Cameron’s Syrian stew

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[/audioplayer]David Cameron doesn’t do regret. It is not in his nature to sit and fret about decisions that he has taken and can now do nothing about. But there are still a few things that rankle with him. One of those is the House of Commons’ rejection of military action in Syria two years ago.

This defeat was a personal and a political humiliation for Cameron. For months, he had been pushing for action against Assad. President Obama had finally accepted that something must be done following the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons. But then Cameron’s own parliament and party stopped him. It sent a message to the world about Cameron, as well as one about Britain and its foreign policy after Iraq.

Downing Street never got over it. In September, George Osborne denounced the decision not to help the rebels fighting Assad as ‘one of the worst decisions the House of Commons has ever made’.

The legacy of this vote complicates Syrian matters today. There’s the task of hitting Islamic State in north-east Syria, a part of the country out of Assad’s control. The military wants to end the absurdity of only hitting the terrorist group on one side of the Iraq-Syria border. Indeed, given that its Iraqi operation is resupplied from its headquarters in Syria, it makes no sense to limit bombing to Iraq.

But No. 10 is reluctant to make it explicit that it is not talking about bombing Assad. This is for two reasons. First of all, Cameron is genuinely revolted by Assad’s behaviour. He believes that someone who is willing to drop barrel bombs on his own people can’t be the answer to the question of what to do about Syria.