Polly Toynbee was one of the first out of the traps in the Guardian, a newspaper which since WW1 has been more often than not on the wrong side of history.
She writes:
All I can say that bitter lesson was long in coming. It wasn’t as if the likes of Toynbee weren’t warned about sending US and UK military into Afghanistan and later Iraq. She only had to turn on her TV and see the millions of people marching across the world who warned of the dangers of intervening militarily in Afghanistan and later Iraq.
But, no, Polly preferred to listen to snake oil salesmen like Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, and over here, Blair, Straw, and the likes of David Miliband. And she wasn’t the only MSM hack who displayed such arrogance and ignorance.
If history teaches us anything it’s that putting military boots on other peoples' streets, rarely ends well for the occupied and their oppressors. In 2001 Toynbee only had to look across the Irish Sea to understand when people in their own streets are treated harshly and in some cases barbarically by foreign soldiers they often resist, and join organisations which oppose their oppressor. In the north of Ireland it was the IRA, South Africa the ANC, Palestine the PLO and in Afghanistan the Taliban.
It beggars believe those who supported the War on Terror didn’t see the link, but then their leaders considered themselves to be the masters of the world and all they behold, when they were in reality war criminals. And the likes of Polly Toynbee, who colluded with them, their enablers, who painted a picture which was far from the truth.
The very least she can do today is hang her head in shame.
She writes:
Here ends the west’s grotesque delusion that it could use its military might to turn Afghanistan into a stable democracy, a shining path of moderate Islam. In the shadow of New York’s burning twin towers, I was one swept along on that “something must be done” tide, that drumbeat for a war to stop terror and liberate oppressed people. We have learned a bitter lesson.
But, no, Polly preferred to listen to snake oil salesmen like Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, and over here, Blair, Straw, and the likes of David Miliband. And she wasn’t the only MSM hack who displayed such arrogance and ignorance.
If history teaches us anything it’s that putting military boots on other peoples' streets, rarely ends well for the occupied and their oppressors. In 2001 Toynbee only had to look across the Irish Sea to understand when people in their own streets are treated harshly and in some cases barbarically by foreign soldiers they often resist, and join organisations which oppose their oppressor. In the north of Ireland it was the IRA, South Africa the ANC, Palestine the PLO and in Afghanistan the Taliban.
It beggars believe those who supported the War on Terror didn’t see the link, but then their leaders considered themselves to be the masters of the world and all they behold, when they were in reality war criminals. And the likes of Polly Toynbee, who colluded with them, their enablers, who painted a picture which was far from the truth.
The very least she can do today is hang her head in shame.
⏩ Mick Hall is a veteran Left Wing activist and trade unionist.
