I don’t think the case that this is in the American national interest has been made, and I don’t think sending airstrikes is going to accomplish anything whatsoever other than helping Obama save face because he vowed to take action. If Obama was actually advocating removing Assad from power, it would require ground troops, but at least then he’d have a clear explanation for what the hell we are doing this for. As it stands, not only will a few missiles NOT remove Assad from power (unless we get real lucky), but they probably won’t stop him from using more chemical weapons, either.
Obama’s face isn’t value-less, and there is some national interest in saving it. But it’s the most asinine thing ever for the President to say “I vow to do a stupid, pointless, violent thing that the world will never support if condition X occurs” and then when condition X occurs, say “Well, now America has to support me because I’m the President and if I look foolish, you all look foolish with me.” What other bullshit can he drag us into on that pretext?
Holy shit, a discussion on which I’m going to agree with UPF. This should be fun.
“Go Team!!” is a great thing when it comes to a football game, but “go to war, team” is altogether a different story. If it has already started, then okay, get in, get out, and get it over. But this one is ridiculous in any regard.
In Texas terms, Israel is just a country mile down the road from Syria and they have the fourth largest nuclear war machine on the planet (now that they used the US to annihilate the previous of their non-nuclear fourth largest just south of them. On top of that, they have more money with which to propagate their expansion program than all of America. If they want to get rid of any more of their neighbors, they have more than enough to do it for themselves.
Yeah, wouldn't that be great if Obama, in a conversation none of us will ever know the details of, managed to say/offer/promise something that would convince Russia to condone us bombing the shit out of one of their allies? We can only hope.
i think this is a fair point, and a compelling one - but not compelling enough to warrant another war in the Middle East, which is what any strike at this point is probably going to entail. There’s a risk involved in not curbing the use of chemical weapons when and where it happens, but the risk of getting sucked into another endless military engagement in a hostile region is even greater.
Why get involved? The rebels are made up of Islamic groups. You want to overthrow a dictator who keeps these clowns in line? It’s almost Iraq all over again. Islamic countries need hard-lined leaders to keep these Islamic clowns in line.
Even if a military action ends in futility, the last thing the world needs is a new arms race where every country starts a CW program as an offensive or defensive weapons system. The message HAS to be hell no. It makes no difference whether it is CW or nukes or BW weapons, to not respond with more than words is to open the whole gamut of weapons development - again.
The opposition:
Russia) They don’t like the idea of chem weapons any more than we do, but they will do whatever it takes to maintain access to warm water ports. This means they have no choice but to support Iran and Syria.
China) China doesn’t really give a damn except for the conditional access to oil as a short-run solution to energy production. Plus, anything that keeps the western nations weak is a useful position as they work toward world dominance.
No matter what we do, it is a losing battle, but we need to look deeper into the likely direction of weapons development and see that we don’t need every country setting up gas production labs. Lose the battle? Very likely, but we need to win the war.
I changed my vote from undecided to no. Unilateral US action is not the way to go at this time. Obama should take his case for strikes to the UN. Assad has committed heinous crimes against humanity and should be prosecuted for war crimes as well.
I think we’ve been in WW3 for a while now and Americans just can’t see it or don’t want to admit it. If they’re trying to strike Syria, it’s for a reason, they were probably using the gassing as the fake reason. I got this thing on my phone that sends me news stories relating to whatever stocks you put in the app, and I got one the other day about, “which companies stand to benefit the most from unrest in Syria”. Exxon Mobil is at the top of the list.
I agree with You Smears, except so far it has been a shadow, a proxy-covert war. Now the fact is, that only for so long can You remain covert. The procedural openness has made it impossible to remain that way, and the nature of intelligence is such that at a certain level it's actual dynamics have to be faced, otherwise loosing face will no longer be an option. I think this is where it's at now, and the dynamics will not allow otherwise.
If we go after Assad and not the makers and suppliers of chemical weapons then we’re just hacking at the branches and not the root.
Those that supplied chemical weapons to Syria, are just as much to blame for over 1400 deaths, as is Assad.
So if Obama does nothing, or if he strikes, if we don’t also go after the makers and suppliers of Syria’s CW, we haven’t taught anyone, or the world, any real lessons.
