An Oasis

War and Terrorism: Where to now?

This evening I wandered round to the Edinburgh International Book Festival and attended an event in the "Debating our World" strand, "War and Terrorism: Where to now?" The panel, which was chaired by David Pratt who is Foriegn Editor of the Sunday Herald, consisted of Aidan Hartley, Barbara Ehrenreich and Dilip Hiro.

The programme teasingly promised,

"In the last year, the fear of terrorism and the reality of war have impacted on millions of lives. Is massive force the answer to the terrorist threat or does it merely foment hatred and therefore future threats? Are there different solutions? We look back on events in Iraq and elsewhere. With Barbara Ehrenreich, brilliant young war correspondent Aidan Hartley and Dilip Hiro, expert on the Middle East."

Sadly, the reality was less visionary than I had hoped and the panel members were content to berate Bush, the dodgy dossier, "45 minutes" and so on ad nauseum while offering no credible alternative.

In fact the most thought provoking words spoken all night were from an audience member who proposed a return to colonialism where "western" states would control and protect their own pieces of empire. A couple of "here, here"'s in the audience caused a couple of the panel members to smile in a patronising "oh, dear" sort of fashion.

What ought to be our response to terrorism? How will we work to make the world better for our children as our parents and grandparents have done before us? What are our options? In the circumstances as they were prior to the outbreak of the Iraq war it seemed to me that the only credible option was to invade - as I discussed in Iraq: A long, twisty and boring rant. I am interested in how we can rewrite the global rule book to deal with aggression which is not between states but between factions, we need to take a long hard look at the rights and responsibilities of nations operating anywhere in our global commons. Terrorism will not be ended by meeting the demands of terrorists - that will just lead to more terrorists with more outlandish ideas. Nor however will it be defeated by the iron fist of the military - the war which the United Kingdom has fought for decades inside its borders against the Irish Republicans has demonstrated that much.

We can't run scared of conflict where conflict must prevail but we must couple strong intelligence and military power with ethical and just international dealings, not for our national interest but for a greater international interest.

I would love comments on this - I'm really keen to see a debate of ideas...

Posted by Paul at August 12, 2003 01:59 AM |