Iraq: Coalition Against ISIL

David Anderson Excerpts

Friday 26th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)]

In the aftermath of the invasion of Iraq, I led a trade union delegation to Kurdistan. I was amazed by the reaction of the people there, who were delighted that our country had invaded that benighted nation. Since then I have learned why that was so. The people in Kurdistan lived through a period where they saw genocide at Halabja, 182,000 people destroyed by Saddam Hussein and 4,500 villages razed to the ground, while the west, including the Government led by Margaret Thatcher, turned its back. While 1 million Iraqis and Iranians were being killed on the battlefields, the west turned its back because it was a price worth paying, as Saddam was keeping the Ayatollah occupied.

To take a position today, I went back to those people and said, “What do you think we should do in the House?” The advice from a very close comrade of mine on the ground in the trade union movement in Kurdistan was, “ISIS is a fascist organisation. The only language it understands is force. Under ISIS, trade unions have been, as under Saddam, forced to go underground. Despite recent elections, Iraq is still terribly divided, but the immediate threat of ISIS must be halted and to do that we need external military air support.” That was the clear advice from people at the sharp end, not the intelligence services. We have learned lessons. Things are different today. However, I want to say clearly to the Prime Minister: under no circumstances should this be escalated without Members coming back together. I do not care what he says about circumstances perhaps meaning that he has to act on his own. He should not do that. That is one of the main reasons that the House is held in such contempt.

I am also wary about who the Prime Minister is being advised by. Yesterday at the UN, the Iranian President said that certain intelligence agencies put blades in the hands of madmen and were behind the build-up of ISIS. Some people claim that those agencies were the CIA and Mossad and that they intended, after last year’s failure to take action on Syria, to find another way to make people such as us take and support action. That may not be correct but unless such claims are addressed the people of this country will suspect that this could the back door to action on Syria.

I believe in supporting the people on the ground in Kurdistan. I have to support this action, even though I do not really want to, but I am clear that the Prime Minister should do nothing without the sanction of this House.