War in Iran, Crawley Observer Column, Wednesday 4th March 2026

I know it will concern many that we are once more set for war in the Middle East, not least those with friends and family in the region, and over recent days I have been contacted by UK citizens stranded in countries which have come under bombardment.

Few will shed tears for a regime prepared to murder so many of their own people and in the last month I had already spoken with the Minister for the Middle East to discuss what the UK could do to support those protesting for freedom, and ask that the Home Office review proscription of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

Yet, in past discussions with Iranian campaign groups, the request has always been that the UK support a peaceful transition to freedom in Iran, not military-backed regime change which will inevitably cost many lives, both military and civilian.

In the wake of Iraq, steps were taken to clarify the basis upon which the use of UK force could be justified. The first strikes undertaken by the USA and Israel against Iran did not meet that threshold and consequently neither UK forces nor British bases were used. Legal experts have similarly been clear that US-Israeli action has violated international law, further undermining the structures upon which global peace and prosperity is built.

Following indiscriminate Iranian strikes on neighbouring nations, threatening British nationals, the UK is now undertaking limited defensive action against facilities involved in deployment of these drones and missiles, protecting UK bases and allies in the region but continuing to avoid involvement in wider US-Israeli action. Unusually, the Government has published the documents setting out the legal case for such action.

It is far from clear how this will end, but modern Middle East history suggests nowhere good. The Congress of Vienna, in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars, sought to stabilise both international and domestic politics out of the belief that war leads to revolutions and revolutions lead to war, endangering all. Since the Iraq War we have seen cycles of this across the Middle East. I fear a new cycle is just beginning.