Article published in The Times, 9 February 2016. © Richard Kemp
Following a leaked UN report alleging war crimes by the Saudi-led coalition against civilians in Yemen, there have been calls, including by Jeremy Corbyn, for Britain to cease supplying military equipment and to withdraw our military advisers.
The Saudis are not fighting this war as we would. That is true also of the Afghan, Iraqi, Libyan, Malian and Nigerian forces that we have trained, armed, funded, advised and fought alongside. I knew an Iraqi military unit whose immediate action under attack was to form the “death bloom”, spraying rapid fire in every direction at anything that moved.
In fighting the global war on terrorism, our preferred policy is to support and advise the indigenous forces of countries where violent jihad is taking a hold in a way that threatens our interests and those of our allies. This is preferable to deploying our own combat forces to deal directly with the problem, especially in the wake of long and costly campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Such support, sometimes including military trainers and advisers in headquarters or at the front, not only helps to defeat the threat but also buys vital political influence.
We do all that we can to induce the local forces to fight according to the laws of armed conflict. But we cannot always dictate to them and if we were to make our support for them conditional on them fighting exactly as we do, then this policy would cease to exist and we would either have to accept the growing threats against us or send in our own troops. Of course we do have red lines, and our forces cannot actively participate in operations that breach the laws of armed conflict. Continue reading