Use of Chemical Weapons in Syria

[Defiant47]

I hope I don't give the impression I'm making points, I'm pretty conflicted on the whole thing myself. Call the chamberpot thread the "convince Antilogic of the general goodness or badness of intervening in civil wars" thread.

Didn't get that impression thus far. Just letting you know that I think I need a little cool-down time before I can discuss effectively

 

[ReindeerThistle]

I hope I don't give the impression I'm making points, I'm pretty conflicted on the whole thing myself....

The media in the US and the spin of the US "intelligence" discoveries as well as the general news blackout on anything but the Pro-strike line leaves many people conflicted. You know WH, tell me this is not history repeating itself.

Remember there were citizens of secessionist states who dud not want secession, and many abolitionists who did not want to fight in the War Between the States. We are still sorting those things out as a nation.

Let Syria deal with its problems without cruise missiles. This has not proven ever to be effective. But the US has made up its mind. Kerry said we are making our own decisions based on "our" (i.e. The .01%) interests.

Justice be damned.

Sent via mobile.

 

[DemonicAppleGuY]

Let Syria deal with its problems without cruise missiles. This has not proven ever to be effective. But the US has made up its mind. Kerry said we are making our own decisions based on "our" (i.e. The .01%) interests.

So...is Pax Americana not in our interests to continue?

 

[Rashiminos]

wait what

It was something you said about r16 in a WH thread.

through the use of a weapon that 98 or 99% of humanity says should not be used even in war, and there is no action, then we’re sending a signal… That is a danger to our national security.”

President Barack Obama

Oh how telling.

 

[Defiant47]

Let Syria deal with its problems without cruise missiles. This has not proven ever to be effective.

Libya.

 

[kramerfan86]

Libya was a radically different situation, but that doesnt change the incorrectness of the statement.

 

[Borachio]

“I am not sure that it will be right to assume that there is a government in Libya. There is no army, no police, armed militias are in control. There is violent chaos,”

http://rt.com/news/libya-gaddafi-fall-anniversary-981/
Still, only rt.

 

[Rashiminos]

Libya.

The intervention in Libya was effective at what?

 

[DemonicAppleGuY]

I don't think anyone is hearing that any "intervention" in Syria would likely change nothing.

Do you think that the US would be so timid about going in if they actually wanted to change the situation...?

 

[Defiant47]

A Canadian Perspective

We can’t fix every evil in the world. That is the lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan. It is also the lesson of Syria.

Sometimes, doing nothing is the least worst option.

Ordinary people often get that. In the United Kingdom, pressure from voters caused MPs, including 30 in Prime Minister David Cameron’s own Conservative Party, to reject any kind of British military intervention in the Syrian civil war.

I expect that the Canadian public’s war ennui is also behind Stephen Harper’s decision to rule out military involvement by his government in any strike against the Syrian regime of President Bashar Assad.

Canada’s prime minister suggested Thursday that his government would diplomatically back the U.S. if and when it does make such a strike. But he made it abundantly clear that even this limited support would be, at best, tepid.

“Our government has been a very reluctant convert to the idea that there needs to be some Western military action,” Harper said.

If all of this signals a tapering off of Western hubris, then maybe we are getting somewhere.

Such hubris knows no ideological bounds. In 2003, conservatives, including Harper, lauded then U.S. president George W. Bush’s plan to bring democracy to Saddam Hussein’s Iraq at the point of a bayonet.

These days it is liberals who constitute the war party, as they call on America’s current president, Barack Obama, to punish Assad.

Yet hawks in both camps conveniently forget the calculus of armed conflict: It’s easy to get into war; it’s more difficult to get out.

Yes, there are times when war is necessary. Hitler did need to be stopped in 1939. In hindsight, it would have been better to stop him earlier.

And there are times when military intervention is easy. The U.S. suffered no harmful consequences from its 1983 invasion if Grenada, nor from its 1989 invasion of Panama

NATO’s 1999 attack on Serbia was, in fact, a war crime. But by allowing Kosovo to separate relatively peacefully from Serbia, it caused little lasting damage.

Yet far too often, the law of unintended consequences plays itself out. The abortive 1961 U.S. attack on Fidel Castro’s Cuba led directly to the 1962 missile crisis, which brought the world close to nuclear war. America’s war in Vietnam allowed the murderous Khmer Rouge to take power in next-door Cambodia.

The Afghan war destabilized Pakistan. Bush’s Iraq war led to chaos and strengthened the hand of Iran. The war against Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi spilled over into Mali.

In the looming Syrian conflict it is hard to have much faith in Obama. He says any attack on Assad would be merely a “shot across the bow.” If so why bother? Yet if he plans more than a symbolic attack, how far does he intend to go?

Indeed, Obama’s comments suggest he has appointed himself as a weird kind of war umpire: Yes, you can use napalm to kill schoolchildren (which, as the BBC reports, happened recently in Syria). But you can’t use mustard gas.

Throughout all of this, it’s hard not to conclude that Obama’s real aim is to extricate himself from a trap of his own making. Last year, in the midst of the U.S. presidential election campaign, he warned Assad that America would intervene militarily if the regime’s chemical weapons stockpile were deployed by anyone.

Now, as U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged Friday, Obama has to follow through if he is retain his credibility.

But will such follow-through make the situation any better? Britain’s House of Commons is skeptical. So is the German government. So, clearly, is Harper.

Canada’s prime minister would have been better advised to maintain his earlier stance on Syria which, simply put, called for a political solution without foreign military involvement.

But his new position, to offer Washington reluctant diplomatic support but nothing else, is probably the next best option.

It is also very Canadian.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/...t_doing_nothing_is_sometimes_best_walkom.html

 

[innonimatu]

Oh no, the US is far from "pro-assad". There are simply no good outcomes here for the US.

That doesn't mean it is necessarily a net gain for the US to depose the regime.

The US did not succeed in imposing a regime in Afghanistan, Iraq, or Libya. Why would Syria be different? It wouldn't. We've learned our lesson.

The purpose was never to impose regimes. It was to destroy regimes. And, in the process, the countries themselves, their social fabric and their infrastructure. Nations that are internally divided and have weak governments are permeable to all kinds of pressures. They're reduced to protectorates. This is neo-colonialism.

I find it far more reasonable to conclude that Asaad is genuinely a horrible person who would commit such heinous acts, than that the U.S. is seeking to charge forward into a war that its people and the international community disagrees with.

I find it more reasonable to conclude that Bush and Obama were genuinely horrible people responsible for the killings of hundreds of thousands of people, than that the US is waging wars for the protection of citizens of other countries.

I am currently blinded and paralyzed by outrage at some nations' complete and utter disregard for human life. I will address your points there sometime later.

An armchair warmonger complaining about complete and utter disregard for human life...

The intervention in Libya was effective at what?

Destroying a country that was getting very rich by african standards and increasingly trading with asian companies instead of the european and american ones. Imagine if people in the other colonies though they could get away with that!

 

[Defiant47]

An armchair warmonger complaining about complete and utter disregard for human life...

I would volunteer in a heartbeat. But Canada is holding off. And there'll be no boots on the ground regardless.

 

[DemonicAppleGuY]

The purpose was never to impose regimes. It was to destroy regimes. And, in the process, the countries themselves, their social fabric and their infrastructure. Nations that are internally divided and have weak governments are permeable to all kinds of pressures. They're reduced to protectorates. This is neo-colonialism.

Usually taking advantage of a country involves installing a puppet regime. Did the US do that (successfully)? Nope. Iraq belongs to the Iranians now. And Afghanistan and Libya are hellholes.

I find it more reasonable to conclude that Bush and Obama were genuinely horrible people responsible for the killings of hundreds of thousands of people, than that the US is waging wars for the protection of citizens of other countries.

Be realistic here. People are rarely evil. It's all about strategy man.

Destroying a country that was getting very rich by african standards and increasingly trading with asian companies instead of the european and american ones. Imagine if people in the other colonies though they could get away with that!

You're a very silly man.

 

[Gucumatz]

The US was considered a hellhole for years by Europeans after our independence. Libya is going through a post-Gadhafi acclimatization. The fact that its a hellhole now, is completely irrelevant to the fact that that for American interests the operation in Libya was a success - and from a political view, perfectly natural and not at all worrisome

 

[Kaitzilla]

Cut him some slack.

What else is there to do in Greece but go online and spew lies about a country that is much more financially sound?

We are more financially sound than Greece?



Thanks, I'm gonna have a grin now all day

 

[Commodore]

Libya.

Yes because Libya is just the absolute beacon of freedom and stability in the region right now....

 

[Commodore]

The US was considered a hellhole for years by Europeans after our independence. Libya is going through a post-Gadhafi acclimatization. The fact that its a hellhole now, is completely irrelevant to the fact that that for American interests the operation in Libya was a success - and from a political view, perfectly natural and not at all worrisome

The difference though is that the US became relatively stable within a decade or two, while I am about 96% certain Libya will still be a hellhole 30 years from now.

 

[Defiant47]

Yes because Libya is just the absolute beacon of freedom and stability in the region right now....

It's a shining beacon of "so much better than Gaddafi slaughtering people indiscriminately".

Intervention is not meant to automatically create a haven instantly.

The difference though is that the US became relatively stable within a decade or two, while I am about 96% certain Libya will still be a hellhole 30 years from now.

I disagree. It has a good chance now.

 

[Lord Baal]

wait what

I paraphrased something you said once when I put him on ignore. He seems to think being the first person on CFC to annoy me to the point where I elected to use the ignore function is somehow a victory.

 

[DemonicAppleGuY]

We are more financially sound than Greece?



Thanks, I'm gonna have a grin now all day

I hope you're joking. I don't think any reasonable person on this forum believes the US is not more financially sound than Greece. Or most of the Eurozone for that matter.