Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Wasn’t the British Chief of the General Staff, Sir Richard Dannatt, right to say about Iraq that ‘our presence exacerbates the security problems’?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In reply to the Leader of the Opposition: Sir Richard Dannatt said a number of things. He also said:

We all want to get out, but until there is a sufficiently stable environment to allow democracy to flourish we can’t.

I agree with him. The question in October 2006 that both the government and the opposition have got to appropriately answer is simply this: what would happen if the coalition left Iraq now? Would that be a boost for terrorism or would it be a defeat for terrorism? It would be a boost for terrorism. Would it be likely to promote democracy in Iraq? It would be likely to promote further chaos in Iraq. Would it be a defeat for the terrorists? No, it would be a victory for the terrorists. It would be an enormous boost for the jihadist cause all over the world. The jihadists would cheer. They would say: ‘We have beaten the Americans. We have beaten the British. We have beaten the West. We have beaten the coalition. Let us go on and carry our cause to the four corners of the earth.’ I cannot think of anything more calculated to give the terrorists a boost than the cut-and-run defeatist philosophy of the Leader of the Opposition.