“The 2003 invasion has tainted the idea of liberal interventionism. But the people of Homs should not suffer because of that

We rightly slam generals who are always fighting the last war, but I wonder if today’s peace movement is guilty of the same crime. The thought was prompted by a hasty glance at an email from the Stop the War Coalition.

I saw the words ‘rally’,  Syria’ and ’embassy’ and assumed they were organising a demo outside the Syrian embassy to protest at the truly shocking slaughter now conducted by the Assad regime against its own people. After all, Stop the War do not confine themselves to opposing military action involving British troops (they recently co-organised a demo outside the Israeli embassy to mark the anniversary of the offensive against Gaza). All credit to them for taking a stand against the Syrian tyrant, I thought.

But I had read too fast. Stop the War were, in fact, calling for a rally outside the American embassy, urging the US to stay out of Syria and its neighbour Iran. Its slogans were directed not at the butchers of Damascus, but against the planners in Washington.

There’s a one-word explanation for how anti-war activists find themselves more exercised by the prospect of intervention to stop murderous violence than by the murderous violence itself. That word is Iraq. The 2003 invasion of Iraq has tainted for a generation the idea once known as ‘liberal interventionism'”.

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