Thin red line

I will admit I never understood the argument that atrocities befalling other humans had nothing to do with me simply because they were far away. So when the Canadian government announced this week it was expanding its mission in Iraq into Syria to resist the carnage and brutality carried out by thugs in the name of God, my reaction was, and is; yes, of course. There is no other moral choice available. There are safer choices, but even these are illusory, offering only to postpone intervention—likely at a higher cost.

Expanding Canada’s mission in Iraq and into Syria is a moral imperative because we— by this I mean the West, or perhaps more narrowly, Canadians—have to stand for something. We must make clear, if for no one other than ourselves, that we believe in fundamental principles of life, justice and opportunity for all.

These principles must mean something. They are not slogans we tell each other when remembering past sacrifices. They are irrevocable ideas that define essential rights belonging to all humans. If we are not able to defend these ideas, if we bargain away the lives of innocent people in exchange for time or space, we diminish our own humanity. Bit by bit, we hollow out the part of us that makes a civil society—trading values for a warm blanket of ignorance.

The barbarians move closer to our gate— meanwhile our resolve to defend basic shared values has been shredded by decades of denial that those lives slaughtered elsewhere are worth as much as ours.

This ought not to be politics as usual.

Of course, all three federal parties have been out surveying their base, poring over polling data and testing their messages in advance of this announcement. What they say next, however, will define their suitability for the job of leading this nation.

Tories of most shades will endorse expanding the mission in Iraq and into Syria. The NDP will oppose it, preferring humanitarian aid and refugee assistance. It is less clear what Justin Trudeau’s Liberals will do. Pierre Trudeau, on the other hand, would have known instinctively, reflexively this is a moral test—not a political one.

The NDP’s position has the attractive quality of helping without actually getting involved. It will appeal to those shocked by the images of horror appearing on our television and computer screens. It will feel as though we are doing something.

But it doesn’t address the moral issue. That will come in a tented camp at a desert border region, when a child asks an armed Canadian aid supplier to help save his brothers and sisters, his parents, his village from certain brutality a few kilometres away.

What will be our response?

The world is watching.

Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin is assessing how much of Ukraine he can carve out and add to an expanding Russia before inviting conflagration. Latvia and Estonia watch nervously, wondering who will act to protect them from Putin’s growing appetite to reassemble the Soviet Union.

Such hunger, however, is never sated. In failing to stand up to this and other aggressors based upon principle, we do not avoid confrontation— we simply postpone it. We look away until we can no longer avoid the truth. By then, the cost of reasserting our values will be much greater. And bloodier.

In the mountains between Pakistan and Afghanistan, the Taliban wait patiently for the West to leave. And when we go, they will empty schools of girls, slaughter the police we trained and vanquish the judiciary. The achievements in terms of the lives of Afghani people, gained over the past decade and half, will be erased by the rapid return of tribal warlords, free to reign again.

In Africa, the Arab spring is but a sad memory. Islamic terrorism is on the rise, threatening to topple fragile governments in the north and deep into the Sahara.

In 2012, U.S. president Barack Obama drew a red line for Syria’s president Bashar al Assad—if you use chemical weapons on your own people in your civil war you will bear the world’s wrath. Assad ignored the warning, poisoning as many as 1,800 civilians and combatants with sarin gas in Ghoutta in September, 2013.

The red line was meaningless.

Obama now says it wasn’t his red line—it was the world’s red line. I agree. But when tested, our collective defence of some important principles proved hollow. Not only was our vow to intervene empty—it has proved deadly to 160,000 Syrians who believed we had their backs.

rick@wellingtontimes.ca