Credit: Creative Commons
Yesterday, before the British House of Commons voted against British participation in any Western military intervention in the wake last week’s sarin-mustard cocktail gasattacks in the northern suburbs of Damascus, protesters gathered in London to demonstrate. The protesters indignantly shouted “Hands off Syria! Hands off Syria!”
Yet the complicated question that I would like to have answered from President Obama, which he did not address in his White House press conference, is this: How exactly can the U.S., along with the French, prevent Assad and his henchmen from committing more atrocities, capture them dead or alive, and if alive, bring them before the International Criminal Court, and all without inadvertantly empowering the Al-Qaeda affiliated Syrian opposition groups? Complicated, indeed.
The question I would like to have answered from the London protesters, and those on this side of the pond with a similar outlook, is much more basic: How would you feel if you and your family were gassed by a brutal dictator as major world powers sat back and did nada?
The questions of exactly what to do in the wake of the Syrian gas attacks, and how, are excruciatingly difficult, but a simplistic “Hands off Syria!” is nothing but a signed, sealed and delivered memo from the Western liberal camp that Bashar al-Assad should have a free hand to gas as many men, women and children as he damn well pleases. If the reality of over 1,400 Syrian men, women and children awoken in their sleep by explosions of poison gas that attacked their entire nervous systems, and which then suffocated them to death, is not a sufficient threshold for international intervention what would be? 14,000 sarin gas murders? 140,000 sarin gas murders?
President Obama has not yet laid out anything that resembles a coherent post-chemical weapons massacre strategy to the American people and the Congress, but simple assertions that any Western response to this chemical weapons atrocity is somehow untoward sends an unmistakable message to Bashar al-Assad: Kill as many of the people in your country that you think you own as you like, we just don’t give a damn.
The tide of one-note dissent that we have seen since the Syrian chemical weapon attacks ought to quickly give way to a genuine debate about policy options, including the crucial question of how to respond to Iran’s recent saber-rattling. As reported by the Wall Street Journal:
Officials from Iran, Syria’s chief ally, said publicly for the first time that U.S.-led strikes on Syria would provoke retaliation on Israel. “Any attack on Syria would burn down Israel,” Iranian news media reported Maj. Gen. Hassan Firouzabadi, chief of staff of Iran’s armed forces, as saying.
So let’s get this straight: a U.S.-led humanitarian intervention in Syria intended to stop a murderous dictator from gassing innocent civilians would be so morally offensive to Iranian General Hassan Firouzabadi that he would want to burn down Israel.
Make no mistake, the intent of such a statement is to hold the entire world political hostage to a cult of mass murder.
There is nothing inconsistent, morally or strategically, about pressing for a Middle East nuclear weapons-free zone, which includes bringing Israel into the NPT, and urging President Obama to give the Israeli government the bunker-busting bombs and aircraft that country needs to prevent psychopath Iranian generals from getting their hands on nukes.
The world is too complex for one-note dissent on Syria/Iran policy.
I’m all for multi-faceted perspectives, and I deplore mentalities based on slogans. But let’s be clear here, and multi-faceted; the idea that this intervention is a ‘humanitarian’ one is so naive as to be downright sad to find here in Tikkun.
Neither the West, nor the Saudis, nor the Russians, Iranians or Jihadis have been idle for the past two years after hijacking the Syrian democracy/reform movement. This is a proxy war, with considerable energy interests vying for supremacy.
It’s not about nerve gas, it’s about natural gas.
Syria is not known for its natural gas reserves. But thy are know for their nerve gas reserves.
Thank you Stephan. Other wise commentators have observed that the USA has persistently used chemical weapons for fifty years in an unparalleled way and has used the state of Israel as a secret weapons stash (nuclear, chemical and narcotics) as part of its endeavours to control the wealth of the mineral oil and gas in the region. I fear for the lives of many innocent Jews when mineral oil and gas is depleted. Their association with the state of Israel will also visit on them much retribution in the resulting mayhem.
David, your comment about the real reason for our intervention is correct. (It is oil, not natural gas, but I think you were being metaphorical.) Why did we ignore the atrocities in Burma (Myanmar) for years and years, and why do we continue to ignore the atrocities in Tibet? There is nothing there we want.
Yes, Assad’s regime is a bloody tragedy. And yes, we should do something. What is unclear. But if we could somehow start by leaving out the “what’s in it for us” reasoning, we might figure it out.
Timothy, you say this:
“There is nothing inconsistent, morally or strategically, about pressing for a Middle East nuclear weapons-free zone, which includes bringing Israel into the NPT, and urging President Obama to give the Israeli government the bunker-busting bombs and aircraft that country needs to prevent psychopath Iranian generals from getting their hands on nukes.”
Does your concept of a nuke free zone include Israel? Until every country is nuke free, including the US, there is disparity. I don’t feel that Iran or other countries should also have nukes, but isn’t it a bit hypocritical to be so righteous about Iran and North Korea having nukes when we all have them? Isn’t our righteousness false here, that the idea that it is all right for the US and our allies to have nukes but not others more about power and controlling resources than about any humanitarian or other goals?
DonH How many time has iran threatened to incinerate Israel? How does that sound to you. I don’t recall Israel threatening to use any nuclear weapons on anyone. BTW, Saudi has threatened to go nuclear if iran goes nuclear? That would not end well
As I mentioned in another post, during the Iran/Iraq war, back in the eighties when Saddam was our friend, poisonous gas (sarin) was used on the Iranians by Saddam Hussein and it’s now reported that the U.S. gov’t. knew about it. In fact, recent documents released by the CIA indicate that the U.S. gov’t. was complicit in it. What has Assad done that we haven’t done already?
We have no money to take care of the needs of the American people but we always have money for war, even with a 17 trillion dollar debt. The question to ask is: “What domestic programs do you want slashed so that we can pay for another war?” Another might be, “How large a war tax should we impose on the American people?” Another might be, “How many are in favor of an immediate draft for men and women–no exceptions?” Maybe if we all have some skin in this, we’d think about this a little more carefully.
I agree with Stephen. I have a bridge to sell anyone who thinks this is about humanitarian concerns.
However well meaning, or “surgical”, any attack on Syria will certainly aid Al Qaida aligned factions within the rebel movement. This is a Sunni/ Shia war and weighing in on one side or another can only be harmful for Western and Israeli interests in the long run. As for humanitarianism, it’s very likely that the Alawite officers have dispersed into the civilian population, leaving their Sunni underlings on the bases to be slaughtered by the US “punishing” Assad. Like in Iraq and Libya, the probability of unintended consequences is immeasurable. What to do? Massive diplomacy – getting the tribes to talk – support for refugees inside and outside the country. However bad Assad is, the alternative of a Salafist dominated government is much worse.
There is a lot more evidence that Timothy Villareal is a closet Nazi, advocating the very crimes for which we hanged the Germans at Nuremberg, than there is that Assad is a mass murderer.
I see absolutle zero indication he is a Nazi.
Sorry to disagree, but people also offered all sorts of “realpolitik” reasons when they refused to let the St Louis land and its Jewish refugees to disembark, or when they refused to bomb the rail lines to Auschwitz. As Jews we should be esp sensitive to the suffering. Drawing a line at WMD is understandable. BTW, it is immaterial whether Obama’s motivation is pure; Jewish stories include those of good things coming from poorly motivated actions. There is too much knee-jerking going on, in my opinion. And cynicism doesn’t equal sophistication.
Which side do you want to take, Phil? Assad’s side or the side of the rebels, filled with al Qaeda fighters who are just as vicious as Assad and who, I fear, are just as anti-American.
Finally, this article raises issues in a way that makes some sense. I can only shake my head at the silliness of so many progressives, who seem to spend most of their time shrieking about non-existent monsters, when they’re not engaging in various kinds of odd but invariably self-congratulatory posturing. Maybe it comes from having so much emotion and so many ideas how the world should be, but having little power, and hence very little responsibility; and therefore not much common sense.
I present these realities to my “progressive” friends:
1. Iraq was a near-genocidal disaster. Bush should be tried as a war criminal, but he won’t be, because many of our fellow Americans think he’s wonderful. But Iraq didn’t happen because of a failure of intelligence, it was a failure of an imperial president who would only listen to intelligence that told him what he wanted to hear. Syria is not Iraq. It is a completely different situation. If you view Syria through the lens of Iraq, you’re stuck in the past and are allowing yourself to be manipulated by the Iraq trauma.
2. Yes, the Israel Lobby wants a military strike on Syria for its own corrupt reasons. So what? If the people in the Israel Lobby drink water, should you stop drinking water? Grow UP, for cat sakes.
3. Yes, the neo-cons want a military strike. See number “2” above.
4. Yes, Iran supports Hezbollah, and Hezbollah fighters are now fighting on the side of Assad. This makes a solution harder, but it has the advantage of completely discrediting Hezbollah, who until very recently were folk heroes. Every horror has a silver lining, and that may be a big one.
5. Yes, the Likudnik war criminals killed 1400 people in Gaza, 400 of them children. Only an American progressive would believe that this justifies 1400 dead Syrians. Would you save people in Gaza? Then you must contemplate doing the same for Syrians.
6. Yes, there are extremists among the rebels, but not that many yet, and besides that’s an argument for intervention, not against it. We need to stop talking about arming the Free Syrian Army, and start doing so.
So what’s the real issue, as opposed to all the ghosts and phantoms that liberals and progressives are getting their knickers in a bunch over? The reality is this. Sarin gas is a game-changer. Despite what anti-intervention people are saying, killing with sarin gas isn’t the same as killing with automatic weapons. Sarin gas kills many more people, and it kills them much faster. Because it can kill 1400 civilians in a single night, and it does so in a way military units cannot defend against, it creates a complete asymmetry of power. The Free Syrian Army knows that it can’t defend against it. Assad will use it again, and if the world blinks, he will use the power that arises out of his use of mass murder. Sarin gas used for military purposes has one endgame, and that endgame is genocide.
The international community has to “deter and degrade” the Syrian military. Naturally, any chance for a cease-fire should be pursued, and also a regional peace conference, but the military option will almost surely be necessary. If nobody else will do it, the Americans must, simply because they have the capability to do it. Furthermore, the US–and its allies–have to find a way to dismantle and make safe the rather large stores of sarin gas that Assad has been collecting for decades. That is our responsibility, as people of conscience in the world, and there’s no way to wriggle out of it. Will there be a response by Assad to the American strike? Yes, and I think based on recent events it will most likely include a massive cyber-attack on the US. But we have to go ahead. It will involve risk. Deal with it.
Remember the words of Dr. King: “What is bad is not the evil people, but the good people that do nothing.”
1. Mant were killed in iraq, bug the deposed leader, Saddam gassed his own people. Interesting that you ignore that.
2.What are those corrupt reasons. I don’t think Syria would be any more likely to make peace under a different regime. nice try
3.Oh yes, the jewish conspiracy. jews control the US media and government. I forgot.
4. Hezbollah has never had credibility. Anyone who knows Hezbollah, understands that it is fighting to protect its lifeline
5. The war in Gaza was one initiated by Hamas. They attempted a raid into Israel to kidnap more soldiers and showered the town of Sderot with rockets. Israel has every right to fight back and protect its won citizens. Yes, PROTECT. 1000 died, most were fighters and then there were civilians caught up in he fighting. Hamas is not one to take the safety of their brother Palestinians into consideration.
6. Ok so should we support them or not. Oh yes, I thought Israel would support it…perhaps
So what is it, or is all about the Jewish lobby?
The American people are emotionally and financially spent. We cannot afford another go-it-alone intervention. How would you like to pay for it? Will the same spent troops be used if it came to that?
If a response is needed, it needs to come from the international community, not just the U.S. We need to be building a consensus for that. And while we’re holding Syria accountable, who holds us accountable for sarin gas, cluster bombs, white phosphorus, (which burns the skin to the bone–is that less worse than sarin gas)? — Agent Orange, depleted uranium munitions, drone attacks killing/maiming innocent civilians, torture.
“People of conscience?” I wonder about that.
As a Syrian American, I am offended and hurt by the reluctance of so many to having a meaningful intervention to stop the further killing of innocent men, women, and children–including members of my own extended family–at the hands of Assad’s regime. Diplomatic measures would be pointless by now–Assad doesn’t give a shit whether or not some international body will sanction him. No matter what the cost, the US and the Global Community as an imperative to act to take responsibility for this situation before it gets worse. If we allow this to continue on our watch, it will be on our conscience forever.