Brownlee Gerry: Ministerial Statements — Iraq—Deployment of Military PersonnelText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBrownlee Gerry: Ministerial Statements — Iraq—Deployment of Military Personnel[Sitting date: 24 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1826. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Defence): I want to speak in support of the statement made to the House this afternoon by the Prime Minister. I want to acknowledge some of the contributions that have been made by party leaders as we have gone around the House but also to take issue with some of the points that have been made. As Minister of Defence can I also thank those who have spoken in support of the individual soldiers who will be part of the contingent that is to be deployed to Iraq. I appreciate that although the political sentiment may not lead to support the individual support for those soldiers is very much appreciated.I thought the analysis of what the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is—Daesh as it should more correctly be known—given by the Leader of the Opposition was quite correct. I thought he did in fact sum up exactly what the problem is: this is a mercurial enemy a Stateless enemy and an evil enemy that knows no bounds for where it would perpetrate its evil. It is arguable whether it can even find its moral authority inside the Koran and there will be tens of millions of Muslims who agree with that. It is worth noting too that although we are moved by the high-profile beheadings and other atrocities committed upon Daesh’s high-profile hostages there are thousands of Muslims who are receiving exactly the same treatment from this evil outfit.If there is a theme that has come through even from those who are opposed to this action it is that the solution to the problems that we are currently seeing and to the threats that the world is facing from this particular evil has to come from the Muslim world. I am encouraged that when we met Dr al-Jaafari the Foreign Minister of Iraq he stressed that point with us. In recent weeks I have met the Foreign Ministers and Defence Ministers of a number of other countries in that part of the world and similarly they have expressed that view. That I think is one of the most significant differences between this and any other interventions in that part of the world.We certainly respect the desire of those countries to lead the fight against this particular evil. When it comes to the suggestion that in a country like Iraq we should somehow be concentrating our efforts entirely on improving civil society it denies the fact that it is a country pinned down by the evil that it faces every day—a country that does not have the capacity to reach out to someone who is opposed to it and somehow come to a point where you can shake hands and move on. As Andrew Little so clearly pointed out they are facing an evil that wants to set up a medieval-type arrangement across borders that have been respected for centuries. So the only way forward is firstly to be able to tackle that particular evil—Daesh—with military action. Iraqis are prepared to do that but they have said to us very clearly that where they can get help to assist with training their very large military force—some 40000 soldiers—then they will accept that willingly.I note that every one of the civil interventions that have been raised as prospects by the Labour and Green parties this afternoon occurs outside the so-called “wire”—beyond a military camp and beyond a boundary that can be protected just out there in the ether offering good advice to people about the best way to run things. Well that flies completely counter to everything that Winston Peters had to offer and that Peter Dunne had to offer. There are times when evil simply has to be put down and this is one of those occasions.The suggestion was that we can contribute more if we help a country like Iraq to diversify its economic base particularly in agriculture. But when you have a country where its most fertile regions are beset by daily improvised explosive device tragedies by kidnappings and by other just general lawlessness then it will not matter how many field advisers with clipboards and UN hats we put in the field there will be no change. There has to be at some point a Government that is supported to take control of its country and we observe from a Government perspective that the arrangements that were in place at the beginning of 2014 are quite differentto those that are in place now. Reaching out across the sectarian differences and factions in that country is something that we should be supporting.This contribution from New Zealand is very well considered. The ridiculous suggestion from the Green Party that this was somehow a deal cooked up in another country and imposed upon us is just that: completely ridiculous. We did not make any commitment at any point anywhere until the Iraqi Foreign Minister sat in front of us and said: “We want your help.” No one should be surprised though by the reaction of the Labour Party and the Green Party. On the one hand they will stand up and they will say: “We should be supporting a United Nations resolution here and if the United Nations is not telling us to go there we should not be there.” Well they are the two parties that defeated motions in this House to support United Nations Security Council motions in 1998 and then again in 2003. They want to have it both ways. On the one hand they say: “We will support the United Nations’ motions.” but when it comes right to it no they do not do it. And what is worse—going back to 2003 and to all this business about: “We have got to go to the House and get a mandate.”—where was the mandate for the intervention in 2003? Where was the House mandate for the 63 engineers who were sent to Iraq as part of the reconstruction in a war?There are some things about this whole involvement that give everybody cause for concern but if anybody sits in this House and thinks that there is no threat on a daily basis to New Zealanders they are seriously deluded. I will ask one question that I think everyone should reflect on: if we were to have New Zealanders or a New Zealander somewhere in the world grabbed by this outfit put into the hostage block and paraded in front of us where would we go for help? Would we simply say: “Well look don’t pick on us because we’re just civil advisers. We are just here to help with the agriculture.”? They will not make that decision and New Zealanders are at risk just as much as anyone else in the world.I think it speaks volumes for the decline of the Fairfax newspaper that apparently no one in the House—at least on the other side of the House—read in this morning’s paper of the threats posed to New Zealand. This is not something that we can just walk away from—not something that we can turn a blind eye to. I am sorry but simply saying that there are other ways of doing it does not face the reality of daily life in Iraq for a people who are doing their best to overcome the evil of Daesh.Hon Member: What difference are they going to make?Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: People over there can say: “What difference does it make?” yet I know that in other circumstances they will come in here and talk in all number of other cases about how one person can make a difference. Well what we are doing here is simply sticking our hand up and saying: “We want to get rid of this. We do not see it as being legitimate.” It is not about saying that there is a divide between the Western World and the Muslim world because as I said before the Muslim world is suffering from these people as much as anybody else if not significantly more.Our troops will go into this mission with the appropriate protections; we have said that we will make sure of that. They will make a contribution to the future security of not only the Iraqi Government which is legitimately in place but also of New Zealanders who travel so much around the world. And we are making a statement about what we are prepared to tolerate on our own shores. This is not a huge intervention; it is a modest intervention. Our people have the expertise to make a difference and we are very pleased to be supporting them in this endeavour.