Tuesday 5th January

The real story is often quite different than the one we are told about.  It is a bit like a doctor describing quite accurately the symptoms but not telling you the root cause of your illness, let alone hazarding a guess as to the possibility of you ever recovering.  And we have been here before; for decades after the Second World War we read of wars in Korea, in Vietnam and the evil of Cuba, when the real battle was of two seemingly opposing ideologies – Capitalism and Communism.  Or maybe in even simpler terms two Super-Powers who couldn’t even imagine the possibility of not achieving World Domination.  And then there was one…Russia imploded, or at least Communism in Russia collapsed, and America was suddenly the only Super-Power.  But even America soon discovered that being militarily and economically triumphant still would not guarantee that you would always win.  On paper both Afghanistan and Iraq must have looked shoo-ins.  I believe it was Prussian General von Clausewitz who said that “War is the continuation of Political Will by other means”.  He also said that an attacker should have three times the army of their opponent to be certain of victory.  America (with a smidgeon of help from us) had far more than that and yet has failed in both wars, just as they will fail in Syria/Iraq against ISIS.

And ISIS isn’t even the real story.  It is maybe just the most extreme exponent of a major battle of ideas in Islam.  Or maybe the real story is not the division between Shia and Sunni Muslims just as the Cold War was not really about Communism and Capitalism but about Russia and America.  The troubles in the Middle East, which extends from Libya right through to Yemen and possibly beyond is really a battle for Supremacy between Iran and Saudi Arabia.  And neither of them is particularly pleasant; both are regimes – one of a decadent “Royalty” and the other of a clerical hegemony which is secretive and almost impenetrable (though I am sure that the ordinary people in both those countries do not want War and aggression but simply want to lead peaceful lives with their families).  And maybe the real reason we are fighting ISIS is that Saudi Arabia is supposedly our ally and Iran is supposed to be the enemy.  And this struggle has been going on for decades too.  America once backed Saddam Hussein and encouraged Iraq (mostly Shia) to conduct a war against Iran (mostly Sunni).  That war lasted eight years and ended in a stalemate before Saddam became another enemy of the West.

But the real story may still be emerging, a struggle for Democracy in both of those countries may eventually end the regional discord.  Though look what happened in Egypt when they tried Democracy….