Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague opposite for his testimony. I do not doubt for a split second his conviction and sensitivity, but what I find terrible about this conflict is that everything happening now was predictable years ago. The country has been destroyed and completely ravaged by war. Control of the situation has been taken by the group that is most fanatic, most hateful and most heavily armed. They are completely mad. For them, life has no meaning. Death is a release, a fulfillment. Their idea of complete success is to give their lives for the cause.
As the defence against people like that, we need people with a real interest in defending their territory. The Peshmerga, for example. Peshmerga, by the way, means “those who face death”. They have been fighting for years.
If the Americans had taken the Kurds seriously from the outset, the situation in Iraq would never have degenerated to the point we have reached now. We have to start asking ourselves questions. Are we going to become the team that always does the cleaning up after the Americans have made a mess of things? Or are we going to end up admitting that we have to let people solve their own problems in their own countries? That does not prevent us from providing them with assistance, or even weapons.