David Cameron Syria Vote Fails In UK Parliament

The David Cameron Syria war vote has not passed the House of Commons in the UK.

The motion to launch military action against Syria following that country’s use of chemical weapons in its ongoing civil war failed by a vote of 285 to 272 in the British parliament.

The British prime minister apparently was unable to convince lawmakers that a military intervention was justified on humanitarian grounds. The BBC reports that “It effectively rules out British involvement in any US-led strikes against the Assad regime.”

Another parliamentary vote could come next week, however. “The prime minister said no decision to act had been made and that the UK wouldn’t become involved in military action until a further parliamentary vote, due next week, after inspectors from the United Nations report their findings on the use of chemical weapons last week. Western governments have said the Assad regime carried out the attack.”

The Guardian reports that Cameron told the House of Commons that there were nearly 100 videos “of people dying in a gas attack in a suburb of Damascus two weeks ago” but he also conceded that “there could be no 100% certainty about the intelligence on which Britain would have to make a decision on whether to intervene in Syria.”

President Obama this week said that he hasn’t decided on intervening in Syria after it reportedly used poison gas on on its own citizens. Over 100 lawmakers on both sides of the aisle in the House of Representatives want the president to seek Congressional approval for launching any military strike as required by the US Constitution.

Although remaining generally supported of the president in this regard, House Speaker John Boehner has called upon the president to explain to the American people how intervening in Syria would secure US national security objectives.

Apart from the opposition to getting entangled in another Middle East war, much of the resistance to military action is that intervening against the Assad regime puts the US in a position of helping the Al Qaeda-linked rebels.

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