Please, Cameron – no moral grandstanding over Iraq

If there’s a bright spot in the murky mess of Iraq, it’s that finally we have a war that it is impossible to paint in simple terms, as a battle of good against evil. This time, even our PM, the self-appointed heir to Blair, can’t grandstand about defeating ‘terror’ or protecting ‘innocent civilians’ because there’s terror and innocence on every side. He can’t pose as world policeman; stand side by side with Obama and say ‘we must not let this evil happen’, because clearly we already have.

Take ISIS, the Islamist group once affiliated to al-Qa’eda who’ve become the world’s new public enemy number one. ISIS have captured parts of northeast Syria and Iraq, and have begun to eye up Baghdad. They’re into beheading and stoning, even crucifying civilians, and under other circumstances it’d be tempting for both Obama and Cameron to paint them as the very apex of evil and the antithesis of all the West holds dear.

But as both leaders know, ISIS are not the only horror show around. Take a look at the ‘good’ rebel soldiers of the Free Syrian Army, the ones we’ve armed and backed against Assad, and you’ll see they’ve developed quite a taste for darkness too. You can watch them on YouTube, if you like, sawing off body parts from their Shia victims and wearing necklaces made of ears. The brutality has spread as if waterborne down the Euphrates.

Next, consider all the ways in which ISIS owes its success to the West. They’re a tiny outfit, just a few thousand men, but they’ve been able to capture great swaths of Iraq with remarkable ease, because ordinary Iraqis don’t care enough to fight. This is in part our fault. The man we backed, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, has presided over the collapse and corruption of government and the police.