Obama on Syria

[Hakan]

 

Poor Obama! For the record I think its completely horrible that Obama wants to start another pointless war in the middle east. It's not our job to do this, and it's gonna cost money we don't have. We HAVE HAD ENOUGH of the BS about having to be everywhere all the time. WE need to take care of our own problems right now here at home.

[Simon]

First of all, it's not a war. It's a limited military intervention with the goal to stop, or at least deter, a dictator from killing his own people with chemical weapons. I wouldn't say that's pointless.

 

Furthermore, the United States is the major economic and military super power in the world today. And that comes with certain responsibilities and moral obligations to act against international and human rights violations - just like the crimes done by the Syrian regime. I think it's selfish and dangerously isolationistic to say that the world's richest country cannot afford to intervene and stop a genocide.

 

I believe that an intervention is necessary. Diplomacy has failed completely and the Syrian regime have been able to bomb and slaughter its own people for more than two years. And now they are using chemical weapons which is a clear breach against international laws and norms. The chemical massacre last week cannot go unanswered and the repercussions need to be swift and hard. The only way for Bashar al-Assad to be tempted to join negotiations is if there are real and costly repercussions for not participating in such meetings.

[Hakan]

We still cant know for sure if a gas attack has even happened!! We can only trust Obamas word on it. But remember Bushs WMD? There were none. How much did that war cost us? They just wanted to get in there and grab the oil! And compared to the islamistic rebels the Syrian government doesn't look THAT bad.

[Simon]

Really? Doesn't seem so bad? The Human Rights Watch has called the country "among the worst in the world". Feedom House labels Syria as "not free". The Syrian authorities harass and arrests democracy and human rights activists, they censor websites and detains bloggers. Arbitrary detention, torture, and disappearances are widespread in the country. And that was way before the regime started to bomb their own people.

 

The US government lied about WMDs in Iraq, that's true, but its a pretty known fact that Syria has large stockpiles of chemical weapons. Considering the evidence we've seen so far its silly to try and claim that chemical weapons haven't been used by the regime in Syria. The Syrian regime themselves acknowledge the fact that a chemical weapons attack has taken place, but they blame the gas attack on the rebels...

 

And if it's the rebels who are responsible for the gas attack, which despite their gains against government forces seems highly unlikely, then that would be an even worse scenario. Because that would mean that the Syrian regime have completely lost control of the situation and that dangerous chemical weapons could be spread to other hot spots around the world, sold to terrorists, black market arms dealers and so on. If that were the case, the response from the international community would have to be on an even larger scale and much more powerful, i.e. boots on the ground and a potential occupation of Syria to find, secure and destroy the stockpiles of chemical weapons.

[Hakan]

We have launched a significant overseas assault every 40 months since 1963.

[Simon]

That article fails to mention that many of those "assaults" were humanitarian interventions or limited targeted missile strikes against dictators. Many happened on just grounds and even with the backings of the UN and the international community.

 

These are the wars he is talking about:

1. Vietnam
2. Cambodia
3. Dominican Republic
4. Grenada
5. Libya - The US undertook targeted air-strikes in response to the 1986 Berlin discotheque bombing. This assault were condemned by many nations, but just as many nations supported it.
6. Panama
7. Iraq - This was actually a two-part intervention. The first was the Gulf War, which was waged by a U.N.-authorized coalition led by the US in response to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. The second part was an intervention between 1991-2003 by the US, UK and France with the goal of creating a no-fly zone to protect the Kurds in northern Iraq and Shiite Muslims in the south.
8. Somalia - A UN-sanctioned operation with the aim to create a secure enough environment for humanitarian operations to be carried out in the increasingly lawless and famine-stricken country.
9. Haiti - The US led a multinational force, which was authorized by the UN, to remove a military regime who had overthrown the country's democratically elected President.
10. Bosnia - This was a NATO intervention to implement several UN Security Council resolutions aimed at stopping the horrible war and genocide.
11. Kosovo - This intervention had many similarities with the intervention in Bosnia. It was also a NATO operation with the aim of stopping a genocide and enforcing peace in the region.
12. Afghanistan - The Afghan war happened with the backing of the international community - because there were clear links to the Talibans/al Qaeda and 9/11. Unfortunately, the US fucked up the situation and lost control in Afghanistan when they didn't keep up the pressure against the Talibans and instead engaged in a long, costly and frankly stupid occupation of Iraq.
13. Iraq - This was a horrendous war and decades long occupation that, for obvious reasons, did not have the backing of the international community.
14. Libya 2 - The US participated in a multinational force (countries such as Norway and even Sweden participated) with the goal to implement a UN Security Council resolution. This was done by establishing a "no-fly zone and to use all means necessary short of foreign occupation to protect civilians."

[Simon]

We still cant know for sure if a gas attack has even happened!!

 

As expected, the recently released UN report says there is "clear evidence" chemical weapons were used in Syrian attack last month. UN chief Ban Ki-Moon described the chemical attack as a "war crime". "It is the worst use of chemical weapons on civilians in the 21st century," he said.

 

Also this: 

 

Syrian army defector says he was ordered by top regime officials to use poison gas in attacks on rebel-held areas.

 

Syria: Government Likely Culprit in Chemical Attack, says Human Rights Watch.