‘US should form united front with Assad if it really wants to fight ISIS’

The US-led coalition’s bombing of Syria will not stop the spread of terrorism and will inevitably lead to an escalating cycle of violence in the region, Brian Becker of the Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER) coalition, told RT.

RT:The UN resolution is binding and will call on nations to adopt new laws and regulations. What could those be?

Brian Becker: In the case of the US, it has been arresting people for the last 15 years on the basis that they were somehow connected to foreign terrorist operations. Many of them were just set up by the FBI so that they could have big press conferences. I think the resolution actually will be quite meaningless – at least in terms of understanding what the cause of the rise of Islamic extremism or the so-called Islamic State in Syria is. That is the consequence not really of foreign fighters flowing into Syria so much, even though that is happening, the real reason is that Iraq has been fractured and Syria has been fractured and Libya has been fractured as a matter of US foreign policy, a deliberately calculated military policy that created the space for this. And this will only escalate the cycle of violence, with the US now starting to say that they have the right to bomb Syria over and over again for the matter of years. That will not stop the increase of terrorism that will lead to an escalating cycle of violence. That is inevitable.

READ MORE: UNSC demands tough global laws to stop foreign extremist fighters

RT:But when you have a frightened public back in the West, an average American person at home will think this resolution is great, they are doing something about it?

BB: Yes, fear is a very powerful political mobilizer. That is what Bush tried to do, Bush and Cheney when they tried to present Saddam as the greatest menace in world history, one armed with nuclear weapons or chemical weapons or biological weapons. The fact of the matter is though that if the US really wanted to fight the Islamic State they should join forces with the Syrian government which has done all the bulk of the fighting against these armed opposition groups who are really fighting with US weapons, with the money that has been supplied to [Islamic State] by Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia – the principal allies of the US. So if the US was genuine about stopping terrorism in Syria, they should take up the Syrian government's offer and offer a united front. But they won't do that because the real goal is still to overthrow the independent, nationalist Assad government in Damascus.

RT:What do you think the UK will decide about military engagement with the US against ISIS?

BB: Britain of course has hampered a little bit because the opposition from the British people stopped in a very historic way Britain from joining the US in the anticipated bombing of Syria last August and September. That still weighs heavily on the Cameron government. But of course the growing trend right now among the Western powers, the NATO powers is to join in. The US through the exercise of its undoubted military supremacy is realigning or disciplining the old alliances, and I think you will see the UK joining in even though the people in the UK don't want this.

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