from ation to the intelligence services and then that has been seized upon and it's being used to exaggerate in that case the threat from iraq but it will likely get a lot of specially you know we obviously britain is going to go and he's still there in a war in iraq what about syria because this story in wiltshire has moved syria off the front pages something apparently is still going on in good the russians are saying that it is the u.k. linked islam is of ghouta that he have the chemical weapons linked to. his sleeve to the government here in governing. i think it's extremely important for everyone parliament and the british public to start to understand what is going on at the moment in a broader geo political context and you're absolutely right to highlight the issue of syria here the west at this point in time appears to be facing strategic failure in syria in terms of the military operations in the attempts to overthrow the assad regime and what we're beginning to see in

a city indications coming out of the areas which the syrian arab army moved into are for example fines of chlorine which have been held by the rebel groups now of course we've had this constant political charged constant charge being leveled sad and the russian government and the sad regime for the use of banned weapons in the syrian conflict but we know that the rebels have been using them as world arguably . we don't know about their weapons there we don't know about the weapons in wilcher would you goes over to say i don't know would you go to the moment when visit here in london this sounds crazy the worst but he's on his way to washington and this is part although this side of things are part of a war with iran and of course russia would be dragged into anything conflagration of that well if you want to look at western policies from policy over the last sixteen seventeen you. years and this was confirmed by the chilcote report there's

been a series of attempts to change regimes to engage in overt and covert operations iran was listed in the chilcote reports around was and syria were mentioned in conversations between george bush and tony blair when no discussing when to hit various countries and i think if we step back a little bit and look at the broad contours of the last seventeen years we can see western military operations and regime change operations pointing towards are ultimately the end goal for according to some people being iran and yes we might well be saying this is part of a broader attempt to try to corner to try and pressure russia in the context of the west either trying to persist with its military strategy of hope of what they want to do perhaps end up with iran and this is all part of that broader dry as a propaganda drive to enable further conflict and further military engagement possibly ending in iran and this is extremely dangerous territory to be in this is

this is you know running us down the road towards a potential confrontation with russia in the middle east and this is something again that politicians in parliament and british public should be thinking about when we're focusing upon events and souls we should also be thinking about how this might be relating to a broader drive to demonize russia and possibly take is to a point to military confrontation certainly in syria with russia and this is none of this is to be taken lightly that this is a time for calm serious deliberation come heads and i have to mean i'm not hearing much about what i was hearing in the commons today well the minister of defense is telling this program is referring us to the chilcot inquiry as regards any of the allegations like this you were nodding while professor roberts was speaking there are serious. compare what is happening in this sleepy schools breed town with all

of this massive geopolitical game play but thoughts exactly thought get exactly how the pay is as right you described it elements and why this is so dangerous let's get back to core facts here no one has yet shed any conclusive evidence to connect the russian state with the souls pre-atomic it was an attack that's a really central page i think she doesn't use the attack because of because of nato i'm going to tell you the right way this is as there is no alternative conclusion other than that the russian state was culpable for the attempted murder and for threatening the lives of other u.k. since it's about so so the reason no other alternative reason they don't use the word attack is because of the connotations for nato but that's on ambiguous and as you rightly pointed out there's no doubt what the prime minister is saying here's a second fact and piers is rightly pointed out time for the second bag right that

visit because robinson thank you after the break we'll be joined in this special episode of going underground by the chairman of britain's oldest conservative think tank the bow group ben harris quickly. it appears and highly likely these are the words used by u.k. prime minister to resume pinning blame on russia for the poison attack on a former russian intelligence officer turn to british claims are made and threats long wars without evidence. it will become. clear as well. it was an.

official line. does not exist. to be a great source of. problems. and if that happens. all this countries have a lot of developments. welcome back i'm still here with. this special ops that are going underground reacting to u.k. prime minister decision to give twenty three russian diplomats a week to get out of the country we're also joined by ben harris quiney he's the chairman of the u.k.'s oldest conservative think tank the bow group welcome back to you and welcome to you ben you think is done nearly enough to address this atrocity in southwest well it's nothing i think we didn't expect it's the usual

procedural by the numbers approach and i think in the last week what we've seen is some very interesting foreign policy developments as the result of nontraditional approaches i'm talking about. diplomats. well what i would have done i think is presented more information to the public. and invited the russians as to recently did to comment on that. and then if the response was on satisfactory i think i would have separated this issue from what we've seen in the past on russia syria crimea stuff that really had nothing to do with britain and made the point that this is different because a british police officer has been injured. and approached in that way and then take perhaps harsher measures if russia wasn't forthcoming with an answer or do you think i do interrupted you with the fact that it was about geopolitics but it's

relevant to this is the problem here that reason may has it not ultimatum which if it's ignored she really hasn't got a stick to russia with in other words she has now created for herself a problem which russia can simply ride out and thought that undermine too is a maze credibility is a strong leader well i don't think it's a problem for theresa may but i also don't think it will see any shift in the position which is really what we're talking about donald trump's approach was. very unusual we had all of the commentators saying that this is extremely dangerous we're going to have world war three and actually it has occurred sort of career so yes and so this sort of procedural we're going we're not going to attend the world cup we're going to send home twenty three diplomats that it's not going to be any difference to either be the workshop would make it limbo never we don't really know we're not boycotting the world cup as a football team we're not sending ministers i mean who cares if there's a minister at the world cup and although i don't think anyone in britain is

loveable here treating go and be there would that make it because i know i think england the football team should be there because the world cup has nothing to do with what's what's going on with the with this poisoning the world cup is a football tournament. have your your respect in the old bo group history of south africa at the end of it. would be or you are but i believe people in britain only realise the importance of this address that yes but i don't i don't think that this should be allowed to overlap into sports but the procedural response that teresa mayes engaged in as you say is not going to shift. russian policy does a little bit differently and i think with what i think but i think there's a more important point it's not going to shift the decline in relations between the u.k. and russia that's this is my issue and i've made this point already on the program that the evidence is shaky there may be evidence but i haven't seen it the public hasn't seen it we've been told that. the prime minister seen it

on the road and as he denies insults jumps at his door we haven't seen the evidence either i think the british public should have been veiled of the information that the u.k. government is apparently acting on i don't think there's any national reason a.j. it's as national security considerations as she said also about the outcome of the living public inquiry these are far too secret for the british public to comprehend why a fleet i would completely disagree with i think if you're going to go no if you're going well i think when you're talking about the use of merge nerve agents by a foreign government. those sorts of excuses for not revealing why the u.k. government is taking the action it is taking leads to suspicion because agree right is and m i five is just next door and we see that it would put it into view of what you think of the they have evidence that they can tell and this is exactly the

point ben's making exactly the point that has to be made and it has to be made repeatedly because it's being ignored by the government we as citizens how in a free country i thought have the right to expect the government to justify this tremendously proud. measure it against russia then isn't saying that bad as you're saying lines now believe you now believe the security services i'm saying in the balance of the evidence that. this was of course the russian spy that was that was targeted is the nerve agent was extremely complex there are only a few number of states that could produce such a thing one of sixteen states right but but you know you've got to consider also the motive so i think there is certainly there is certainly evidence that would point one towards russia but clearly the u.k. government is saying and we have all this evidence that you can't possibly see well i think of this waiting you didn't support the iraq war you could see through that

how come you had to raise it may when she says there is no alternative conclusion other than that the russian state was was culpable well i don't agree that there is no other conclusion i agree that the evidence has to be laid bare my point is is that if the all of the evidence does indeed point to russian intervention then serious measures need to be taken so this is where i would differ from a jeremy corbin saying well you know we should really be moving towards war anything like that i think i'm not an op in saying i'm going to want a war with russia just on this and nobody really wants to know i think now is calling for war what cornell calling the cyber warfare actually came up with the threat of a cyber attack which is pretty dangerous because i reckon russians know quite a lot about that they want to escalate it that's a very good way of doing it but colvin seems to be saying is let's just hold off he's saying a little bit like you've said that we need to be careful here get the evidence out which is what we're both saying and then act accordingly whereas what too is amazed

on is he's he's jumped the gun she said think of men's pointing at russia and now we have to act which means that she's extended two or three diplomatic steps. to west nile relationship with i think the diplomatic steps of the problem. jeremy corbin's past record indicates that he is a peacenik by any estimation it's joy where is where is latvia's is yes where is where is on the realist i'm not a neo liberal interventionists i don't believe we should be traipsing across the world getting involved in conflicts where we have no business but when it comes to the injury the serious injury of the british citizen i think we do have business i think what it is we do have is to find out who it is and resumes as we know who it is yes i think i've i would come back on limits point though that you know we should wait and wait and wait i think the fact that there has been serious injuries to a british citizen and also there is genuine feeling in the british public at large that something should be done about this present some of it see i'm just saying

that the method it's that to resubmit. using are old and tired and point to that deferential age where we the public were told that the state has all the information they can possibly be told. if you are some fan of the donald trump but new rail quality you know theory is the thing oh yeah be really tough on the outside of russia and threaten russia militarily which is what drawn buggy bully appeared to do before this amazing breakthrough with relations between the west and north korea indeed fire and fury the title of this this book was based upon trumps threats to north korea which the president repeatedly denies any i may have to gauge right but he doesn't deny saying we will bring fire and fury which of course the the much of the establishment media dismissed and lampoon at the time but has now led to some some quite significant results in terms of threatening war and

bellicose statements yesterday the russian embassy released a statement saying that threat shouldn't be made against a state with nuclear arms now the united kingdom at that time had made any threats relating to conflict in. related to nuclear no i don't think i think that's an escalation especially when you look at diplomatic language which is very controlled and very new wants to in terms of what it is say have called this last action the twenty three diplomats say they have but i think the progression to talk about nuclear armaments is a further it's of aggression but but i think the problem with the world of this is that everything leading up to it has been to corner the american phrase and nothing but all of the stuff about russian agents you know i'm.