As Parliament debates this latest resort to the favoured tactic of air power intervening in yet another Middle East conflict, this Blog can do little more than exhort readers to go back over previous posts because most of what can be said has already been set down.
The key points are these. It is not possible to destroy ISIL as it will only morph into something even more bloodthirsty.It is possible to halt its advance and degrade its capability. At best this means it will be a contained threat either within its own territory, or in the territory it loses and which returns to whoever controlled it before. None of this is likely to increase or reduce the terrorist threat to the UK.
To achieve even that objective, the ludicrous diplomatic position, which prevents vain politicians on both sides of the Atlantic from admitting that they have tied themselves in knots with a failed policy in the middle east which has succeeded in imploding Iraq, Syria and Libya and put several others at risk, will have to be abandoned. The critical line up of allies of the West in the drive against ISIL is Iran, Shia Iraq, Assad’s Syria, the Kurds and Russia. The meddlers who conceived, funded and still support this frightening rampage of religious nihilism are Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. Turkey buys ISIL oil. The moderate Sunni powers who can bring not only positive influence but also competent military assets to bear in support are Jordan and Egypt. The military power in reserve to stop things getting out of hand in the Lebanon and Western Syria theatres is Israel.
In that context the inclusion of British air assets in the battle, though potentially spectacular, is much more of a political event than it is a military one. It is said the RAF will deploy six fighter bombers for this mission. A single US aircraft carrier of the Nimitz class deploys about sixty.