The Spectator

Friday

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: The ugliness of pacifism

From our UK edition

From ‘The Pacificist Vision’, The Spectator, 24 July 1915: It must not be supposed that the majority of Americans are pacificists, but there are enough pacificists to force a strong tide of feeling through the country. In the West an advanced pacificisin—what seems to us, when we reflect on the probable results, a hopelessly unthinking pacificism—is very popular. As an illustration of this present wave of pacificism we must refer to an article by Mr. Sydney Brooks, a student of American affairs, which was published in the Daily Mail on Monday. Mr. Brooks says:— "A friend of mine who has lately returned from a visit to America tells me that wherever he travelled he heard the Song of the Pacifist.

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 23 July 2015

From our UK edition

Don’t write off Assad Sir: Ahmed Rashid refers to our ‘Arab allies’ supporting al-Qaeda (‘The plan to back al-Qaeda against Isis’, 18 July). Clearly they are no allies of ours, so thank you Mr Rashid for pointing this out. Apart from that, his perspective is peculiar. He starts off by accusing Assad of plunging Syria into a bloody civil war. Clearly that is not the case. The civil war was started by Assad’s opponents, encouraged by the ‘success’ of the Arab Spring elsewhere. Of course we now see that the ‘success’ was illusory. He also suggests that Assad is finished. Now that his ally Iran has come in from the cold, I think it is a bit early to write him off.

The Spectator

Barometer | 23 July 2015

From our UK edition

Gesture politics A royal home movie from 1933 apparently showed the future Queen, aged seven, and her mother giving a Nazi salute. Like the Swastika, the stiff-armed salute was not invented by the Nazis. In this case they took it from the Mussolini and his Fascists, who thought it came from ancient Rome. Three Roman soldiers are shown making such a gesture in Jacques-Louis David’s 1784 painting ‘Oath of the Horatii’.But the US beat both Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy by using the gesture to accompany the pledge of allegiance. Hitler himself claimed the salute was one of peace, saying it meant ‘Look! I am holding no weapon.

The Spectator

Giving up the fight

From our UK edition

"Whether it’s in Iraq, Syria, Libya or elsewhere — as Prime Minister, if I believe there is a specific threat to the British people, would I be prepared to authorise action to neutralise that threat? Yes, I would." It is almost two years since David Cameron lost a vote on intervening in the Syrian war and he has barely spoken about foreign affairs since. He is now slowly returning to the subject, making the case for pursuing Islamic State in Syria. The recent murder of 30 British holidaymakers in Tunisia was almost certainly planned in Isis’s Syrian stronghold of Raqqa. The Prime Minister is making the fairly simple case that the military ought to be able to pursue the enemy. But there is no chance of the RAF ‘neutralising’ the threat.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 23 July 2015

From our UK edition

Home Parents would be able to have their children’s passports removed if they were suspected of planning to travel abroad to join a radical group, under provisions outlined by David Cameron, the Prime Minister, to deal with Islamist extremism. It emerged that five British pilots embedded with allied forces had been taking part in air strikes over Syria, which Parliament had voted against in 2013. Julian Lewis, the Conservative chairman of the Defence Select Committee, accused Mr Cameron of making up policy ‘on the hoof’. Lord Richards of Herstmonceux, the former Chief of the Defence Staff, said that in order to defeat the Islamic State, ‘tanks would have to roll and there’s going to have to be boots on the ground’.