Not so long ago, the story of a young refugee found drowned on Europe’s shore was front page news. Now such news is on page 34 (Dozens of refugees drown after boat hits rocks, The world, January 31). It doesn’t take long for tragedy to become the norm.
Syria is a catastrophe, with no end in sight. Those who argued against military action in August 2013 might like to ponder whether a chance was missed to resolve things. At that time, there was a recognisable moderate Syrian opposition and Assad was in retreat. A short, sharp air campaign might have been enough to topple Assad and his brutal regime. The chance wasn’t taken and now we have a fight to the death involving numerous factions, with none strong enough to win outright.
It was Ed Miliband, that nice but naïve and ineffective Labour leader, who pulled the plug on an air campaign that would have involved forces from the US, UK, Europe and the Middle East. And it was Tony Blair, former Labour leader and now reviled by many in the party, who remarked some years ago that doing has consequences, but so does doing nothing. We chose to do nothing in 2013 and the consequences are all too clear. You’d have to be very bold to claim that military intervention in 2013 would have produced a situation worse than we have now.
And where is the UN in all this? AWOL; again.
Doug Maughan
Dunblane
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel