff all

the time. They can't get away from their own emotion. Good morning to

you. Good morning. Where are you on this debate? I think enyou talk

about Buddhism you talk about things happening in the world and worldic

things. So whenever we talk about self, Buddhism is nonself. What is

nonself? Whenever we talk about our body, we talk about four elements.

Hard elements, fire elements, fire elements and water elements. We are

made up of four elements, so for example, air elements, what right

now what I breathe in, air, and breathe out, air. But very short

period of time we keep breathe in my body it is present, I call, it is my

breathing. So breathing the air belongs to me. So Muslim, Hindu,

everybody is interconnected. So what we see, the world, is not myself.

Not self at all. We are tiny little dots? Yes. We have to keep others

happy to keep myself happy. David Jennings? Of course, what I'm

suggesting is just a bit more than that. It is important that we have

some understanding of self but it is important that we are able to move

beyond that and not be so absorbed just with self but to become

completely absorbed with political, social, volunteer issues in the

world, even to the point where we make ourselves unpopular in that

process of challenging those injustice. It is a question of

balance. If everybody got on the street for a big protest or march it

wouldn't be practical, because the streets would be jammed, but if

everybody went to their rooms to meditate that wouldn't be helpful

either, would it? It doesn't seen that we should not protest - we

should. We should protest righteously and with the correct

understanding. The meditation is not something that we should do all the

time. Also meditation is misinterpreted. What meditation is

being aware of who you are and being able to live in the present moment.

Which we have to do now, because we are you come to the end. Thank you

so much. Give yourself a round of applause. That's all from the

football capital of Europe. Leicester. We'll see you next week,

from Cambridge. Have a good day. APPLAUSE.