---

Foreign Affairs and Defence

It is always a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig), whose sincere support for our armed forces, and indeed our veterans, is recognised in all parts of the House. I want to make a few brief points arising from both the Gracious Speech and today's debate. Once again it was confirmed to us that Parliament, not the people of this country, would be asked to approve the European treaty. I cannot think of a British Government who have shown greater contempt for the people of this country. They are motivated purely by fear: knowing that the British people would reject this surrender document, they deny them the promised referendum for which they—the Government—were given a mandate at the general election. Perversely, they have absolutely no mandate, not even in a footnote in their manifesto, to use their parliamentary majority to ratify what I believe is a constitutionally subversive treaty. In my view, the British people will never accept this gateway to the country called Europe. I was delighted to hear my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), the shadow Foreign Secretary, say that the Conservative party would not do so either. He suggested that nearer the time he might consult on the best way forward. May I give him a little premature advice? I believe that if by the time of the next election the treaty is already implemented and a unilateral retrospective veto cannot undo it, we must still have a referendum. However, the price of not having that referendum now is that the one we do have will need to be more fundamental. It must be not an in-and-out referendum of the sort suggested by the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (Mr. Moore), the Liberal Democrat spokesman, but a referendum seeking a mandate either to renegotiate for an agreed Europe of sovereign nations—which is what we originally joined—or, if our partners refuse that, to renegotiate, quite calmly, the status of the United Kingdom within Europe. For some months I have been unable to fathom what British national interest was being served by our troops' remaining in Iraq, and I have to say that I am glad they are now being drawn down. I have nothing but admiration for the courage and dedication of our armed forces and for what they have achieved, but at the same time I, too, am absolutely certain that we have no right to ask them literally to risk life and limb without a clear purpose for doing so. In 2003, the Queen's Speech spoke boldly of our ““rebuilding”” Iraq, but no more. We now talk about helping with ““political reconciliation””. The truth is that once the same Shi'a in Basra whom we liberated from tyranny began to turn their guns on us, we became part of the problem, rather than the solution. Whatever the official explanations may be, I believe that moving to overwatch at Basra airport effectively recognises that. The fact that there has been so much less violence since that move was made illustrates that point. I would like to see—it is not the first time that I have said this in the House—all our troops coming home now. If they do and when they do, we should give them a great homecoming of appreciation for what they have done on our behalf, but the truth is that we cannot solve Iraq. Nor can America. In the end, Iraq is going to have to solve Iraq, ideally with the combined help of its regional neighbours, which have a direct interest in a stable Iraq: Turkey, which cannot countenance the break-up of Iraq and the emergence of an autonomous Kurdistan; Syria, which is currently struggling economically under the burden of 1 million Iraqi refugees, with more coming across its border every day; Saudi Arabia, which is concerned at the potential threat of a Tehran-driven Shi'ite satellite; and Iran, which is anxious to avoid another Sunni-Shi'a conflict. The Baker-Hamilton report pointed the way to that and the Government should now press hard for its implementation. Afghanistan is different. There, our overstretched but outstanding armed forces are fighting for a clear British national interest: to prevent the re-establishment of a Taliban-controlled country from which al-Qaeda could again with impunity plan and launch terrorist attacks against the west. As has been sad, our troops have an enormously daunting task. It is not unlike driving water uphill, only to watch it flow back down again after we leave. We need to give our troops all the support that they need, both in manpower and equipment, and in letting them know that they are fighting on behalf of the direct interests of this country. At the same time we need to understand that sponsoring a local tribal leadership, an age-old habit of British Governments in the past, and winning the battle of hearts and minds could be as important as the military campaign itself. Those two must go hand in hand. We should not underestimate the importance of our relationship with Pakistan either. The traffic between our two countries is significant. An Islamist, nuclear-armed Pakistan, which is not an impossibility, would be an enormous threat to international peace and security, with serious domestic implications for us, too. When we look at what is happening there, we must beware risking throwing the baby out with the bath water in our reaction to current political events. From Lebanon to the west bank, I have rarely seen the middle east so explosively volatile. Polarisation has led to radicalisation and radicalisation has led to confrontation. As we have heard, the west is now backing one side and Iran is backing the other, and each of us is providing them with the arms for violence in future. Military action is not and has never been the answer in that region. Israel's war in Lebanon last year ironically left Hezbollah greatly strengthened and now Lebanon teeters on the brink of internal conflict again. Palestinian opinion is dangerously polarised. It is dangerous because confrontation will not achieve for Israel the security that she rightly requires; nor will it achieve a viable and autonomous Palestinian state living peacefully alongside Israel. My fear is that it will ensure only another generation of suffering and death. The proposed meeting at Annapolis fills me with foreboding because failure would be disastrous, yet it is very difficult to see where success can be achieved. In a conference of that sort, there are only a number of ways in which there can be success. They can do one of three things. They can crown a previously negotiated agreement; they can provide a forum for negotiation; or they can launch a new process. In this case, as far as I can see, there is no previously negotiated agreement to crown. Negotiations without a unified Palestinian team representing all parts of Palestinian opinion ultimately would be self-defeating. Merely to exchange a few aspirations and economic packages will in the end satisfy nobody. The real way forward is, as it has always been, through comprehensive dialogue, including all the elements that inevitably must be part of a lasting solution: Hamas as well as Fatah; Hezbollah as well as Signora and Hariri; Syria as well as Egypt and Jordan—they are all ready to talk. I know that; I have talked to them. Without undeliverable preconditions, I believe they should now be invited to join that comprehensive dialogue. If Israel and the United States cannot find their way to inviting them, we should. The world is changing. The days of undiluted hard power solutions of ““shock and awe””, which we will all remember from the beginning of the Iraq war, are passed, not least because we are learning that they did not achieve the purposes that they set out to achieve. In the words of the current Lord Chancellor, it would be ““completely nuts”” to use hard power against Iran. In these days of the Shanghai Co-operative Organisation, of the powerful Russian energy lever and of the clash of ideologies, my view is that we need to dust down our old manuals on soft power backed by hard. We used to be rather good at that. We had better start being rather good at it again soon.