Syria and the Use of Chemical Weapons

Debate between Gerald Kaufman and Malcolm Rifkind

Thursday 29th August 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sir Malcolm Rifkind (Kensington) (Con)]

I listened in the most charitable manner I could to the Leader of the Opposition explaining why he cannot support the motion. Given that the Government responded not simply to his request but to those made by Members on the Government Benches to wait until the inspectors had completed their task and to enable the Security Council to consider the consequences, we and the country can only conclude that the right hon. Gentleman is incapable of taking yes for an answer.

I want to use the short time available to me to concentrate on one set of words—a reasonable phrase—in his amendment: the need for “compelling evidence” of the Assad regime’s responsibility for the chemical attacks. We should be clear what “compelling evidence” means. Nothing could ever be proven 100%. Someone charged with murder before our courts can be convicted if the jury is satisfied beyond reasonable doubt. That does not require someone to say, “I saw him pull the trigger.” Sometimes—usually—that is not available.

When we look at the situation in regard to the use of chemical weapons in Syria, what we know for certain—it is not in dispute—is that chemical weapons were used. The Assad regime themselves admit that. We know that such weapons were used in the middle of a sustained artillery attack by the Syrian Government forces on the very suburb in Damascus where the chemical attacks then took place. We know that the Syrian Government are the only state in the middle east that has massive stocks of chemical weapons, and we know that there cannot have been any ethical objection on the part of the Assad regime to using chemical weapons, not just because they have probably used them before, but because any regime that slaughters 100,000 of its own citizens clearly would have no compunction about using chemical weapons as well.

[Sir Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

When the right hon. and learned Gentleman says that we know that Syria is the only country in the middle east that possesses stocks of chemical weapons, will he draw attention to the use by Israel of illegal chemical weapons in Gaza—white phosphorus? Surely Israel, too, has such weapons, and we should take that into account in looking at the spectrum.

[Sir Malcolm Rifkind]

Let us use another occasion, if we may, to debate these important allegations. The issue is that the Syrian Government themselves do not deny that they have massive stocks of chemical weapons, and therefore the issue is whether there is any credible argument that on this particular occasion, in a district controlled by the opposition, the opposition somehow had both the capability and the will, and indeed did carry out this attack.

The inspectors’ reports will be helpful in two respects, I hope. First, they will give confirmation of the scale of this chemical attack. If only three or four people die, it could be argued that somebody could have been carrying around a bag of chemical agent and dispersed it, as happened in the Tokyo underground a good number of years ago. But when there are not just 300 people dying, but more than 3,000 people treated by Médecins Sans Frontières, clearly this was a massive chemical weapons attack which required rockets and a capability which, as we have heard, no one else in Syria has now or is likely to have in the short to medium term. Against that background, the inspectors could provide us with some helpful additional information.

The question then becomes, what is the purpose if military action is taken? It is not only going to be limited, as the Prime Minister has rightly said, but it has one overwhelming purpose, which has to be to deter further acts of the use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime. Let me be emphatic about this—I hope no one would argue otherwise—that at this very moment, the Assad regime in Damascus is watching very carefully to see whether it will get away with what it has done. If it gets away with it, if there is no international response of a significant kind, we can be absolutely certain that the forces within Damascus will be successful in saying, “We must continue to use these whenever there is a military rationale for doing so.” There is no guarantee that a military strike against military targets will work, but there is every certainty that if we do not make that effort to punish and deter, these actions will indeed continue.

The other point that must concentrate all our minds very comprehensively is that a failure to act is not in itself an absence of a decision. It has profound other consequences, not just the ones I have mentioned, and most profound for the United Nations itself. The League of Nations effectively collapsed in the 1930s when Germany and Italy effectively prevented any sanctions or other action being taken against Italy for the invasion of Abyssinia. That, together with other similar acts of aggression which the League could not handle because of the absence of unanimity, created a chaos which led to the second world war. So if we can take action that has the support of Arab states and of the bulk of the international community, far from suffering, the United Nations and the concept of international institutions and the international community acting to deal with such acts of aggression will be boosted in a way that would not happen through any other course of action.

I believe that what is being recommended and will come back to this House is not only overwhelmingly in the interests of innocent Syrian men, women and children, but is far more likely to boost the concept of international action to deal with gross atrocities and violations of human rights than simply wringing our hands, protesting at the action but failing to make any effective response to it.