she did this against the Bush administrations wishes, it would be like Boehner going in there nowThis pic I dont have a problem with. This is not some cozy dinner, it looks like official govt business
Attack on Syria is it justified ?
- Thread starter Mr Deeds
- Start date
Hindsight is beneficial but unfortunately not available pre action. I was against the Iraq war. Never understood the reason. And when it started it felt to me that the Us ties one hand behind its back before it fights. If you are gonna fight, fight. The rules of engagement that the US follows are bullshit. The enemy certainly doesn't respect them. And there is NO moral ground grabbed by instilling them. Your view that the US kills indiscriminately is way off the mark.
It is well known, now, that Bremer carving out the Baathists from the reconstruction of IRAQ was a fatal mistake.
Big difference between all rebels are terrorists or AQ, than some embedded among the rebels.
What's so different about Syria vs. all the other uprisings in the Middle East that we have seen?
If the majority of the rebels are terrorists, then the International Community would encourage Assad, save for any harm done to mothers and children.
That and having literally no idea how to provision clean water and electricity, post invasion, despite those facilities having been prominent strategic targets.
That mistake was literally fatal for many Iraqis, and the fathers and brothers of the dead children enlisted in the resistance in droves.
Its just getting started. So it is an unfair comparison. But hey, dont let that stop you from making your conclusions.
Pictures like that with both facing the middle of the room are from press ops, not from actual business getting done.This pic I dont have a problem with. This is not some cozy dinner, it looks like official govt business
The Onion does a bang up job once again...
http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-majority-of-americans-approve-of-sending-cong,33752/
http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-majority-of-americans-approve-of-sending-cong,33752/
I agree that that they ran sanctions for years longer than that should. Sanctions were a good idea but didn't wor k the way they were supposed to. When it became clear that they were only hurting the people and not the regime, then military options should have been moved forward.
The real missed opportunity was the rebellion in Basra. When that happened, the US could have supported it the same ad in Libya. Iraqis could then have toppled Saddam with support from the outside.
So if all you morons cheering for the US involvement in the Syrian situation and removal of the Assad regime (despite what that a**hat Kerry says about how it's not about regime change) are so educated about the situation - can you care to explain why they didn't (nor did the Western media) lift one finger against Bahrain or Saudi Arabia (which happens to be the worst Islamist dicatorships in the ME, more so than Iran) when they violently and brutally crushed the uprisings occuring in their states?
It's hard to call Saudi Arabia a worse dictatorship than Syria. Al Assad has killed a hundred thousand people now. Syria is attracting attention because of the unbelievable scale of the loss of life.
Here is a number for you: 426. The number of children killed in the sarin gas attack.
I agree though that it is shameful that we didn't give the Bahrain protesters at least moral and diplomatic support.
Whatever anybody thinks of the syrian government, and it is hard to believe anybody is happy about it, it is disingenious to say that Assad has killed 100,000 people. The civil war in Syria has taken 100,000 lives.
Saudi Arabia is the largest Western supporter in the Middle East after Israel, plus it has oil and ever since the 1980's has routinely bent to western pressure to maintain or increase oil supplies even when OPEC tries to do the opposite.
The problem with Saudi Arabia is that while the majority of the princes in the royal as well as the religious leadership are vehemently anti-West and oppress the people by flooding them with anti-West propaganda, the King remains a staunch ally of the West. Until that changes, nothing will happen to the Kingdom.
Consider for a moment a simple comparison: Why did the US invade Iraq when Pakistan is known to have stronger ties to Al Qaeda and various other anti-West terrorist regimes? Because Pakistan is a strong ally. Pakistan provides the bulk of UN protection forces. Eliminate Pakistan as an ally, and suddenly the West needs to supply the troops required to secure her own interests instead of relying on Pakistan. The West can't afford that.
This trend will always continue. Those who are willing to help the West are allowed to get away with bad things while those who don't are treated harshly.
Here's my question to you: Does it matter? Look at cancer research. Maybe breast cancer kills more people than skin cancer. But imagine we suddenly found a promising new treatment that might just cure skin cancer. The problem is that it's time sensitive and we need to devote all resources away from all other cancer research to develop it. Surely there is something to be gained from doing exactly that. Of course, breast cancer is left with no research until we complete the investigation into this new treatment option, but if we eliminate a form of cancer, can't we still call that a win? Breast cancer isn't going anywhere, we can get to it later. Likewise, should the Middle East find stability and only a handful of oppressive regimes are left, we can go after the Kingdom or Pakistan then. We don't need to alienate allies now, they'll still be there if we find ourselves in a position to get the support we need elsewhere down the road and decide to go clean them up too.
The American public was lied to about WMDs in Iraq. They were lied to about Saddam's links to Al Qaeda. But no one can rely deny that Saddam was an evil man who oppressed people, engaged in genocide and deserved to be removed from power. If it weren't for the lying, I would've supported such an action personally. Are there worse dictators out there? Absolutely. But even if you help just a handful of people, that's better than helping none. It's the same when people complain about corporations getting rich or pipelines getting built. Sure, maybe that happens. But if we help people and can put an end to genocide even if it's just in a small corner of the world, isn't that worth it?
To look at it another way, WWII Russia was a horrendous place. Everyone knew that. They essentially allowed, even encouraged, the opening salvo's of WWII with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. They were content to allow Nazi rule to spread across the world, they had no problem with mass genocide, until it landed on their doorstep. And we in the West allied with them, because we needed their help. When Germany was defeated and the Western countries remained mobilized for war with rapidly evolving technology, we probably could've crushed Russia... but we never even tried. Yet no one cries about it there because Hitler was such an obvious evil. The problem is that he's only obvious in retrospect. A lot of the things we today take as common sense weren't so cut and dry back then. Eugenics was widely practiced around the world, and that was the main component that gave the Nazi viewpoint any credence at all. The majority of people fighting the Nazi's from western powers were draftees, not volunteers like we see today. I'm certain many circles saw Russia as the bigger evil.
I'm not saying you shouldn't wonder what a countries motivations are when they engage in war, police actions or interventions. I'm simply saying that maybe we shouldn't avoid giving out support when governments help out in some places, even if the motivations are selfish, just because a greater evil is allowed to continue somewhere else. I don't think that's a valid reason to deny support.
Anyways, that's my rant. My personal opinion on Syria is that military intervention won't help. It's in a civil war. If it was as lopsided as Libya, we'd be seeing a swing of the populous to one side or the other. Be we aren't. It seems fairly even. Unfortunately, I think they need to figure shit out for themselves. If a full-on military invasion like Iraq takes place, or if sides are chosen like in Libya, you risk pushing too many people over to the anti-West side again no matter which side it is you chose. Having said that, I have no problem with Obama's plan for punitive surgical cruise missile strikes. I think sending a clear message that chemical and biological weapons will not be tolerated by the West even if the West isn't involved is an valid one.
I don't think you can back that statement up. Most estimates are that took about 6 years to get 100,000 casualties in Iraq (most... there are some exceptions like the Lancet surveys - though they are likely the most reliable they also used the methods of estimation the least like the ones that have come up with Syria's numbers). Syria, on the other hand, is already estimated at 100,000 in only 2 years.
I'm not going to get into a debate about it with you, however. Call me a clown and claim I'm wrong all you want.
We were comparing Iraq with Libya.
Two years in there are far fewer dead Libyans then there were dead Iraqis. As bad as things are in Libya, they are nowhere near as dire as the situation was in Iraq two years after the invasion.
The point being made that externally supporting a domestic rebellion is a lot less of a risk both for the Western militaries and for the civilian population, as compared to an outright invasion. Far fewer dead Americans. Far fewer dead civilians.
The relevance here is that externally supporting the rebels is relatively(!) low risk, assuming we could figure out the right rebels to support (nobody wants to help al qaeda).
