Thread by @shaunjlawson

I'm pleased Gary tweeted this. It gives me a chance to explain my view of Benn - and also why "we must oppose all war in all circumstances regardless of what they are" is just wrong.

It's wrong because many of us wouldn't even be here if that had been the approach in 1939.

https://twitter.com/GMacL114/status/1226390810972680194

It's wrong because my people - the Jewish people - would no longer exist if that had been the attitude back then.

And it's also wrong because there *are* certain circumstances in which military action is legitimate. Not many - but there are certainly some.

Let's go back to 2003. What was the biggest single criticism of that war? Not just that it was pre-emptive - but that it was illegal. It had no UN mandate. It was internationally illegitimate, based on lies and did catastrophic harm to the region and our geopolitical reputation.

The further problem was it was such a disaster - and went against public opinion to such an extent - that the mindset amongst way too many people became "no war in any circumstances ever". What those people don't realise is how dangerous that mindset truly is.

Moving on to 2011: while there was a UN resolution for intervention in Libya, how we interpreted it was very dubious and, just as in Iraq, we had no plan to rebuild the country afterwards. Our conduct was disgraceful, disgusting and indefensible: triggering the migrant crisis.

If you ever wanted to know the state of the UK's structural media bias, consider how the same media which went to town against New Labour for Iraq did nothing of the kind against the Tories for Libya... or now in Yemen. Apparently, it's OK if Tory governments do it. Nauseating.

The same Tory government which did that then wanted to intervene in Syria on the same side as ISIS - ie. against Assad. Not just absurd - but sheer, total madness. Ed Miliband deserves to go down in history for stopping that. Parliament at last did its job.

However, the following year, ISIS/Daesh made terrifyingly swift progress in Iraq: slaughtering all in its path. Very quickly, they had the Kurds in desperate trouble: having already established a sick, perverted terrorist 'caliphate',

With Baghdad also in danger - Daesh had a huge amount of territory - and the Yazidis facing genocide, being sold into sex slavery and frankly being eliminated, the sovereign Iraqi government asked us for help. As did the Kurds.

Those who oppose all military action in all circumstances would've simply abandoned Iraq to its fate, the Kurds to their fate and the Yazidi people to their fate. I find that monstrous. It boggles my mind that people tell themselves that would've been the right thing to do. No.

Daesh, meanwhile, were using their 'caliphate' to get stronger and stronger: doing oil deals and threatening Europe with hideous acts of terrorism. Apparently, we should've done... nothing? Against a death cult every bit as hideous as the Nazis? What?!

And when we do nothing against death cults as hideous as that. guess what happens? Those death cults attack us because there are no consequences for it.

Daesh aren't people we could talk to or play nice with. Daesh needed to be destroyed for the good of humanity.

So the US, France and UK launched air strikes in support of Kurdish ground forces. And slowly, very slowly, hugely because of our frantic desire to avoid civilian casualties and propaganda victories for the enemy, we pushed them back.

Without our help, the Kurds would've been sunk. Are opponents of that action OK with that? I know I'm not.

Nor was I in any way OK with the 43 MPs who apparently preferred to abandon the Kurds, the Yazidis, the Iraqi people and their sovereign government.

How can you possibly speak up for Iraq and the Iraqi people and what we did to them in 2003, claim to be on their side, claim to be ashamed of what we did... then stick two fingers up and say "not our problem, guv" when a legion of mass murderers is killing everyone in sight?

Those 43 MPs - for whom Corbyn himself was the teller -- should be ashamed. And as they were voting for the death of heaven only knows how many at the hands of Daesh, what they did was a lot WORSE than the mass abstention on the Welfare Reform Bill a year later.

Then we come to the Syria debate. A quite massively complex issue, in which both sides of the argument were entirely legitimate and merited complete respect.

Opponents of action rightly highlighted that unlike in Iraq, the Syrian government hadn't asked for our help.

They also rightly highlighted the small, disorganised numbers of ground troops in Syria, whose motives were never entirely clear.

And they highlighted the quite mindboggling chaos in Syria: so many different sides engaged in a war of annihilation. A perfectly principled position

Proponents, meanwhile, rightly noted that in practice, there was no longer a border between Iraq and Syria: meaning that if we merely chased Daesh back into Syria, they would regroup from there and come straight back. Threatening everyone.

Proponents also noted the UN resolution which mandated "all necessary means" to be taken against Daesh, Why did international law suddenly cease to be relevant to all those who'd pointed to it in 2003?

And they noted that if we didn't act in support of ground troops now, they'd be destroyed and in all likelihood, Daesh and other such groups would be the beneficiaries.

It was a quite devilishly difficult decision. Great, thoughtful speeches were made across the House.

And Benn closed for the Labour Party with, whether you agreed with him or disagreed with him, a brilliant speech which covered a massive amount of ground and was both impassioned and conciliatory: reaching out to his Labour colleagues-

It is nonsense - outrageous, intellectually bankrupt, vapid nonsense - to describe someone who believed we needed to act in support of our French allies - whose people had been slaughtered at the Bataclan by monsters - as "a warmonger". More than that: it's disgraceful.

Those who make such comments simply couldn't care less about any of the detail. Nor do they give a damn about the people who die when we do nothing; nor, it often appears to me, even about our own security when it's threatened by mass murdering fascists.

The illegal 2003 Iraq invasion undermined regional security and our own security.

Acting in Syria in 2013 against Assad would've done that again, with bells on.

NOT acting in Iraq in 2014 and, arguably, in Syria in 2015 against Daesh would've also done that. Catastrophically.

International relations are complicated. People who pretend they aren't are in some other world entirely. Every single case should always be assessed on its own merits: the danger posed to us, to our allies, to civilians, and to the world.

Acting without thinking carefully first - in the name of "something must be done!" - is disastrous. NOT acting at all is also frequently disastrous. Yet what was ultimately achieved? Daesh's defeat, thank God. Before Trump, to his eternal shame, sold out the Kurds: who are heroes

Meanwhile, the reality of the UK now is this. We are a declining, third rate power with a hugely scaled down military. We play a VERY junior role in things like this nowadays. We'll never send ground forces into the Middle East again; we'd never actively support US action in Iran

And there will never be another Iraq 2003-style misadventure again. Not on our part, at least. We're too weak to ever do such a thing.

Yet we remain vital to NATO - and in Europe. it's us and France as nuclear powers who protect the whole continent, under American aegis.

It should tell you something that even Corbyn ultimately didn't propose weakening NATO in any way. And it should also tell you something that our interventions in Sierra Leone and Kosovo HELPED people. Many people.

War is horrific and hideous, True settlements are only ever achieved through diplomacy and negotiation. The glamourisation of war by the West - 24/7 blanket coverage, out with the popcorn, watch the bombs rain down from your sofa - is vile and beyond shameful.

War must always, always be a last resort. But sometimes, there IS a casus belli. Sometimes, we - along with our allies -DO have to act. And the British people, including so many of those who abandoned Labour for the Tories, expect nothing less.

Because the first duty of any government anywhere is to protect the safety and security of its citizens.

That's why Tory cuts to the police, fire services and the NHS are outrageous. But it's also why a policy of no war in any circumstances whatsoever is just flat out wrong.