Haste Would Be A Waste

THE PHILOSOPHER George Santayana once said: “Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. It is a well-known fact that history repeats itself and that events that occur in the modern world are simply a repetition in an on-going cycle. Yet a vast number of people choose to ignore this fact and fail entirely to learn from the past.

A fine example of this is the current situation in Iraq. I can talk forever and a day about how the USA and Britain could have predicted the current situation by looking back on the past, but this is not the point that I wish to make. We have the situation in Iraq to deal with one way or another whether we like it or not. The question is: will we deal with it in an educated and sensible way or duplicate the mistakes of the past?

After an exceptionally turbulent sixty years since the end of British rule in Somalia, civil war broke out in 1991. A UN mission imaginatively known as the United Nations Operation in Somalia was sent to restore order in Somalia due to the famine that gripped the country. As is all too often the case with UN missions, its use of force was limited to self-defence, rendering the mission entirely ineffective. In response to this the USA established a coalition known as the Unified Task Force to embark on Operation Restore Hope with the mission of restoring order and alleviating famine.

In May 1993 the vast majority of US troops were withdrawn from Somalia and replaced by the equally imaginatively-named United Nations Operation in Somalia II which was just as ineffective as the first mission. The UN mission sustained large numbers of casualties, particularly in an attack on Pakistani troops during June 1993 and a few months later in the mission popularly known as ‘Black Hawk Down’. By 3rd March 1995 UN forces were withdrawn from Somalia in a very optimistic and victorious-sounding mission called Operation United Shield. To this date Somalia is in a state of anarchy and constant civil war.

The situations in Iraq and Somalia reflect each other very closely and it is almost certain that if coalition forces were pulled out of Iraq immediately, the country would descend into chaos, anarchy and civil war as happened in Somalia. The only way that this wouldn’t happen would be if a strong and repressive dictator such as Saddam Hussein took control of the country; but then the only positive of the entire war in Iraq would be reversed.

Both of these countries have very strong political factions that will stop at nothing to create a radical Islamic state. These elements will use any means possible including terrorism and will kill as many people as they deem necessary to form a domain mirroring the previous Taliban regime in Afghanistan. So many people seem to believe that if coalition forces were withdrawn from Iraq, all forms of violence would cease over night. This is simply not the case.

The violence against coalition forces would disappear, which would account for a sizeable part of the total fighting seen in Iraq, but the instigators would still be hell-bent on destabilising and destroying the established form of government for something baser. This would result in a civil war very similar to that seen in Somalia, which could last years if not decades without the support of foreign powers. The Iraqi army and police force are currently nowhere near capable enough to take on such an enormous task alone.

Like all Brits I would love to see our troops come home, but this can only happen when the British-controlled provinces are in a position where order can be kept by Iraqi forces. Currently, three of the four previously British-administered provinces are under Iraqi control with the forth due to go the same way very soon. The British troops have moved away from an active presence to an advisory and reinforcement role. This can only be good news and shows real progress toward the restoration of order, so it seems utterly ridiculous to destroy this progress by withdrawing troops immediately.

Recently I witnessed a protest outside the Students’ Union calling for all British troops to be withdrawn from Iraq immediately. This really angered and frustrated me, considering the progress being made, and begs the question: do these people live in absolute ignorance regarding the bloodbath that would occur in the wake of British withdrawal or do they simply not care about the thousands of lives of men, women and children which would be brutally taken under a radicalised re-submergence in Iraq?

letters@student-direct.co.uk