At 10pm Parliament will vote on whether to send British planes to join the US-led bombing of Syria. David Cameron’s drive to war has nothing to do with protecting civilians and everything to do with maintaining Britain’s status as the USA’s principal ally.
A vote to bomb Syria will mean RAF jets killing civilians they are supposed to be protecting from ISIS; another wave of refugees with nowhere to run and an increase in terrorism and support for ISIS in the Middle East and in Britain.
It will be a tragedy for the civilians of Syria if Labour MPs are responsible for adding British bombs to those of the French, US and Russians.
This is why we, along with hundreds of thousands of Labour Party members and supporters supported Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign to oppose the war and persuade the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) to vote against Cameron’s bombing.
But Jeremy’s decision to allow Labour MPs a ‘free vote’ weakens Labour’s chance to stop the Tory bombing, as we did in 2013.
We think Jeremy should not have given in to blackmail from shadow cabinet members and warmongers like Hilary Benn and Maria Eagle.
Jeremy’s retreat is a victory for Cameron and the belligerent ‘war party’ within the PLP. It is a decision that will rightly dismay the hundreds of thousands of Labour Party members and supporters who oppose this war.
More than a quarter of a million of us voted for Jeremy because we never again wanted to see our party corralling the British people into a war that we do not want and that only serves the interests of the ruling elite. We have all watched with mounting anger as right wing Labour MPs have undermined Jeremy from the start. We have defended him against attempts to divide and discredit the party by career politicians who have nothing but contempt for the democratic rights of the membership.
All the more difficult it is then to criticise Jeremy now. But at times of crisis sharp words are often necessary. By allowing the right wing what they wanted – the ‘right’ to back the bombing of a city of 400,000 people in Syria – Jeremy has sacrificed an important principle. The principle is simple: that Labour should oppose the wars demanded by the British billionaires, the right wing press and the venal political establishment. The lives of civilians and children in Raqqa are more important than parliamentary advantage, unity of the shadow cabinet or political manoeuvrings.
What is more, this is also a tactical mistake. Jeremy has missed an opportunity to demand unity on an issue of the highest importance, when everyone would understand why he was doing it and respect his strength for doing so. There is no more important issue than war, no higher principle on which he could have tried to call the right wing rebels to order.
After all, 75 per cent of Labour Party members polled opposed this war. Today’s Times says more than half of British people want to avoid getting dragged into another Iraq style criminal adventure.
The right wing will not be pacified by this move – they will be encouraged by it.
Some supporters are arguing that Jeremy’s move was just a tactical manoeuvre intended to postpone a premature clash or split with the right, we think it was a tactical error.
Jeremy had an overwhelming mandate to direct the PLP to vote against war. His failure to use it undermines his own authority, reinforces the privilege of MPs over ordinary members and will encourage the right to press on with efforts to overthrow him. The fact that the shadow cabinet torpedoed Jeremy’s proposed compromise on Monday afternoon shows the futility of trying to negotiate with blackmailers. John McDonnell and Ken Livingstone’s advocacy of a free vote did nothing to help strengthen Corbyn’s principled stance.
Jeremy was principled to fight to win the PLP to a collective position on voting against war. His attempt to convene the NEC and his appeal to ordinary members to urge MPs to oppose war was a welcome change which rattled MPs too used to ignoring the wishes of their members.
If, as Jeremy said on Tuesday morning, it is only a minority of “diehard” MPs that will vote for war, then it is an even more inexcusable concession to a tiny, but vocal and disloyal minority. Hopefully Jeremy’s supporters in the Party will have learnt one vital lesson from this. We need to organise, we need rapid steps to subordinate rebellious MPs to the democracy of the Party as whole.
The fact that the Labour leader and the Shadow Foreign Secretary will speak on opposite sides of the debate highlights the irreconcilable differences within the Labour Party.
Of course, Jeremy will speak, and undoubtedly powerfully, on behalf of Labour Party members against war. But Hilary Benn will add his voice to Cameron’s. Both will claim to speak for the Labour Party but Benn will be lying. The free vote means he can do so without being held to account.
Benn is the mouthpiece for those MPs who want to prove their loyalty to the British establishment by defying Jeremy Corbyn over questions of fundamental importance to our rulers.
The right wing will never stop campaigning to undermine the Labour Party while it is led by a leader who is opposed to austerity and war. That is because these issues are fundamental policies not just of the Tories, but of the class they represent – the billionaires, bankers and press barons who monopolise economic and political power in our society.
Since the removal of Jeremy is a prerequisite for restoring the Labour Party’s credibility in the eyes of the ruling class there has been an unprincipled alliance of anti-war (like Wes Streeting) and pro-war Labour MPs (like Watson, Benn and Eagle) who have used the issue to attack and undermine our elected leader.
They have accused Jeremy of trying to divide the party. In reality it is this disloyal parliamentary faction who are acting as a party within a party, with the aim of reversing the membership’s decisions and restoring the dictatorship of the PLP.
Next steps
MPs who insist it is a ‘matter of conscience’ to vote for war will have blood on their hands. But 250,000 Labour members and supporters will be keen to wash their hands of these warmongers.
Far from being a vote winner at the next election voting for war now will have the same effect as it did for Blair – a decline in membership and votes.
Labour MPs who oppose this war will be rapidly vindicated – just as they were after Iraq, Afghanistan, right back to Suez and the First World War.
Any Labour MPs who vote with the government to go to war in Syria must be held accountable to local party members.
Members should organise to select MPs who share our opposition to war and remove those who voted for it.
As in 2003, when the antiwar movement brought millions on the streets the responsibility now is to mobilise as many people as possible to halt a new war. We need to ensure that Labour Party members are at the forefront of this movement, that we fight to change our party, to change Britain and to change this endless cycle of bloodshed.
