Pretty much everyone in New Zealand agrees that ISIS is a barbaric organisation. Videos of public beheadings and burning people alive turn our stomachs.
Before we rush off to war, we should try to understand how such a barbaric organisation came to administer such a large territory and achieve some degree of support from the local populace.
The answer lies in the way the largely Sunni people in the territory were mistreated by the mainly Shia regimes in Syria and Iraq and the corruption of those regimes.
Even Iraq’s vice-president for reconciliation, Iyad Allawi, recognises this problem. He says there is currently “widespread ethnic cleansing” of Sunnis in the territory surrounding Bagdad and “scores and scores of people… have been expelled from their areas and they can’t go back because of the dominance of militias.” He is backed up by another senior Iraqi official, Dr Hisham al-Hashimi who says the tribes in the area “have started to reflect on the idea of joining ISIS. The tribes believe that there are moves to deport them from their lands.”
In this context US air strikes only make things worse, increasing Sunni support for ISIS. The Sunni populace is not well-disposed to the Americans to start with. They remember the death and destruction visited on their communities following the 2003 invasion of Iraq by the US-led “coalition of the willing”.
Air strikes don’t make us as sick the stomach as the ISIS beheadings. Following an air strike we never see the blood-splattered bodies on the ground or hear the anguished groans of the injured. Most of the casualties of these air strikes are inevitably civilians, for two reasons. Firstly, most of the targeted ISIS fighters would be living among the people, rather than in separated barracks (where they would be more vulnerable to air raids), Secondly, the US-led forces target economic infrastructure in the ISIS-controlled territory, particularly oil installations, and this often results in “collateral” civilian casualties.
New Zealand joining the US military crusade in Iraq will probably be counter-productive, helping ISIS garner more Sunni support as it takes on yet another pro-Shia “foreign invader”.
If New Zealand really wants to help the Iraqi people it would be better to provide more aid for the social and economic development in the territory controlled by the Iraqi and Kurdish governments.
On the UN Security Council, New Zealand could be advocating moves to restrain those outside parties who still supply ISIS with arms and other essential supplies.
“If New Zealand really wants to help the Iraqi people it would be better to provide more aid for the social and economic development in the territory controlled by the Iraqi and Kurdish governments. On the UN Security Council, New Zealand could be advocating moves to restrain those outside parties who still supply ISIS with arms and other essential supplies.”
…. exactly!
Iraq have asked NZ to help. If we don’t rid the world of this menace, it will be on our doorstep. Perhaps it already is.
They said the same balderdash about Vietnam. This an equally disastrous blunder, and in we are going boots and all with the same silly catch-cries. Depressing…
New Zealand is a rare country in that it actually has the luxury of being able to follow a more independent/neutral path in world affairs thanks to its geographical location. We could easily be focusing completely on humanitarian roles but like a lot of things, the advantages we have in this area are being squandered by the present government.
One of the great ironies of New Zealand sending troops to Iraq is that the money we spend to buy petrol goes to the Saudis to pay for weapons for IS to kill New Zealand troops.
There is a significant difference between an airstrike and a beheading in terms of how it is done.
Even today a pilot flying a 20 ton combat jet at 900km/h is at risk of making a mistake. He probably has only seconds to positively identify his target, knowing there is nothing he can do once the aircraft has discharged the ordnance. Most pilots would be very upset if you told them they killed innocent people.
Sure they are part of a military machine with massive capability for death and destruction, but you have a prospect of them being tried if it is found they deliberately sought to murder innocents. Sure their indoctrination is to turn them into people who will fight, but as the many who have gone before them, they understand orders are orders. They joined the military to serve their nation. Many are probably quietly horrified at U.S. government policy, but as soldiers it is the job of their superiors to make sure that if military fire power has to be used it is being used for a good reason. The ordinary soldier, sailor, airman, marine has the task of delivering that fire power.
A militant group with no obvious morals or ethics, would not care a dime. Trying them would make no difference as western law is that of the infidels to them. Sad but true.
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