Commentary: Even intervention lite risks a quagmire for Britain

David Cameron has been warned he may be entering a diplomatic and military quagmire as he urges bolder action to support Syria’s insurgency.

First there is the question of the legitimacy and practicality of the actions he is proposing.

Short of being empowered by a full UN mandate, which seems unlikely as both Russia and China seem ready to play their vetos, any British action would have to conform to two sets of international conventions ­— those governing humanitarian intervention, and the Responsibility to Protect, adopted by the UN in 2005.

The use of military might, in whatever form, should offer the reasonable prospect of making things better and not worse. Much of this framework has been created in the light of what went wrong with the intervention in Iraq, and to an extent Afghanistan.

In both cases the outside force brought to bear was not particularly appropriate or proportional. In fact the US defence secretary at the time, Donald Rumsfeld, boasted about “shock and awe”.

And even if the Prime Minister intends to go for military intervention lite, with special forces as trainers, no-fly zones and the like, he will be expected to help rebuild Syria.

Assuming his team can find the right bunch of moderate, secular, western-facing insurgents to give to arms to, it is unlikely that things are going to get better in the country for quite a time.

It is set fair to stoke up an arms race between Syria, Russia, Iran and the Hezbollah militia on one side and a cat’s cradle of interests behind the rebels, including the US, UK, France, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the al Qaeda affiliate al Nusra Front.

The nasty sectarian flavour of this contest on the ground is now unmistakable. It pitches Sunni against Shiite, with the Druze, Alawites, Christians Orthodox and Catholic caught in a cultural and political no-man’s land.

Arming the rebels implies a belief by Mr Cameron that the fate of Syria can be decided by victory on the battlefield. Again we have echoes of what the West thought could be done in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The British government has been told that preparing the insurgents to defeat the Assad regime militarily will take three years at a minimum.

First the best elements of the Free Syrian Army would have to be taken away from Syria to be trained up as a disciplined force. This would take a minimum of a year.