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Bombs Away, One Way or Another

One day after the British Parliament humbled Prime Minister David Cameron with a rejection of his plans to join military action against Syria, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office issued a travel advisory.  It warns UK citizens in Thailand and elsewhere to ‘be vigilant and avoid any protests or demonstrations’ because of ‘an increased risk of anti-western sentiment linked to the possibility of military action in Syria’.

Acting on a tipoff, Prachatai arranged a clandestine meeting with a representative of the Bangkok Embassy about why this warning was issued.  The representative gave the interview under conditions of anonymity and an umbrella amidst the rain-swept construction site on the Embassy grounds.

The following is a transcript of the interview (as far as Prachatai could make out – his tired and emotional accent was at times difficult to understand).

Q:  Why send out an advisory about a risk only after the ‘possibility of military action in Syria’ has disappeared?

A:  Disappeared?  You think so?  Just because a bunch of out-of-touch self-important pontificating bastards want to look clever and kick poor David in the whatsits?  This is not over by a long way, believe me.

Q  You mean that military action might still go ahead despite the Common vote?

A:  A way will be found.  We can always engineer some other threat like we did with WMD in Iraq.

Q:  But public opinion in the UK is over 50% against military action.  Many former high-ranking military officers have warned against it.

A:  Hah!  Public opinion was even more against invading Iraq and the generals weren’t keen, but we were strong then and we’ll be strong again.

Q:  But you will wait for the findings of the UN weapons inspectors, won’t you?

A:  No reason to.  We never waited for that Blix idiot in Iraq.  Besides the UN has form.  That Carla Del Ponte woman has already said both sides in Syria have used chemical weapons and that the opposition has used sarin nerve gas.  That just the kind of confusing signal we cannot afford in a time of crisis.

Q:  So what exactly is the evidence that the Syrian government was responsible for the latest chemical attack?  We’ve read the Joint Intelligence Committee’s dossier and …

A:  IT’S NOT A DOSSIER!  Can’t you people read?  It’s an ‘assessment’.

Q:  Sorry, we’ve read the assessment and find that it is long on logic and poor on evidence.  It just argues that the Syrian government must have done it and talks about secret information that proves this but doesn’t say what this information is, where it comes from, and how reliable it is. 

A:  Of course it’s reliable.  If it’s secret, it must be.  Listen, everybody knows the Syrian government did it.  Even the BBC knows that.  They showed clips of the chemical attack and then showed ‘another atrocity by the Syrian government’ – the napalm attack on a school.  That proves Assad did it.

Q:  But the doss-

A:  Assessment.

Q:  The assessment wouldn’t gain a conviction in a court of law.

A:  And what’s the law got to do with it?  This is war.

Q:  So what’s the justification for military action?  You won’t get a Security Council resolution.

A:  Per-lease, we bombed Yugoslavia with no Security Council resolution. 

Q:  That’s when you hit the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. 

A:  OK, the map was out-of-date.  But maybe they shouldn’t have used their veto.  And it is the same two vetoes now.  This time we’ll probably just quote international humanitarian law.  Wait a day or two and the Attorney-General will figure it all out.  But we have to punish Assad for using chemical weapons so that we can save innocent lives.

Q:  How?  By dropping missiles on chemical weapons storage sites?  Doesn’t that risk increased loss of life?  And how does it stop the much greater loss of life from other weapons?

A:  You just don’t get it, do you?  Syria has crossed the red line.  It’s a clear violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention.  This kind of atrocity cannot go unpunished.

Q:  But Syria hasn’t signed that Convention.

A:  Bloody typical, isn’t it?  Shows what depths of inhumanity they can sink to.

Q:  Israel hasn’t signed either.

A:  That is an entirely different matter.  They’re a poor struggling democracy surrounded by enemies. 

Q:  But aren’t you worried that by intervening against the Assad government, you will be allying yourself with the opposition?

A:  And what’s wrong with that?  We’re not going to use this as a justification, but Syria has had an Assad in charge for 42 years.  It’s past due for a touch of regime change.

Q:  But Syria has been on your side so often.  It crushed the Muslim Brotherhood in the 70’s when they killed tens of thousands in the Hama massacre, most of them civilians and there was no red line then.  And then it took part in your invasion of Iraq.  And in this war, some say the most aggressive and successful faction in the opposition is the Al-Nusra Front, the Al-Qaeda franchise in Syria.  They’re a terrorist organization, according to your side.

A:  Yes, but the rest of the opposition are asking the US to reconsider listing them as terrorists. 

Q:  And it will de-list them?

A:  I don’t know.  Up to the Yanks.  But Assad is the real terrorist, as this chemical attack just proved, so anyone fighting a terrorist can’t logically be a terrorist, can they?

Q:  I’m not sure I follow that.  Their ideology hasn’t changed.  How do they stop being terrorist?

A:  For heaven’s sake.  Terrorism is a matter of who you’re fighting.  Haven’t you forgotten that the greatest terrorist in recent history was once one of the good guys?

Q:  Ah, you mean Osama Bin Laden?

A:  Well, yes, I suppose so.  Actually I was thinking of Tony Blair.


About author:  Bangkokians with long memories may remember his irreverent column in The Nation in the 1980's. During his period of enforced silence since then, he was variously reported as participating in a 999-day meditation retreat in a hill-top monastery in Mae Hong Son (he gave up after 998 days), as the Special Rapporteur for Satire of the UN High Commission for Human Rights, and as understudy for the male lead in the long-running ‘Pussies -not the Musical' at the Neasden International Palladium (formerly Park Lane Empire).

And if you believe any of those stories, you might believe his columns.

 

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