French President Francois Hollande is trying to build a fresh military strategy against the terrorists who killed 130 people in Paris on November 13. He is right to seek a global consensus on action, but he must also recognise that an international coalition against Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) has existed for more than a year.
The coalition’s agenda was to remove Daesh and restore legitimate government, which has become a significant problem. Iraq’s government remains determinedly sectarian and Syrian President Bashar Al Assad’s remnant in Damascus has very little credibility.
Nonetheless, it is clear that Daesh must be removed from the Middle East. It is a savage and dangerous organisation that seeks to export its terror and sectarian divisions from the territory that it has carved from the collapsed regimes in Iraq and Syria, where it dominates an area the size of France with more than six million inhabitants.
When Hollande meets his allies — British Prime Minister David Cameron, United States President Barack Obama, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the new entrant into the Syrian maelstrom, Russian President Vladimir Putin — he should not focus on military strategies. Instead, Hollande must seek consensus on what the international powers will do after the battle is won.
The coalition needs to agree to establish some sort of order in the shattered territories of Iraq and Syria. In Iraq, they will have to work with the local inhabitants to build some kind of regional government that can then work with the central government in Baghdad, and in Syria they will need to support an interim regime, which will help take the country back to a new government as defined by the Geneva process.
The French will naturally be seeking quick military action, following the horror in Paris, and they will have the world’s sympathy. But the international coalition has to work with regional powers and local forces if it is to help rebuild the shattered nations of the Arab world.
