Why shouldn't the US intervene in Syria?

Which of the following options, ON ITS OWN, would be a deal-breaker for intervention?


  • Total voters
    54
This was the most horrifying moment of my life. Reading this:
Well, it's true.

More horrifying than watching my friend die of cancer and scarier than being led at gunpoint into NYPD custody during my arrest FOR BEING A COMMUNIST.

Trolling is a cancer...? Yeah, cancer is too serious to make a good quip there. I promise you weren't arrested for being a communist though. You were probably arrested for being a disturbance.

On Topic: as it looks like Syria is acquiescing to turning over its chemical weapons, the US will have to fabricate more excuses fir regime change.
Likely not. Is it logistically impossible for Assad to turn over all of Syria's chemical weapons. I doubt the Russians are willing to help Assad do it. I doubt anyone else just wants to put boots on the ground to do it.

So if Assad agrees, how would it happen? Simple answer, it wouldn't.
 
@Demonic:
1. no, really, I was arrested under false pretenses in a raid. It was for political reasons.

2. don't be so sure that it's "logistically impossible" to turn over all the chemical weapons. Saddam and Qaddafi turned over their WMDs. And if the US knows where to strike, it can easily verify this. Or, are we still calling Iraqi mobile homes "biological weapons labs?"

3. the US will not accept the outcome, either way, and regime change will be forthcoming. Just 'cause you can't see them, it doesn't mean there are no boots there, already.

Sent via mobile.
 
@Demonic:
1. no, really, I was arrested under false pretenses in a raid. It was for political reasons.
d00d, proof? The arrest record ought to be public.

don't be so sure that it's "logistically impossible" to turn over all the chemical weapons. Saddam and Qaddafi turned over their WMDs. And if the US knows where to strike, it can easily verify this. Or, are we still calling Iraqi mobile homes "biological weapons labs?"
Except in Iraq chemical weapons were recovered by US forces. (Degraded to an extent, but still usable).

(Obviously these were not the kind of WMDs that were given as the reason for invasion, but they still existed)

The fact that Sadam could not effectively eliminate all of his chemical weapons is a fairly stable country it is not such a leap to say it is logistically impossible to recover them all in a country in open civil war. Especially with fighting near some of the depots containing chemical weapons.

3. the US will not accept the outcome, either way, and regime change will be forthcoming. Just 'cause you can't see them, it doesn't mean there are no boots there, already.
d00d, you silly.

The US will accept the outcome if it were a possible outcome.

Regime change is not in the US interests, well it is, but it is politically impossible.

Realistically, we can only go from the current regime to a failed state. EDIT: (or continue the current regime)
 
Realistically, we can only go from the current regime to a failed state.
Well, it'll certainly be a "change" for sure...
 
@Demonic: google ReindeerThistle and find out about my arrest record. :lmao:
Since the newspapers spelled my name wrong, I don't even show up there. Thank God, too, since my granma already had a heart attack when she heard about the arrest.

On Topic: failed states (Libya, Egypt, Iraq) seem to be what the US excels at making).

Keep watching.

Sent via mobile.
 
@Demonic: google ReindeerThistle and find out about my arrest record. :lmao:
Since the newspapers spelled my name wrong, I don't even show up there. Thank God, too, since my granma already had a heart attack when she heard about the arrest.

So it didn't even happen? Thanks for clearing that up man.

On Topic: failed states (Libya, Egypt, Iraq) seem to be what the US excels at making).

Egypt isn't a failed state.

Considering Iraq is a state with three nations, I wouldn't necessarily pin that one firmly on the US.

And lastly Libya. So? What's your point man?
 
So it didn't even happen? Thanks for clearing that up man.
My attorney who has my $60,000 in legal fees, would agree with you.

Keep lookin' hotshot. HINT: it happened before the Internet was a big thing, so you will have to go to the library.

Egypt isn't a failed state.
:what::screwy:
If you say so...
And lastly Libya. So? What's your point man?
I think that's clear.


Sent via mobile.
 
"Aggression" and "defence" aren't the empirical categories you're posing them as, Defiant. They are necessarily constructed within the terms of a specific narratives, most usually an ideological one. We call the Nazi invasion of Poland "aggressive" because we subscribe to the belief that the Polish state wielded territorial sovereignty over the area in question, and the invasion represented a breach of that sovereignty. The Nazis, in contrast, maintained that the territory was and remained German, and that the Poles were an illegitimate occupying force, so their invasion was of an essentially defensive nature.

Your rhetoric extracts meaning from any sort of argument that is not based on "empirical categories". Rather than address it directly, I'd like to outline how it can apply to other factors as well:

"Slavery" and "freedom" are constructed similarly in narratives. We call the CSA's subjugation of black people as "inappropriate" because we subscribe to the belief that humans cannot be owned as property and that the masters did not have the "right" to execute authority over what they believed to be their own property. The USA's terms of property were actually quite similar, that people should be free to use property as they deem fit; they only disagreed with whether people could be property.

The same rhetoric, Traitorfish, that you used to deconstruct the German invasion of Poland can be similarly used to deconstruct other moral quandaries, even though my attempt to do so above may have been insufficient or non-parallel.
  • From whence come inalienable rights? Any narrative could be constructed to provide or withhold freedom from subjects and actors.
  • Why should chemical and biological weapons be banned? It can be empirically proven that pain is usually greater when such weapons are used, but why is the distinction of "pain" a meaningful one?

And so on. If we subscribe to the "moral relativism" theory, then discussions of moral truths become difficult and/or meaningless. If we subscribe to "moral absolutism", in that there is an absolute moral truth, then there is a correct answer as to which, if not equal, of two parties is more in the wrong. Our task is then to parse the information we have and the moral truths we've estimated to date to arrive at a moral judgement.

What narratives can be constructed is again irrelevant. What matter is what narratives we construct. Where "we" means our philosophy and ethical structures that we have created to date. Empiricism is lacking in countless situations. It should not be a prerequisite.
 
My attorney who has my $60,000 in legal fees, would agree with you.
So you're not communist enough to take a public defender? Not like it happened anyways.

Keep lookin' hotshot. HINT: it happened before the Internet was a big thing, so you will have to go to the library.
So, it didn't happen?

Because unless it happened around 30 years ago, I'm going to guess the records are online somewhere.

And if it did happen 30 years ago, well you deserved it :P

:what::screwy:
If you say so...
How is it a failed state? Do you know what a failed state is?

I think that's clear.
Nope. I don't see your point on the failed states thing at all.
 
ReindeerThistle is so communist he was apparently arrested during the McCarthy period. He then redistributed his arrest record so that it can no longer be found.

I was arrested once for drink driving. I went to the hospital, took a blood test which proved I had zero alcohol in my system, and off I went. My arrest does not prove that I am an alcoholic - I do not drink and never have, which is why the breathalyser result came as such a surprise - nor that my arrest was "political." It merely proves that that particular breathalyser happened to be broken. When tested, after my blood test, it still stated that I had a 0.09 blood alcohol reading.
 
I am so glad you totally devo'd this thread to talk about me. You obviously have not read up on me, so I will summarize: I want you to give me attention on line. I like the attention.
Here is the news article about my arrest.

On topic: Putin today in his NYT Op-Ed clearly gave the American people much more credit than our own government does.

I like the fact he said he is not supporting Syria but international law. Kinda puts him on an even footing with Obama. Maybe a little ahead.

Discussion:
Does it matter whence comes the way out of a military strike? Unless the US government has another agenda, like regime change, the US would only come out ahead with a diplomatic solution.

Meanwhile,
U.S. begins delivering weapons to Syrian rebels: report

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- TheUnited States
has begun delivering weapons to Syrian rebels over the past two weeks, which marks "a major escalation of the U.S. role" in the Syria conflict, a report said.
The move by the U.S. spy agency the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) ended months of delay in lethal aid that the Obama administration promised long ago, a report published on the Washington Post's website quoted U.S. officials and Syrian figures as saying on Wednesday.
The shipments of weapons were delivered to Syrian rebels together with separate deliveries by the State Department of vehicles and other gear, the report said.
The arms shipments are limited to light weapons and other munitions that can be tracked, and the U.S. hopes that they "will boost the profile and prowess of rebel fighters in a conflict that started about 2 1/2 years ago."

I rest my case...

Sent via mobile.
 
That's actually a good, interesting op-ed by Putin. There are issues around Putin, of course. But I think his balanced stance on this is preferable to Obama's Rubicon stance (if they use chemical weapons, we'll attack). Several of the options in the poll I agree with as reasons the U.S. should not get involved:

- If they really supported the opposition, they would've done so years ago, not after a particular type of attack.
- An attack likely would increase instability and make the U.S. appear as an aggressor.
- As I understand it, it's not clear exactly who used chemical weapons. As the U.S. already got the Iraqi nuclear situation wrong in 2003, they'd best be absolutely certain before using a similar reason for war again (or you get the aggressor problem even more).
- There's no appetite for war in the U.S. With Afghanistan, there was an obvious reason to support it. With Iraq, most Americans supported it at the time (though I'm not sure why, other than thinking the CIA was correct about nuclear weapons).
- There's no international support. Putin is right in saying that there really shouldn't be foreign interventions without security council approval. Interventions without any foreign allies is even worse.
- The long history of the CIA (and U.S. more generally) interfering in foreign countries, and generally to support the side they believe is most U.S. friendly, which is not always the morally superior side. This in turn has lead to a view of America as imperialist, which isn't really desirable, but is understandable. The U.S. should really be trying to shed that image, not add to it.
- The ever-so-many better options for investment. Education, gang violence, infrastructure in the U.S., infrastructure in Iraq or Afghanistan, etc.
 
I am so glad you totally devo'd this thread to talk about me. You obviously have not read up on me, so I will summarize: I want you to give me attention on line. I like the attention.
Here is the news article about my arrest.

I just want everyone to recognize this is about as close as we will ever get to RT admitting he has never been arrested and is actually dirt poor and that is where his beliefs come from.

I like the fact he said he is not supporting Syria but international law. Kinda puts him on an even footing with Obama. Maybe a little ahead.
Except not in reality.

Discussion:
Does it matter whence comes the way out of a military strike? Unless the US government has another agenda, like regime change, the US would only come out ahead with a diplomatic solution.
Except you know, politics and reality get in the way.


About what? The US wants more leverage in the region. Not necessarily regime change. The US could change the regime yesterday if it wanted.
 
I am so glad you totally devo'd this thread to talk about me. You obviously have not read up on me,
I tried, but your personal files are all under lock and key by order of the House Un-American Activities Committee. You're so hardcore.

so I will summarize: I want you to give me attention on line. I like the attention.
Yes, like I said, you're a troll. Good to see you admitting it.
 
And so on. If we subscribe to the "moral relativism" theory, then discussions of moral truths become difficult and/or meaningless. If we subscribe to "moral absolutism", in that there is an absolute moral truth, then there is a correct answer as to which, if not equal, of two parties is more in the wrong. Our task is then to parse the information we have and the moral truths we've estimated to date to arrive at a moral judgement.

Moral relativism or absolutism, the distinction between aggressor and defender is not what you should focus your moral judgement on. Judge them by the entirety of their deeds. A provocation is only a small part. Focusing on the provocation will very likely mean the defenders will get off lightly.
 
Your rhetoric extracts meaning from any sort of argument that is not based on "empirical categories". Rather than address it directly, I'd like to outline how it can apply to other factors as well:

"Slavery" and "freedom" are constructed similarly in narratives. We call the CSA's subjugation of black people as "inappropriate" because we subscribe to the belief that humans cannot be owned as property and that the masters did not have the "right" to execute authority over what they believed to be their own property. The USA's terms of property were actually quite similar, that people should be free to use property as they deem fit; they only disagreed with whether people could be property.

The same rhetoric, Traitorfish, that you used to deconstruct the German invasion of Poland can be similarly used to deconstruct other moral quandaries, even though my attempt to do so above may have been insufficient or non-parallel.
  • From whence come inalienable rights? Any narrative could be constructed to provide or withhold freedom from subjects and actors.
  • Why should chemical and biological weapons be banned? It can be empirically proven that pain is usually greater when such weapons are used, but why is the distinction of "pain" a meaningful one?

And so on. If we subscribe to the "moral relativism" theory, then discussions of moral truths become difficult and/or meaningless. If we subscribe to "moral absolutism", in that there is an absolute moral truth, then there is a correct answer as to which, if not equal, of two parties is more in the wrong. Our task is then to parse the information we have and the moral truths we've estimated to date to arrive at a moral judgement.

What narratives can be constructed is again irrelevant. What matter is what narratives we construct. Where "we" means our philosophy and ethical structures that we have created to date. Empiricism is lacking in countless situations. It should not be a prerequisite.
I'm a bit hazy as to what your actual argument is, here.
 
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