“It's not going to be my political raison d'etre, I think it would be presumptuou…” — Crispin Blunt

Doing something to make ourselves feel better is beside the real point of defeating Isis and ending the Syrian civil war.

The creeping optimism that there might be a route to peace in Syria remains constrained by the elephant in the room - Bashar al-Assad.

The requirement for military force is clear when looking at the first of the nine points agreed in Vienna, which states that 'Syria's unity, independence, territorial integrity and secular character are fundamental.'

We are in this Alice in Wonderland world where parliament has approved a motion saying: 'notes the government will not deploy U.K. troops in ground combat operations.' It doesn't say: 'brackets not special forces.' But the convention is that it is 'brackets not special forces.'