Syria intervention even less popular than Congress

[frigidmagi]

Washington Post

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll has finally found something that Americans like even less than Congress: the possibility of U.S. military intervention in Syria. Only 9 percent of respondents said that the Obama administration should intervene militarily in Syria; a RealClearPolitics poll average finds Congress has a 15 percent approval rating, making the country’s most hated political body almost twice as popular.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll was taken Aug.19-23, the very same week that horrific reports emerged strongly suggesting that Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad has used chemical weapons against his own people, potentially killing hundreds or even thousands of civilians. If there were ever a time that Americans would support some sort of action, you’d think this would be it. But this is the lowest support for intervention since the poll began tracking opinion on the issue. The survey also found that 60 percent oppose intervention outright, with the rest, perhaps sagely, saying that they don’t know.

Strangely, 25 percent said that they support intervention if Assad uses chemical weapons. I say strangely because the United States announced way back in June that it believed Assad had done exactly this. A large share of people who answered that the United States should intervene if Assad uses chemical weapons are apparently unaware that this line has already been crossed. Presumably, some number of these people would drop their support if they realized the question was no longer hypothetical.

The United States certainly appears to be considering limited strikes on Syria in response to last week’s suspected chemical weapons attack. The calculus for and against is complicated enough in foreign policy terms. But the White House is also a political institution, and it will surely keep the domestic politics, which appear to oppose any intervention very strongly, well in mind.

There's likely to be some kind of strike due to recent use of chemical weapons.

[Josh]

Can't say I'm terribly enthused by the prospect either.

[General Havoc]

Well we could always wait for another hundred thousand murders.

[frigidmagi]

Well then Havoc asking in all honesty and sincerity. What do you propose?

[General Havoc]

Bomb the fuck out of the Syrian government, army, and secret police. Take out their air defence network, their air force, every heavy unit in their army, turn their internal security HQ into a smouldering crater. Drop a cruise missile down Assad's chimney.

If we're not going to act in resp once to the flagrant use of chemical weapons, then what the fuck are we going to respond to? How are we supposed to have any credibility with Iran or Pakistan or North Korea or anyone else if we ignore our own red lines like this?

If we don't act now, how the hell is NATO supposed to trust that we ever will? Or our allies in Asia?

[Josh]

Bomb the fuck out of the Syrian government, army, and secret police. Take out their air defence network, their air force, every heavy unit in their army, turn their internal security HQ into a smouldering crater. Drop a cruise missile down Assad's chimney.

If we're not going to act in resp once to the flagrant use of chemical weapons, then what the fuck are we going to respond to? How are we supposed to have any credibility with Iran or Pakistan or North Korea or anyone else if we ignore our own red lines like this?

If I honestly thought that this was the form of response we are going to initiate, I'd be a lot more comfortable with it. The reason I'm not happy with our likely response is because it's going to be hard for it not to be token.

There's also the fact that no matter what we do there will most likely be tens of thousands of more deaths, genocide, ethnic cleansing, etc. That was pretty much assured from the time Assad went militant on his protestors.

If we don't act now, how the hell is NATO supposed to trust that we ever will? Or our allies in Asia?

However, on this I'd say it's reading too much into the moment. In another decade this is going to be history one way or another and whatever crises emerge in the future will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis as usual. I mean, if credibility is the concern, we're fucked no matter what we do on this. If we do basically put the Assad regime out of business and enable a rebel coalition to win, the probable post-victory bloodbath's also going to be laid at our doorstep. To take your Korean example, we have a clear and vested interest that compels our intervention in the event of the DPRK crossing the line. With Syria we have strictly humanitarian concerns that we are going to fail to satisfy regardless of what actions we take.

[General Havoc]

If I honestly thought that this was the form of response we are going to initiate, I'd be a lot more comfortable with it. The reason I'm not happy with our likely response is because it's going to be hard for it not to be token.

There's also the fact that no matter what we do there will most likely be tens of thousands of more deaths, genocide, ethnic cleansing, etc. That was pretty much assured from the time Assad went militant on his protestors.

Yes, it's true that no matter what we do, there will be yet more piles of dead. It is also true that we will probably not hit hard enough to permanently put Assad out of business. But at least we will have done what little we can do to try and stop it. And the consequences of doing nothing are potentially grave.

However, on this I'd say it's reading too much into the moment. In another decade this is going to be history one way or another and whatever crises emerge in the future will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis as usual. I mean, if credibility is the concern, we're fucked no matter what we do on this. If we do basically put the Assad regime out of business and enable a rebel coalition to win, the probable post-victory bloodbath's also going to be laid at our doorstep. To take your Korean example, we have a clear and vested interest that compels our intervention in the event of the DPRK crossing the line. With Syria we have strictly humanitarian concerns that we are going to fail to satisfy regardless of what actions we take.

The consequences of not acting are considerably worse for our credibility than those of acting. If stupid people want to lay the bloody end to a two year bloody war on our doorstep, then nothing we say or do will be able to stop them. But if we don't act on this, how in the world can we enforce any other red line we choose to set? How can we convince the Iranians we mean business about their nuclear program, or Pakistan about the consequences of proliferation? How are Japan and the Taiwan, countries we effectively promised to defend against all comers, supposed to trust that we will fulfill our obligations to them, the ones that have prevented them from pursuing their own nuclear programs? Vital interests are a perception, not a hard fact that people can reference. And even if none of the above is true, how many other tinpot dictators will now take this situation as a blanket okay to simply nerve gas anyone who opposes them, confident that there is nothing to stop them?

The fact that we cannot stop the killing is no excuse for not acting. Neither is the fact that we could get away with not acting. This motherfucker just dropped nerve gas on his own population so as to remain in power at any cost. Blow him the fuck up. And we will deal with the consequences of having done so thereafter. They can be no worse than allowing him to continue nerve gassing people.

[Norseman]

To be cynical I think the world (and various dictators) will understand the difference between not going after a horrible dictator who can only really hurt his own people, and not going after dictators who are trying to get the means to directly hurt and intimidate the USA.

[rhoenix]

So, I see first that David Cameron in Britain lost a key vote regarding Syria, which means that Britain will not be supporting the USA for a strike on Syria.

The consequences of not acting are considerably worse for our credibility than those of acting. If stupid people want to lay the bloody end to a two year bloody war on our doorstep, then nothing we say or do will be able to stop them. But if we don't act on this, how in the world can we enforce any other red line we choose to set? How can we convince the Iranians we mean business about their nuclear program, or Pakistan about the consequences of proliferation? How are Japan and the Taiwan, countries we effectively promised to defend against all comers, supposed to trust that we will fulfill our obligations to them, the ones that have prevented them from pursuing their own nuclear programs? Vital interests are a perception, not a hard fact that people can reference. And even if none of the above is true, how many other tinpot dictators will now take this situation as a blanket okay to simply nerve gas anyone who opposes them, confident that there is nothing to stop them?

The fact that we cannot stop the killing is no excuse for not acting. Neither is the fact that we could get away with not acting. This motherfucker just dropped nerve gas on his own population so as to remain in power at any cost. Blow him the fuck up. And we will deal with the consequences of having done so thereafter. They can be no worse than allowing him to continue nerve gassing people.

I get your point, and I agree with you that using chemical weapons on your own populace is reprehensible.

We have no agreements with Syria or any allies of Syria, as far as I know, so I can't see the Syrian situation as similar to our obligations with Taiwan or Japan. Instead, I see it as quite possibly being similar to Iraq.

My point here is that the UN weapons inspectors weren't sure. For all we know, it could have been the rebels using chemical weapons, as much as I hate to say it. If we launch a cruise missile into Assad's chimney and firebomb his army into dust, as you suggested, and it turns out once the dust settles that Assad was innocent, what then?

My concern here is also about respect. The United States launched a vicious war on Iraq recently for reasons that turned out to be entirely without merit. If the United States then launches even a single strike on Syria, and it turns out the reasons we did so also turn out to be without merit, it'll hurt the United States' reputation with respect to other nations in a much worse way than not acting at all.

I'm speaking as a relative layman as it concerns international politics here, so I grant off the bat that I do not have the analysis of others here. However, I would like to hear your thoughts.

[Josh]

My main issue is this: are we officially assuming the role of World Watchdog for WMD Usage on Civilian Populations? I mean, up until now we've done various non-military measures despite the fact that the Assad regime has killed and maimed the population through guns, bombs, artillery, as well as engaging in torture and other unpleasantness.

So is that our new official policy? Shoot, stab, napalm, boom boom, that'll get you sanctions and stern lectures, but gas is beyond the pale? If, in the event of a rebel victory leading to a bloody purge of the Alawite/Christian population are we going to stand by for that so long as they don't break out the VX?

Does the perceived need for commitment come from the POTUS saying a thing, and therefore we are committed to at least bounce some rocks for the honor of the flag?

I mean, hell, I'd be perfectly satisfied to see Assad and his cronies lined up and shot. But we've not had much luck with the world police gig in the past, and this is shaping up to be an utterly meaningless response, basically a louder way of saying "We really really disapprove of this shit."

[Lys]

If we're not going to act in resp once to the flagrant use of chemical weapons, then what the fuck are we going to respond to? How are we supposed to have any credibility with Iran or Pakistan or North Korea or anyone else if we ignore our own red lines like this?

We don't have any credibility with Iran, Pakistan, or North Korea. The test case for the dictator gives up his WMDs was Ghaddafi. You remember how NATO respected the hell out of Lybian national sovereignty up and down 2011, right? At this point bombing Assad's organization out of existence is closing the barn door after the horse already left. There's nothing to salvage, we're put into an impossible situation where either we sign off on the genocide of the Alawites and the Druuze or we putter around ineffectively doing nothing useful and looking weak and stupid. At this point the only people who are winning are the Russian Mediterranean Squadron, who are looking forward to getting their troll faces on as soon as the President starts launching tomahawks.

The only way we were going to come out of this without looking like utter tools would have been to give Assad carte blanche to do whatever it took to destroy the rebel coalition the moment it became infested with Islamist radicals. Everyone understands ideological hatreds, and we can sell the idea that the United States hates those fuckers the Islamics. We hate them as much as we hated those fucking communists, and we're just as willing to betray everything we stand for in order to see them undone. This is basic, solid, consistent, defensible foreign policy. It advances America's interests, clears up all the inconsistencies, and answers all the questions. We make it clear that Assad's our bitch and we are allowing him to save his sorry regime because we hate the alternative his opponents present that fucking much. If we'd done that the war would already be over, because that's how a super power ends a war: it picks a fucking side and applies maximum brutality on its behalf until the shooting stops.

Honestly it fucking galls me that I'm actually espousing "fuck radical Islam" as an an actual foreign policy exercise on the scale of half a god-damned century of "fuck of communism", but looking back on things secular military dictatorships were good for the United States. They've always been good for the United States, that's why we keep fucking supporting them. Since the end of the Cold War the US has been sort of puttering around at a total loss as to what it's role in the world is without the big bogey man of Communism to stand against. I say keep it simple and go back to first principles: capitalism, secularity, and democracy, in that order. It's easy to trumpet the hell out of all three of them, because they're legit good principles to support and they form a nice solid base for national foreign policy.

[General Havoc]

So, I see first that David Cameron in Britain lost a key vote regarding Syria, which means that Britain will not be supporting the USA for a strike on Syria.

Then a pox on the House of Commons for cowardice. Relying on us to take the opprobrium as usual.

I get your point, and I agree with you that using chemical weapons on your own populace is reprehensible.

We have no agreements with Syria or any allies of Syria, as far as I know, so I can't see the Syrian situation as similar to our obligations with Taiwan or Japan. Instead, I see it as quite possibly being similar to Iraq.

My point here is that the UN weapons inspectors weren't sure. For all we know, it could have been the rebels using chemical weapons, as much as I hate to say it. If we launch a cruise missile into Assad's chimney and firebomb his army into dust, as you suggested, and it turns out once the dust settles that Assad was innocent, what then?

There is strong evidence, nearly ironclad in my opinion, that it was indeed either Assad's direct order or one of Assad's commander's going off the reservation, in which case the same thing applies. Moreover, I'll remind you that the UN weapons inspectors weren't sure because the Syrian government refused to allow them access until after the agent broke down, and then delayed them further with sniper fire.

But hell, say you're right, and somehow it wasn't Assad, and we erroneously kill him? Who gives a shit? The man started a war with his own people, killed a hundred thousand of them, tortured hundreds of thousands more, and is presently waging chemical warfare in order to remain in power against all comers. I could not physically care less if he got wrapped up in some mistaken identity case concerning these WMDs, as he is unquestionably guilty of the cold-blooded murder of tens of thousands of his own people by other means.

My concern here is also about respect. The United States launched a vicious war on Iraq recently for reasons that turned out to be entirely without merit. If the United States then launches even a single strike on Syria, and it turns out the reasons we did so also turn out to be without merit, it'll hurt the United States' reputation with respect to other nations in a much worse way than not acting at all.

Not only is this wrong, it's downright pernicious. If we hold back from responding to a war crime because we're afraid that people might say mean things about us, then we are a gang of cowards, and deserve every nasty thing said about us. And moreover, I do not believe for one instant that it will hurt the US' credibility more to attack Assad for the wrong reasons than it would to do nothing. And if you don't believe me, try John Kerry out for a spin. He was the one who brought up the fact that failing to do this would shatter the US' credibility towards our existing commitments, and give a signal to dictators the world over that it's okay to gas children as long as it doesn't inconvenience us.

The intelligence reports I've seen state that Syrian government forces from a chemical weapons unit have been operating in the area for three days. The rockets that discharged the agent were fired from government launchers IDed on satellite photos ninety minutes before the launch. Syrian government officials were wiretapped talking about the launch and discussing strategies for preventing the UN inspectors from finding evidence. Can we please put to bed this preposterous notion that the Syrian government did not do this?

My main issue is this: are we officially assuming the role of World Watchdog for WMD Usage on Civilian Populations? I mean, up until now we've done various non-military measures despite the fact that the Assad regime has killed and maimed the population through guns, bombs, artillery, as well as engaging in torture and other unpleasantness.

And whose fault is that? I've been advocating dropping bombs on Assad since long before this incident took place. The fact that we didn't do what we should have done until now is not an excuse for continuing to do nothing. And if we're not going to assume the rule of a World Watchdog for WMD use on Civilian Populations, then who the hell is?

So is that our new official policy? Shoot, stab, napalm, boom boom, that'll get you sanctions and stern lectures, but gas is beyond the pale? If, in the event of a rebel victory leading to a bloody purge of the Alawite/Christian population are we going to stand by for that so long as they don't break out the VX?

Are you seriously advocating not responding to this attack because we failed to respond to attacks before? We should have done this months ago. The fact that we did not is not an excuse to continue to do nothing, and the claim that it is is preposterous in the extreme. It was arguments like this one (Why bomb Assad when we didn't bomb [other tinpot dictator]) that allowed Assad and his army to murder two hundred people a day for two years. And now you want to bring it up again?

If he drops a fucking nuke next, will the argument be that intervention would be hypocritical because we did nothing about the VX gas?

Does the perceived need for commitment come from the POTUS saying a thing, and therefore we are committed to at least bounce some rocks for the honor of the flag?

Does the perceived lack of need for commitment come from the fact that Brown people don't count insofar as war crimes are concerned? Because I don't think we'd be having this conversation if the Dutch government nerve gassed downtown Rotterdam.

Fourteen hundred people just got nerve gassed to death, but yeah, clearly us hawks are only upset because of some statement Obama made on the subject.

I mean, hell, I'd be perfectly satisfied to see Assad and his cronies lined up and shot. But we've not had much luck with the world police gig in the past, and this is shaping up to be an utterly meaningless response, basically a louder way of saying "We really really disapprove of this shit."

Then so be it. I don't expect we can stop the bastard from doing more evil, but we can put an end to his capacity to do evil on this scale, or at least hinder it. And even if we cannot do this, then we can at least say we tried to do it. Sometimes you gotta take a stand on things even if the result isn't going to wrap everything up in a bow. Chemical warfare has got to be one of those things, or else what the fuck is anyone doing here?

And the mere fact that we went to war with Iraq does not by the way alter the calculations re: world police at all. Because I'll remind you, if we don't conduct ourselves as the world's policeman for at least actual WMD strikes, then nobody else will. I reject this notion that it is somehow axiomatically wrong for someone to take on such a role, not in the least because if this country had taken that policy to heart a couple of generations ago, then I would have considerably more relatives. As would most denizens of Rawanda, Bosnia, and the Congo.

I agree that whatever lame-ass response the Administration is planning will likely barely be a slap on the wrist, given the magnitude of the crime. But that is not an argument for doing even less.

We don't have any credibility with Iran, Pakistan, or North Korea. The test case for the dictator gives up his WMDs was Ghaddafi. You remember how NATO respected the hell out of Lybian national sovereignty up and down 2011, right?

And what, now we should have stayed out of Libya too? Gaddafi was left alone after he gave up his WMD program, until he started massacring his own people to suppress an Arab Spring revolution. There are boundaries of behavior that are supposed to be permissible even to evil fucking Dictators. And the fact that we have let those boundaries slip when the dictators were friendly to us does not mean they don't exist. And gassing your own populace, something even Gaddafi never did, has to be beyond those boundaries, or else none of us have any right to speak on any foreign policy matters whatsoever.

At this point the only people who are winning are the Russian Mediterranean Squadron, who are looking forward to getting their troll faces on as soon as the President starts launching tomahawks.

What in the fuck does this even mean? Are you actually suggesting that the Russian Mediterranean Squadron is going to fire on the US Navy because of a strike on Assad? Because is the the stupidest analysis of foreign policy I have heard in a long goddamn time. And if that's not what you're suggesting, then what the hell are you trying to say? Because this statement makes no sense whatsoever.

The only way we were going to come out of this without looking like utter tools would have been to give Assad carte blanche to do whatever it took to destroy the rebel coalition the moment it became infested with Islamist radicals. Everyone understands ideological hatreds, and we can sell the idea that the United States hates those fuckers the Islamics. We hate them as much as we hated those fucking communists, and we're just as willing to betray everything we stand for in order to see them undone. This is basic, solid, consistent, defensible foreign policy. It advances America's interests, clears up all the inconsistencies, and answers all the questions. We make it clear that Assad's our bitch and we are allowing him to save his sorry regime because we hate the alternative his opponents present that fucking much. If we'd done that the war would already be over, because that's how a super power ends a war: it picks a fucking side and applies maximum brutality on its behalf until the shooting stops.

Honestly it fucking galls me that I'm actually espousing "fuck radical Islam" as an an actual foreign policy exercise on the scale of half a god-damned century of "fuck of communism", but looking back on things secular military dictatorships were good for the United States. They've always been good for the United States, that's why we keep fucking supporting them. Since the end of the Cold War the US has been sort of puttering around at a total loss as to what it's role in the world is without the big bogey man of Communism to stand against. I say keep it simple and go back to first principles: capitalism, secularity, and democracy, in that order. It's easy to trumpet the hell out of all three of them, because they're legit good principles to support and they form a nice solid base for national foreign policy.

Assad was never our bitch. He was Russia and China and Iran's bitch, but not ours, and if we're going to run our foreign policy on the basis of friendly dictators, then we should at least support the ones that are friendly to us. And I'm getting very tired of hearing the notion that foreign policy is required to be universally consistent, and as soon as we compromise our principles somewhere, we are somehow required to do so in every case forever. It is not relevant what our policy was with a different dictator during the Cold War, or last year, or in 1895, or any other thing. It is relevant what we do in this case, in response to this crime. The fact that murderers have gone unpunished in the American justice system does not mean that murder should forever go unpunished in the interests of fairness. Our support for Pinochet or Batista or those motherfuckers in Saudi Arabia does not mean that we somehow have no right to respond here. I would rather be called a hypocrite every day than sit back and let this thing happen without consequence. And I do not understand why nobody else here would.

Not every military dictator is created equal, and not every one of them is good for the United States. And supporting Assad against his own people would not have been to our benefit either. You're correct that there's no way for us to come out smelling like roses here. But that doesn't mean you don't act. And if we, despite possessing the capacity to do so, refuse to ablate Assad's capacity to massacre his own people because it would be politically inconsistent, then as far as I'm concerned, we all deserve to be gassed ourselves.

And maybe we don't have the capacity. But then at least we can say we tried.

[Lys]

And what, now we should have stayed out of Libya too? Gaddafi was left alone after he gave up his WMD program, until he started massacring his own people to suppress an Arab Spring revolution. There are boundaries of behavior that are supposed to be permissible even to evil fucking Dictators. And the fact that we have let those boundaries slip when the dictators were friendly to us does not mean they don't exist. And gassing your own populace, something even Gaddafi never did, has to be beyond those boundaries, or else none of us have any right to speak on any foreign policy matters whatsoever.

I am willing to allow that the Lybia intervention may have been to the benefit of the United States. As far as I can tell the present regime in Lybia is pretty friendly to us and relatively sane. There's been some incidents and instability as a result of the intervention that probably wouldn't have happened otherwise, and it is a damn shame about the library in Timbuktu, but overall I think we won more than we lost there. So no, we probably shouldn't have stayed out of Lybia too.

What in the fuck does this even mean? Are you actually suggesting that the Russian Mediterranean Squadron is going to fire on the US Navy because of a strike on Assad? Because is the the stupidest analysis of foreign policy I have heard in a long goddamn time. And if that's not what you're suggesting, then what the hell are you trying to say? Because this statement makes no sense whatsoever.

The President is probably going to have the Navy attack Syria using sub-sonic ship-launched cruise missiles. If the Russians have their air defence radars on, and we can't stop them from emitting radiation on international waters, they can give the Syrians a good half-hour's warning on any launches plus the incoming vectors. I'm saying as a by-the-way that our actual response to the situation is a bloody useless waste of money, and I would rather we do nothing and save the Russians the laugh.

Assad was never our bitch. NEVER. He was Russia and China and Iran's bitch, but not ours, and if we're going to run our foreign policy on the basis of friendly dictators, then we should at least support the ones that are friendly to us. And I'm getting very tired of hearing the notion that foreign policy is required to be universally consistent, and as soon as we compromise our principles somewhere, we are somehow fucking required to do so in every case forever. It is not fucking relevant what our policy was with a different dictator during the Cold War, or last year, or in 1895, or any other thing. It is relevant what we do in this case, in response to this crime. The fact that murderers have gone unpunished in the American justice system does not mean that murder should forever go unpunished in the interests of fairness. Our support for Pinochet or Batista or those motherfuckers in Saudi Arabia does not mean that we somehow have no right to respond here. I would rather be called a hypocrite every day than sit back and let this thing happen without consequence. And I do not understand why nobody else here would.

Not every military dictator is created equal, and not every one of them is good for the United States. And supporting Assad against his own people would not have been to our benefit either. You're correct that there's no way for us to come out smelling like roses here. But that doesn't mean you don't act. And if we, despite possessing the means to do so, refuse to ablate Assad's capacity to massacre his own people because it would be politically inconsistent, then we all deserve to be gassed ourselves.

I believe political consistency is a very useful and valuable tool of the international stage. In order to be effective at organizing our foreign policy it's important that we and everyone else be very clear on on our ideological stances. Foreign policy isn't just what we tell other peoples we want to accomplish in the world, it's what we tell ourselves we want to accomplish. I think the United States has gone off message, we have no idea what we want to do in the world any more. We have these vague ideas about making ourselves safe and secure from these vague scary people who seem to hate us for no reason, but wind up just sort of putzing around aimlessly. This is ineffective and incompetent, and for the sake of continued American ascendancy on the world stage, we need to have clear consistent message that we stick to with some reliability. I believe that what America has done for the past century has worked very well for her, and we should continue doing it. That's all.

[rhoenix]

Just to make sure I'm reiterating your argument correctly Havoc, you're saying that we should have invaded Syria months ago, on the basis of Assad being a horrible dictator who repeatedly did inhumane things to the people he's ostensibly the leader of. That we should do this not because we have standing agreements with Syria or any of her allies, but simply because it falls upon the United States to follow through with the line drawn in the sand, lest we lose credibility by not acting. And to you, the possible credibility lost by not acting would be greater than the possible credibility lost by acting on possibly faulty intelligence.

If this summary of your argument is correct, then why is North Korea still standing? Why are many African nations untouched? Why does Syria get and deserve our special attention when North Korea and other nations do far worse to its citizenry, and we do nothing?

And why does it fall to the Unites States to decide what precisely constitutes "good behavior" in a dictator?

Why does it fall upon the United States to do the job of the United Nations in these matters, when the United States was one of the key players in the formation of the United Nations in the first place?

Then, there's also the issue of Russian involvement (note that the date from the article was from May 16th of this year):

VLADIVOSTOK, May 16 (RIA Novosti) - A group of warships from Russia’s Pacific Fleet entered the Mediterranean waters for the first time in decades, a fleet spokesman said on Thursday

“The task force has successfully passed through the Suez Channel and entered the Mediterranean. It is the first time in decades that Pacific Fleet warships enter this region,” Capt. First Rank Roman Martov said.

The vessels are now en route to Cyprus and are scheduled to make a port call in Limassol.

The group, including the destroyer Admiral Panteleyev, the amphibious warfare ships Peresvet and Admiral Nevelskoi, the tanker Pechenga and the salvage/rescue tug Fotiy Krylov left the port of Vladivostok on March 19 to join Russia’s Mediterranean task force.
The task force currently includes the large anti-submarine ship Severomorsk, the frigate Yaroslav Mudry, the salvage/rescue tugs Altai and SB-921 and the tanker Lena from the Northern and Baltic Fleets, as well as the Ropucha-II Class landing ship Azov from the Black Sea Fleet.

The task force may be enlarged to include nuclear submarines, Navy Commander Admiral Viktor Chirkov said last Sunday.
The Defense Ministry said in April Russia has begun setting up a naval task force in the Mediterranean, sending several warships from the Pacific Fleet to the region. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in March a permanent naval task force in the Mediterranean was needed to defend Russia’s interests in the region.

A senior Defense Ministry official said the Mediterranean task force's command and control agencies will be based either in Novorossiysk, Russia, or in Sevastopol, Ukraine.

Admiral Vladimir Komoyedov, head of the parliamentary defense committee, previously told RIA Novosti that the Mediterranean task force should be comprised of 10 warships and support vessels as part of several tactical groups tasked with attack, antisubmarine warfare and minesweeping.

The Soviet Union maintained its 5th Mediterranean Squadron from 1967 until 1992. It was formed to counter the US Navy's 6th Fleet during the Cold War, and consisted of 30-50 warships and auxiliary vessels.

Russia's been politically hands-off of the situation directly, but their silent support of the Assad regime is certainly present. Russian efforts to block motions toward action have also been notable on the UN level:

WASHINGTON, August 29 (RIA Novosti) – An urgent meeting of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council – reportedly called by Russia – ended in less than an hour on Thursday without any indication of progress or agreement on the crisis in Syria following last week’s alleged chemical weapons attack, US media reported.

It was the second time in two days that the five permanent Security Council members – the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China – came out of a meeting with no apparent progress.

Russia, which on Wednesday blocked a British resolution seeking the authorization of military force, says there is no evidence that the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad was responsible for the chemical weapons attack. The US and its allies say they are convinced that the Assad regime was behind the attack.

And in a stunning defeat for British Prime Minister David Cameron, the British parliament late Thursday voted against endorsing military action against Syria.

The White House said Thursday’s Security Council permanent member meeting was the latest effort by Moscow to prevent the UN from holding Syria accountable for the alleged use of chemical weapons near Damascus on Aug. 21. The Syrian government has denied using chemical agents.

The United States believes “strongly” in the UN process, but, “What we’ve seen at the UN is a repeated willingness on the part of the Russians to block action… They’ve done it three times, looks like they’re doing it again,” said White House deputy press secretary Josh Earnest in a briefing with reporters.

The United Nations Security Council has not authorized any military intervention in the Syrian crisis, which began in early 2011. Moscow, along with Beijing, has previously vetoed three UN Security Council resolutions condemning Assad's government
“We’ve seen two years of Russian intransigence on the Syria issue at the UN... We’ve haven’t seen a shift in two years, I’m not sure why we would expect one today,” said Marie Harf, State Department spokeswoman, to the media.

More than 350 people, many of them women and children, died in the chemical weapons attack, according to the Syrian opposition and the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders.

With UN approval, US President Barack Obama will “make a decision about an appropriate response based on the national security interests of the United States of America,” which takes into account that Syria is perhaps the most volatile country in one of the most volatile regions of the world, Earnest said.

“This country borders a NATO ally in Turkey, it borders one of our most important partners in the region, Jordan, and it is in close proximity to the nation of Israel, a country whose security we have vowed to protect… so there are a number of ways in which the national security interests of United States are at stake here,” he added.

On Thursday, the White House appeared to be broadening its efforts to build a consensus with US lawmakers for action against Syria with an unclassified phone briefing between senior administration officials, including Secretary of State John Kerry, and leaders of Congress from both political parties.

Two leading members of the US Senate intelligence committee who had seen a classified assessment of the attack said on Thursday that they believe the Assad regime was responsible.

“I have been briefed by the intelligence community on last week’s chemical weapons attack in Syria and I believe the intelligence points to an attack by the Assad government, not the opposition,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the chairwoman of the intelligence committee, in a statement.

“Based on available intelligence, there can be no doubt the Assad regime is responsible for using chemical weapons on the Syrian people,” Sen. Saxby Chambliss, vice chairman of the same committee, said in a statement.

“It is time for the United States to act in a serious way, and send a clear message to Assad and his allies that the world will not tolerate chemical or biological attacks. Continuing to do nothing is not an option,” he added.

But 116 House lawmakers sent a letter to Obama Wednesday requesting consultation with and authorization from Congress before he orders US military force against Syria.

In a separate letter, House Speaker John Boehner also wrote to the president saying it is “essential that you provide a clear, unambiguous explanation of how military action… will secure US objectives and how it fits into your overall policy.”

Boehner further called on Obama to make the case to the American people for how such action “will secure American national security interests, preserve America's credibility, deter the future use of chemical weapons.”

White House spokesman Earnest said while Obama believes it is important for his administration to consult with Congress about Syria “in a very robust way,” he also feels there is a limited timeframe in which to decide on the best course of action.

“It is important for the Assad regime and other totalitarian dictators around the globe to understand that the international community will not tolerate the indiscriminate, widespread use of chemical weapons, particularly against women and children as they’re sleeping in their beds,” he said.

The more I see about this situation, the more I think that getting involved would end up being a clusterfuck of epic proportions. I'm not suggesting that Russian forces would automatically fire on United States forces or missiles, but they don't have to - they can simply feed telemetry information to Assad's military to destroy the element of surprise from a US strike, to start with.

The argument appears to be "we have to get involved in a rapidly developing civil war in Syria, because people might not take us seriously in the future if we don't", which to me is an argument based on not evidence, not prudence, but pride.

The fact that the United States has a frighteningly large military is not in dispute. I would not consider it wise by any power to not take seriously the nation with a gigantic military to deploy, so I'm much less concerned about any perceived loss of respect in that regard. "Speak softly, and carry a big stick" still applies, after all.

But I do not see any reason to get involved in someone else's civil war.

[General Havoc]

I am willing to allow that the Lybia intervention may have been to the benefit of the United States. As far as I can tell the present regime in Lybia is pretty friendly to us and relatively sane. There's been some incidents and instability as a result of the intervention that probably wouldn't have happened otherwise, and it is a damn shame about the library in Timbuktu, but overall I think we won more than we lost there. So no, we probably shouldn't have stayed out of Lybia too.

I don't disagree with this analysis, and obviously not everything that came out of Libya was to our benefit. I lost a friend of mine in the Benghazi Consulate thing, but that was Al Qaeda being opportunistic, best I can tell. What concerns me is that the base level of our calculation cannot just be "what is of benefit to the United States". I mean obviously that's going to be the major question when all is said and done, but even in international politics, there are questions beyond self-interest that must get involved. And that's where the issue arises with Assad. I can point to this and that, but ultimately I don't think we should kill the motherfucker because it is in the US' best interests. I don't think it's particularly against our interests, but it's not a move designed to win us a point in the game of Empire. I think we should kill the motherfucker because we have a separate obligation to do so.

The President is probably going to have the Navy attack Syria using sub-sonic ship-launched cruise missiles. If the Russians have their air defence radars on, and we can't stop them from emitting radiation on international waters, they can give the Syrians a good half-hour's warning on any launches plus the incoming vectors. I'm saying as a by-the-way that our actual response to the situation is a bloody useless waste of money, and I would rather we do nothing and save the Russians the laugh.

Even if that's the case, there are targets they cannot reliably move or protect in half an hour, not with all the Russian-provided warning in the world. Airfields and buildings for instance, to say nothing of the aircraft within them. A modern military aircraft requires a half hour just to get warmed up, and you can't exactly load your Ministry of Defense onto the back of a moving van with that kind of notice. I have no idea what the President proposes to target. But there are all sorts of valuable targets that the Russians and Syrians alike can do precisely fuck-all to protect once we've fired our missiles at them.

I can, if I stretch my mind, conceive of reasons to not attack Assad. The fear that Russian sailors might laugh at us for attacking a WMD-deploying dictator is not one of them. Let them fucking laugh. Their client-state will be the one with a smoldering hole where his Ministry of Internal Security used to stand.

I believe political consistency is a very useful and valuable tool of the international stage. In order to be effective at organizing our foreign policy it's important that we and everyone else be very clear on on our ideological stances. Foreign policy isn't just what we tell other peoples we want to accomplish in the world, it's what we tell ourselves we want to accomplish. I think the United States has gone off message, we have no idea what we want to do in the world any more. We have these vague ideas about making ourselves safe and secure from these vague scary people who seem to hate us for no reason, but wind up just sort of putzing around aimlessly. This is ineffective and incompetent, and for the sake of continued American ascendancy on the world stage, we need to have clear consistent message that we stick to with some reliability. I believe that what America has done for the past century has worked very well for her, and we should continue doing it. That's all.

And that message is what? That so long as one is not an Islamist then one is permitted any action including the gassing of civilians? For all the shit that we got up to in the Cold War, and there was plenty of it, there was a human rights and ideological aspect to the Cold War as well, beyond the realpolitik. We didn't win the Cold War because we had more dictators than the Soviets did. We won the Cold War because ultimately, the Soviet Union was an evil empire, and was recognized as such by enough of its citizens and dominions to finally do away with it. Our behavior in the Cold War was far from blameless, and many of the bad decisions we made during the course of it still haunt us today. But there was a reason beyond mere self-interest that we engaged in that conflict. And the consequences of winning it were not simply American dominion over the Earth.

Our ideological stance in this case, the one we wedded ourselves to for better or worse, was that the use of Chemical Weapons on the populace of Syria was a red line that nobody was permitted to cross. That was indeed not the stance we took during the Cold War, but this is not the Cold War, and to hold to the stances of yesteryear as though it was is no virtue. I personally think we had a responsibility to intervene long before this. But as we did not, at the least we should be intervening now.

And if we do not, then isn't the consistent policy drawn from that that anyone who can get their hands on chemical weapons has carte blanche to use them on whatever they like?

Just to make sure I'm reiterating your argument correctly Havoc, you're saying that we should have invaded Syria months ago, on the basis of Assad being a horrible dictator who repeatedly did inhumane things to the people he's ostensibly the leader of. That we should do this not because we have standing agreements with Syria or any of her allies, but simply because it falls upon the United States to follow through with the line drawn in the sand, lest we lose credibility by not acting. And to you, the possible credibility lost by not acting would be greater than the possible credibility lost by acting on possibly faulty intelligence.

If this summary of your argument is correct, then why is North Korea still standing? Why are many African nations untouched? Why does Syria get and deserve our special attention when North Korea and other nations do far worse to its citizenry, and we do nothing?

And why does it fall to the Unites States to decide what precisely constitutes "good behavior" in a dictator?

I never said the word 'invaded'. In fact I took pains to ensure that I didn't use that word. At no time did I ever advocate putting troops into Syria. Ever. What I advocated was to blow the hell out of the Syrian government's command & control, armor, air force, and military infrastructure. And if you can't rebut that premise, I'll thank you not to invent new premises to rebut in its place just to make me look stupid.

If this summary of your argument is correct, then why is North Korea still standing? Why are many African nations untouched? Why does Syria get and deserve our special attention when North Korea and other nations do far worse to its citizenry, and we do nothing?

And why does it fall to the Unites States to decide what precisely constitutes "good behavior" in a dictator?

This is a morally bankrupt line of reasoning, and one that I have already addressed. The mere fact that we did not destroy North Korea or evil African warlords does not mean we should not destroy this evil fucking warlord. It has no bearing whatsoever on the question. It is like claiming that it is immoral to give to charity on Christmas because you did not give to charity on the other days of the year. It is like claiming that because there are murderers who were never punished, we should never punish anyone who commits murder.

Why is North Korea still standing? Because we didn't take their government out. Maybe we couldn't take them out. Maybe we could have, and chose not to. No possible answer to why North Korea is still here has any relevance to what we should do to the Syrian government. Evil acts occur every day. Does this mean you have no moral responsibility to oppose evil? Does this mean that you should do nothing whenever something horrific happens?

Oh and since you asked? It falls to the United States to decide what constitutes good behavior because nobody else seems to be willing to enforce the most basic standards of behavior. Or are you suggesting that it is indeed good behavior to gas one's own populace? Is all this merely a cultural misunderstanding? Am I being insensitive by suggesting that nerve gassing a city is wrong?

Why does it fall upon the United States to do the job of the United Nations in these matters, when the United States was one of the key players in the formation of the United Nations in the first place?

Because as events as widespread as Bosnia and Rawanda have shown, the United Nations is unwilling to do that job. This is not because of evil or cupidity, but because the United Nations is a political organization that represents every government in power around the world. Moreover I don't believe that the families of the children nerve gassed last week care overmuch about our hair splitting as to which organization should be taking Assad out. In a perfect world, the UN would have stepped in to prevent this. They did not. Perhaps they cannot. We can at least do this much.

I already addressed much of your comment concerning the Russians in response to Lys, but if you'll forgive me Rhoenix, I'll call out one more line of yours:

But I do not see any reason to get involved in someone else's civil war.

As it turns out Rhoenix, there's a statesman of some note who would agree with you:

How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far away country between people of whom we know nothing.

The context of that quote, should you wish to look it up, might prove illuminating. After all, the situation he was so keen to not intervene in also (ultimately) involved the use of poison gas.

[rhoenix]

I never said the word 'invaded'. In fact I took pains to ensure that I didn't use that word. At no time did I ever advocate putting troops into Syria. Ever. What I advocated was to blow the hell out of the Syrian government's command & control, armor, air force, and military infrastructure. And if you can't rebut that premise, I'll thank you not to invent new premises to rebut in its place just to make me look stupid.

Fine - sans invasion then.

This is a morally bankrupt line of reasoning, and one that I have already addressed. The mere fact that we did not destroy North Korea or evil African warlords does not mean we should not destroy this evil fucking warlord. It has no bearing whatsoever on the question. It is like claiming that it is immoral to give to charity on Christmas because you did not give to charity on the other days of the year. It is like claiming that because there are murderers who were never punished, we should never punish anyone who commits murder.

Why is North Korea still standing? Because we didn't take their government out. Maybe we couldn't take them out. Maybe we could have, and chose not to. No possible answer to why North Korea is still here has any relevance to what we should do to the Syrian government. Evil acts occur every day. Does this mean you have no moral responsibility to oppose evil? Does this mean that you should do nothing whenever something horrific happens?

Oh and since you asked? It falls to the United States to decide what constitutes good behavior because nobody else seems to be willing to enforce the most basic standards of behavior. Or are you suggesting that it is indeed good behavior to gas one's own populace? Is all this merely a cultural misunderstanding? Am I being insensitive by suggesting that nerve gassing a city is wrong?

I'm failing to see how this is "morally bankrupt" when the only reason we appear to be paying attention to Syria specifically is because of convenience.

I simply cannot agree with the "he's a bad person doing bad things" argument when the United States hasn't done so with other countries.

As for your final questions, I can only assume you're looking for a non-sarcastic answer to continue the discussion. If that's the case, then:

1. I can't call it overtly bad behavior to gas one's populace when campus police did so here in the US against unarmed students during a protest recently. Granted, it was tear gas and not nerve gas, but it still happened. It would be the United States blatantly throwing stones in a glass house to rebuke another country militarily when we did the same thing, despite being on a lesser degree.

2. I don't really care about "culture" in this case. I'm not happy about some tinpot dictator supposedly gassing his own people either, but I'm a little past the "outrage of some people doing something over there" argument that's been used as a thinly veiled pretext for war. I certainly agree with you that if true, Assad gassing his own people is utterly reprehensible. But I just don't see it as the United States' responsibility to be involved.

3. No, I'm not suggesting you're somehow insensitive. I simply don't agree with you about the argument.

Because as events as widespread as Bosnia and Rawanda have shown, the United Nations is unwilling to do that job. This is not because of evil or cupidity, but because the United Nations is a political organization that represents every government in power around the world. Moreover I don't believe that the families of the children nerve gassed last week care overmuch about our hair splitting as to which organization should be taking Assad out. In a perfect world, the UN would have stepped in to prevent this. They did not. Perhaps they cannot. We can at least do this much.

That's a fair point, and in my mind bring up the question of why the UN still exists, considering it's pretty much toothless and countries routinely ignore any resolutions it makes - but that's another discussion entirely.

That the UN is a political entity bound up in politics while people die is not new, unfortunately. The precedent that the United States must "do this much" to me is too far. It's not our place to do so, and we have no obligation to play world police, in my eyes.

Now... Havoc, you decided to dig up Chamberlain as your counter-example? Was it really your intention to try to draw a comparison of Assad to Hitler?

If the Pope visits Assad on his birthday, then perhaps you might have a point. Until then, I really don't see how that comparison at all helped your point, considering I'm not arguing to completely ignore Syria - I'm arguing to not launch strikes against them.

[General Havoc]

I'm failing to see how this is "morally bankrupt" when the only reason we appear to be paying attention to Syria specifically is because of convenience.

It is irrelevant why we are paying attention to Syria. We are paying attention to it. We should have paid attention to many other things, but we are paying attention to this. And to suggest that we should not pay attention to it because we did not pay attention to those other things, is spurious at best, and reprehensible at worst. Any reason you could suggest for us paying attention to Syria, any reason at all, from self-interest to random chance to convenience to opportunism, any of these reasons, makes no difference in regards to the cold fact that what transpired in Syria was an atrocity. And if it is your position that we should ignore atrocities so as to be consistent with other times we have ignored atrocities, then there is no further value in you and I discussing the matter, for I hold your sense of morality in abject contempt.

I simply cannot agree with the "he's a bad person doing bad things" argument when the United States hasn't done so with other countries.

Why? Why is this relevant at all? What difference does it make whether we have done so with other countries? Why is consistency such a virtue here that it trumps all other concerns, such as the prevention of further atrocities? Four times in this thread, I have given examples of why this logic makes no sense to me. Allow me to try a fifth time. If I break into your house and murder you with an axe, Rhoenix, is it incumbent on the Police to let me go, so as to be consistent with the fact that they have not always prosecuted murderers? Is it morally required for them to do that? How can it possibly matter what we did and did not do in other cases when evaluating what the right thing to do is here, except insofar as it informs us what the consequences of such actions will be?

If it's consistency you're after, the United States has a long, rich history of intervening in other people's countries, for all sorts of reasons, most of them none too saintly. It is perfectly consistent for us to throw our weight around, if that's all you see this as being. Why this sudden need to justify an absolute precedent for stopping this madman from gassing more people? Were Bosnia and East Timor not enough? Did the consequences of inaction in Rwanda or Liberia not make themselves abundantly clear? I do not understand why the conversation continually returns to "We did not intervene here, thus we must intervene nowhere." This concept is so self-evidently absurd to me that I cannot understand the premise behind advocating it. I would have thought it a troll if literally everyone had not brought it up.

1. I can't call it overtly bad behavior to gas one's populace when campus police did so here in the US against unarmed students during a protest recently. Granted, it was tear gas and not nerve gas, but it still happened. It would be the United States blatantly throwing stones in a glass house to rebuke another country militarily when we did the same thing, despite being on a lesser degree.

It is reprehensible to equate an inappropriate use of tear gas by campus police to what happened in Syria. Utterly reprehensible. Tell me, Rhoenix, that we should not attack Syria because the Russians will intervene. Tell me we should not do it because our foreign policy will be irrevocably damaged. Tell me we should not do it because the Rebels will then win, and islamicize Syria, or massacre the Alawites. Tell me we should not do it because it will cost too much. Tell me it will spark nuclear war. Tell me it won't work. Tell me it's not worth doing.

Don't tell me we shouldn't do it because campus police tear gassed a bunch of students. Don't sit there and offer me an equivalency between that, and nerve gassing a city. Don't dismiss thirteen hundred dead civilians, thousands more maimed, all in the context of a civil war that has killed a hundred thousand, by comparing it to a student protest gone wrong. Come at me with an argument that I can object to within the context that a moral person offered it for reasons that they believe to be correct, just, and proper. Don't come at me with this. Not this. It is degrading in the extreme to those who were murdered. It is akin to suggesting that we have no right to object to Genocide because we have unsolved murders in the United States. In fact, that argument makes more moral sense than this one.

I cannot respond to this argument. I reject it, in totality. I reject the mindset that would lead someone to propose it. I abjure whatever leap of logic led to its inception. I have nothing to say to anyone who would espouse such a thing. Objections based on politics or pragmatism or military strategy or history or even different interpretations of basic morality I can address. Objections based around this, I cannot. There is a moral calculus at work here with which I am unacquainted. I do not understand it. I do not believe I wish to understand it.

That the UN is a political entity bound up in politics while people die is not new, unfortunately. The precedent that the United States must "do this much" to me is too far. It's not our place to do so, and we have no obligation to play world police, in my eyes.

And in mine, we have every obligation. And yes, 'obligation' was the correct term. We are obliged, by our position as the most powerful nation on Earth, to act in defense of those being butchered wholesale by nerve gas, whether we have so-conducted ourselves in the past or not. This is my position, and I hold to it. As a man has an obligation to intervene when he sees someone being beaten or robbed or murdered or raped, so we have this obligation to act. I do not understand the mindset that would lead one to believe that we do not.

Now... Havoc, you decided to dig up Chamberlain as your counter-example? Was it really your intention to try to draw a comparison of Assad to Hitler?

No, it was not my intention to draw a comparison of Assad to Hitler, though one could be drawn. It was my intention to compare one set of gas-related atrocities with another. And to suggest that the policy of ignoring atrocities because they happen to someone else has not, historically-speaking, always proven wise.

If the Pope visits Assad on his birthday, then perhaps you might have a point. Until then, I really don't see how that comparison at all helped your point, considering I'm not arguing to completely ignore Syria - I'm arguing to not launch strikes against them.

Thus far, that is exactly what you have argued. I see no proposals for any other action to take in response to this, no suggestions of some alternate course, nothing except repetition of the basic belief that we have no business involving ourselves at all. If this is not ignoring Syria, then I do not know what is.

If you do not wish to ignore Syria, then what do you wish to do?

[rhoenix]

When you can't attack the position, make up motives and attack those. It is irrelevant why we are paying attention to Syria. We are paying attention to it. We should have paid attention to many other things, but we are paying attention to this. And to suggest that we should not pay attention to it because we did not pay attention to those other things, is spurious at best, and reprehensible at worst. Any reason you could suggest for us paying attention to Syria, any reason at all, from self-interest to random chance to convenience to opportunism, any of these reasons, makes no difference in regards to the cold fact that what transpired in Syria was an atrocity. And if it is your position that we should ignore atrocities so as to be consistent with other times we have ignored atrocities, then there is no further value in you and I discussing the matter, for I hold your sense of morality in abject contempt.

I don't think I've disagreed that what transpired there was an atrocity at all. However, further in the post you elaborate this reasoning further, so I'll take up the torch there.

Why? Why is this relevant at all? What difference does it make whether we have done so with other countries? Why is consistency such a virtue here that it trumps all other concerns, such as the prevention of further atrocities? Four times in this thread, I have given examples of why this logic makes no sense to me. Allow me to try a fifth time. If I break into your house and murder you with an axe, Rhoenix, is it incumbent on the Police to let me go, so as to be consistent with the fact that they have not always prosecuted murderers? Is it morally required for them to do that? How can it possibly matter what we did and did not do in other cases when evaluating what the right thing to do is here, except insofar as it informs us what the consequences of such actions will be?

If it's consistency you're after, the United States has a long, rich history of intervening in other people's countries, for all sorts of reasons, most of them none too saintly. It is perfectly consistent for us to throw our weight around, if that's all you see this as being. Why this sudden need to justify an absolute precedent for stopping this madman from gassing more people? Were Bosnia and East Timor not enough? Did the consequences of inaction in Rwanda or Liberia not make themselves abundantly clear? I do not understand why the conversation continually returns to "We did not intervene here, thus we must intervene nowhere." This concept is so self-evidently absurd to me that I cannot understand the premise behind advocating it. I would have thought it a troll if literally everyone had not brought it up.

You don't get to falsely equate my assertion that "we should not intervene in Syria" with "we should intervene nowhere." That does nothing to resolve the debate at hand, since it's attacking a strawman.

Now, as for your example of murdering strings of people with an axe. Your example assumes firstly that all jurisdiction is the same - and it most certainly is not. If you want to continue with this example, this is a case of a police chief in Detroit being asked about axe murders in California. It's terrible, and he'll offer to send aid to the people there working to solve it, but it's not his jurisdiction.

And that right there is the heart of my problem with this entire idea of a strike on Syria - that we're calling this a lawful intervention just because we say it is. I do not agree that we have any obligation to send a strike on Syria for this matter. Not even a little one.

It is reprehensible to equate an inappropriate use of tear gas by campus police to what happened in Syria. Utterly reprehensible. Nauseatingly so. Tell me, Rhoenix, that we should not attack Syria because the Russians will intervene. Tell me we should not do it because our foreign policy will be irrevocably damaged. Tell me we should not do it because the Rebels will then win, and islamicize Syria, or massacre the Alawites. Tell me we should not do it because it will cost too much. Tell me it will spark nuclear war. Tell me it won't work. Tell me it's not worth doing.

Don't tell me we shouldn't do it because campus police tear gassed a bunch of students. Don't sit there and offer me an equivalency between that, and nerve gassing a city. Don't dismiss thirteen hundred dead civilians, thousands more maimed, all in the context of a civil war that has killed a hundred thousand, by comparing it to a student protest gone wrong. Come at me with an argument that I can object to within the context that a moral person offered it for reasons that they believe to be correct, just, and proper. Don't come at me with this. Not this. I described the mindset before of minimizing (as I saw it) the events in Syria as morally bankrupt. That term is not strong enough. This suggestion is beneath contempt. It is degrading in the extreme to those who were murdered. It is akin to suggesting that we have no right to object to Genocide because we have unsolved murders in the United States. In fact, that argument makes more moral sense than this one.

I will not respond to this argument. I reject it, in totality. I reject the mindset that would lead someone to propose it. I abjure whatever leap of logic led to its inception. I have nothing to say to anyone who would espouse such a thing. Objections based on politics or pragmatism or military strategy or history or even different interpretations of basic morality I can address. Objections based around this, I cannot. There is a moral calculus at work here with which I am unacquainted. I do not understand it. I do not believe I wish to understand it.

Fine - consider the example retracted. I was attempting to make the point that getting outraged that another country would gas their own citizens falls flat when we've done it to your own, but I'll certainly grant that no deaths occurred as a result of the campus tear-gassing here in the States.

And in mine, we have every obligation. And yes, 'obligation' was the correct term. We are obliged, by our position as the most powerful nation on Earth, to act in defense of those being butchered wholesale by nerve gas, whether we have so-conducted ourselves in the past or not. This is my position, and I hold to it. As a man has an obligation to intervene when he sees someone being beaten or robbed or murdered or raped, so we have this obligation to act. I do not understand the mindset that would lead one to believe that we do not.

And this right here was what I wanted to see. In your eyes, because we are currently the most powerful nation on Earth, the most powerful nation on Earth has an obligation to tell other nations how to behave and live.

I agree with the idea of wanting our military interventions to always be used for what is ostensibly a good cause, such as acting in the defense of another.

In this case however, I don't see us as having any jurisdiction to do so militarily, mainly because it is an internal conflict with a nation we are at best neutral with, as far as I know. It is not a conflict between two nations, one of which we have sworn to protect. As much as I completely agree with your want to do something about this, I do not and cannot agree that adding more violence to this situation, especially from an outside source, would do anything whatsoever to stabilize Syria - in fact, it has a large potential to make things far more volatile.

And that's the main reason I do not agree with the strike - because in my view, not only is it not our place to get involved with another country's civil war, it is most certainly not our place to jump in militarily in their civil war. We have no right or jurisdiction to do so, whether we're ostensibly the "most powerful nation on Earth" or not.

No, it was not my intention to draw a comparison of Assad to Hitler, though one could be drawn. It was my intention to compare one set of gas-related atrocities with another. And to suggest that the policy of ignoring atrocities because they happen to someone else has not, historically-speaking, always proven wise.

To reiterate, I'm not suggesting we stick our fingers in our ears and scrub Syria off the map with a black marker. I have done my best to avoid calling you names or drawing ugly parallels with your reasoning and posts in this thread in the interests of an actual debate, and I would appreciate the same in return.

Thus far, that is exactly what you have argued. I see no proposals for any other action to take in response to this, no suggestions of some alternate course, nothing except repetition of the basic belief that we have no business involving ourselves at all. If this is not ignoring Syria, then I do not know what is.

If you do not wish to ignore Syria, then what do you wish to do?

I'm going to ignore, for the moment, your assertion that not wanting a strike on Syria somehow means I want to ignore the situation.

Instead, I'll answer the question directly: we send food, water, and other aid to Syria, and do not take a side unless the conflict spills outside Syrian borders and becomes an international incident. Until and unless that occurs, I do not believe we have a right or a place to do so.

If the conflict spills outside Syria's borders, we act accordingly to contain the situation as needed. Until then, we watch carefully and avidly, sending neutral aid to the people of Syria itself, and not to any one side of the conflict.

[General Havoc]

You don't get to falsely equate my assertion that "we should not intervene in Syria" with "we should intervene nowhere." That does nothing to resolve the debate at hand, since it's attacking a strawman.

Thus far you have argued that we should not intervene in Syria because we have no moral right or obligation to do so. The reasoning you used, that it is not incumbent upon us to interfere in the affairs of others, would seem to indicate that we should indeed intervene nowhere, as none of your arguments reference Syria in specific as opposed to other theoretical interventions. If that is not the crux of your argument, then say so. Don't wait for me to divine it from the ether, explain yourself. You mentioned nothing about intervening anywhere else, nor any reason why Syria was specifically off-limits to us in a way that other places were not. Your argument was based on inconsistency and the moral hypocrisy of us criticizing other nations while not setting our own house in order. That would certainly indicate to me that we have no business intervening anywhere.

If Syria is special in a way that other potential interventions are not, then explain how so, or at least mention it. Don't wait for people to draw obvious conclusions from what you say and then accuse them of erecting strawmen because they failed to read your mind.

Now, as for your example of murdering strings of people with an axe. Your example assumes firstly that all jurisdiction is the same - and it most certainly is not. If you want to continue with this example, this is a case of a police chief in Detroit being asked about axe murders in California. It's terrible, and he'll offer to send aid to the people there working to solve it, but it's not his jurisdiction.

And that right there is the heart of my problem with this entire idea of a strike on Syria - that we're calling this a lawful intervention just because we say it is. I do not agree that we have any obligation to send a strike on Syria for this matter. Not even a little one.

Whose jurisdiction then, are we dealing with? Russia's? The UN's? Assad's? Since we're running with the police example, let me remind you that if a local police force refuses to enforce the law or acts with supreme corruption in their jurisdiction, they will lose it. When Arkansas refused to integrate its schools, and the local police beat the students trying to attend high school in defiance of court orders, Federal Troops were sent in to enforce the law. The argument was made at the time that the Feds had no jurisdiction over Arkansas matters, and that we had no right to force them to integrate (or in the case of Mississippi, stop murdering freedom riders). Gassing civilians to death is a flagrant violation of several different kinds of International Law, as well as a violation of the UN charter. Who is to enforce that if not us? Because whoever's jurisdiction Syria falls into sure as hell isn't doing so.

And this right here was what I wanted to see. In your eyes, because we are currently the most powerful nation on Earth, the most powerful nation on Earth has an obligation to tell other nations how to behave and live.

I agree with the idea of wanting our military interventions to always be used for what is ostensibly a good cause, such as acting in the defense of another.

In this case however, I don't see us as having any jurisdiction to do so militarily, mainly because it is an internal conflict with a nation we are at best neutral with, as far as I know. It is not a conflict between two nations, one of which we have sworn to protect. As much as I completely agree with your want to do something about this, I do not and cannot agree that adding more violence to this situation, especially from an outside source, would do anything whatsoever to stabilize Syria - in fact, it has a large potential to make things far more volatile.

And that's the main reason I do not agree with the strike - because in my view, not only is it not our place to get involved with another country's civil war, it is most certainly not our place to jump in militarily in their civil war. We have no right or jurisdiction to do so, whether we're ostensibly the "most powerful nation on Earth" or not.

You are, of course, correct that striking Assad will not stabilize Syria. You are also correct that it may well engender further violence. Whether that violence to come is worse than that which Assad is now free to inflict ad infinitum (this is not the first time the Syrian government has gassed its enemies, after all), is an open question. I believe it is not, but none of us can see the future.

But while I do not believe we have any right to tell other peoples how to live, we absolutely have a right as men to tell them how to behave, at least insofar as WMD's are concerned. If we do not have that right, then I can murder you without consequence, and you me, and both of us anyone else. And all this talk of jurisdiction is an excuse at best. There are twenty different precedents for intervention in a situation like this recognized in international law, and even if there were not, we have no right to sit this out. No right at all. We do not have the right to blithely dismiss this as an "internal matter" that we should not intervene in. If history teaches us nothing else, it is that the phrase "internal matter" is almost universally used as an excuse to justify the most horrible acts in the history of man. The holocaust, or rather the early pre-war stages of what would become the holocaust, was dismissed by the Western Powers as an "internal matter". The Rwandan Genocide was an "internal matter". The atrocities of the Khemer Rouge were "internal matters", and the Bosnian War, and the Kosovo Massacres, and the Holodmor and the Gulag and Apartheid and Slavery and Jim Crow and the Trail of Tears and on and on and on and on again.

No. Some things are never internal matters. Some things are matters for the human race itself. The entire purpose of the UN Convention on Genocide was to put to bed the notion that widespread massacres of entire populations were internal matters, and the use of nerve gas on a civilian population cannot be dismissed as nothing but an internal matter. This is a crime against humanity itself. And as members of the human species, we have not only the right to intervene, but the obligation to do so. We may fail to make a difference and we may be unable to prevent Assad from gassing people some more, but we have no right to pretend that this has nothing to do with us. It has everything to do with us. All of us.

To reiterate, I'm not suggesting we stick our fingers in our ears and scrub Syria off the map with a black marker. I have done my best to avoid calling you names or drawing ugly parallels with your reasoning and posts in this thread in the interests of an actual debate, and I would appreciate the same in return.

Then as before, what are you suggesting? You've made no claims other than we should not attack yet, and nobody here, myself included, has brought up any non-military options.

Instead, I'll answer the question directly: we send food, water, and other aid to Syria, and do not take a side unless the conflict spills outside Syrian borders and becomes an international incident. Until and unless that occurs, I do not believe we have a right or a place to do so.

If the conflict spills outside Syria's borders, we act accordingly to contain the situation as needed. Until then, we watch carefully and avidly, sending neutral aid to the people of Syria itself, and not to any one side of the conflict.

You said before that you were not advocating scrubbing Syria off the map with a black marker. Unfortunately what you just proposed effectively is scrubbing Syria off the map with a black marker. Sitting back and watching and doing nothing but neutrally sending aid so long as the conflict doesn't spill out of Syria's borders (something it has already done, by the way, as either the Turks or the Lebanese will be happy to attest to) is tantamount to doing nothing at all. We cannot send the Syrians sufficient aid to protect them from nerve gas attack, nor the depredations of their own government, nor those of the Al Qaeda-aligned forces now fighting against the government. And while sending aid is a notion I heartily endorse, it is not, by itself, a response to this action. It is something we would (or should) be doing whether Assad had just nerve gassed his people or not.

By this logic you have proposed, there is no action that Assad could take against his own people that we would have a right to stop him from taking, be it mass genocide or nuclear war, so long as he did not spill the conflict over his borders. If that conclusion is an error, then correct me. But that's sure what it sounds like, based on the premises and logic you propose.

[rhoenix]

I'm tired of quoting ad nauseum, so I'm going to approach things this way:

You can argue that the use of chemical weapons is and should be a war crime, which you pointed out on Skype that Assad himself had agreed to the UN not to use - and you'd be right.

You can argue that the use of said chemical weapons should merit a response, because it is fucked up and monstrous to use said chemical weapons on one's own people, and I'd even agree with you there.

You can even make the argument (though I don't think you've done so yet) that because our President stated that any use of chemical weapons by Syria on its own people would merit a response a year ago, and attempting to now show this response to use Syria as an example for future "red lines" set with Iran, and you'd be right there as well.

But until and unless the UN authorizes a strike by the USA and others, it would not be a legitimate use of power, because it is effectively declaring unilateral war on another country, even for a single strike. You can argue that something must be done, and I'd agree with you, even on a moral level - but to me, it sets a dangerous precedent. The existence of the UN was to resolve matters such as this, and the United States charging in with the mindset of "damn the boss, I know what I'm doing is right" without the authority to do so not only illegitimizes the UN, but sets the precedent that the country with the current most powerful military on Earth can act as its own international authority.

In short, unless the boss we set into place says we can, I don't think we should go stomping in Syria - even for a single strike. I don't want the USA to try to replace the UN, and I'd rather no other country try for it either, now or in the future.

Besides - waiting for proper UN authorization to do so means that not only the USA is cracking it's knuckles, but that the rest of the world voted to have Assad nutpunched. To me, I think that sets a much better precedent for the use of chemical weapons, especially on one's own populace.

[Josh]

Havoc:

Don't want to pile in overmuch here because I know how frustrating it is to have multiple people tearing into your arguments. But I do have this to say.

My point with this is to come up with a consistent rationale for intervention. So what I derive from your statements thus far is that 'If a government does nasty gruesome things to its own people and we have the power to intervene, we are therefore morally obligated to intervene.'

Now, where I disagree with that philosophy is because in a situation like this is because it's bloody damned vague and gray-area. With the Syria situation, were we to disable the Assad government's ability to project force beyond infantry and possibly decapitate it altogether, would we then be obligated to intervene against the rebel forces if they start massacring Alawites? Do we then attempt to smash up their leadership? At the end of the day in this hypothetical, we probably end up smashing anybody who rises to power in Syria because for the most part they all seem to be pretty intent on doing horrid and ghastly things to the opposition civilian populace.

The reason I said I'd be happier with your proposed destruction of the regime's ability to operate is because either no measure or full measure is better than an ineffectual half measure. However, there's no scheme of intervention available to our current capabilities that doesn't involve a shitload of folks dying in horrible ways with a minimal chance of anything better coming of the situation. No matter what we do, the virtual certainty of the matter is that whoever ends up on top of Syria when it's said and done will do so on a pile of bodies. If we're going to put ourselves in the business of disapproving of that by means of shooting them up, we're in for a long, fruitless slog.

[rhoenix]

Additional news, as I read it today:

In a report that is sure to be considered blockbuster news, the rebels told Dale Gavlak, a reporter who has written for the Associated Press, NPR and BBC, they are responsible for the chemical attack last week.

Gavlak is a Middle Eastern journalist who filed the report about the rebels claiming responsibility on the Mint Press News website, which is affiliated with AP.

In that report allegedly the rebels told him the chemical attack was a result of mishandling chemical weapons.

This news should deflate the accusations, against the Assad regime, coming from the U.S., Britain, France and the Arab League.

Since the chemical attacks last week, the Assad government was immediately blamed. On Monday, Secretary of State John Kerry said: That Assad’s guilt was “a judgment already clear to the world," according to theguardian.com.

As a result of Assad's government being blamed for the chemical attacks, five U.S. warships are now stationed off Syria's coast. These destroyers are poised to deliver cruise missiles in a strike that is due to begin any time now. According to the report on Mint Press there have been several interviews conducted with people in Damascus and Ghouta, a suburb of the Syrian capital.

The interviews conducted of residents, rebels and their families in Damascus and Ghouta are painting a different picture of what actually happened. Many believe that rebels received chemical weapons provided through the Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Bandar bin Sultan. It's being reported that these weapons are responsible for last week's gas attack.

The father of a rebel who was killed in what's now being called an accident by many in Ghouta and Damascus said: "My son came to me two weeks ago asking what I thought the weapons were that he had been asked to carry,” said Abu Abdel-Moneim. The father said at least 12 rebels including his son were killed by the chemical weapons.

Allegedly they were killed in the tunnel that was used to store the chemicals. These were provided by a Saudi militant, known as Abu Ayesha. He is said to be leading a fighting battalion in the effort to unseat Assad. The weapon was described as a "tube-like structure" by Abdel-Moneim.

Gavlak reports he was told by rebels that the gas "attack" was the result of rebels mishandling the chemical weapons they acquired from the Saudis. He says in the Mint Press report the following:

"They didn’t tell us what these arms were or how to use them,” complained a female fighter named ‘K.’ “We didn’t know they were chemical weapons. We never imagined they were chemical weapons.”

When Saudi Prince Bandar gives such weapons to people, he must give them to those who know how to handle and use them,” she warned. She, like other Syrians, do not want to use their full names for fear of retribution."

Gavlak continues in his report: "A well-known rebel leader in Ghouta named ‘J’ agreed. “Jabhat al-Nusra militants do not cooperate with other rebels, except with fighting on the ground. They do not share secret information. They merely used some ordinary rebels to carry and operate this material.

We were very curious about these arms. And unfortunately, some of the fighters handled the weapons improperly and set off the explosions, ‘J’ said."

The humanitarian agency, Doctors Without Borders, reported that around 355 people had died from what was believed to be a neurotoxic agent. They reportedly treated 3,600 people with symptoms of, frothing at the mouth, respiratory distress, convulsions and blurry vision.

According to the report dozens of rebels said they were receiving salaries from the Saudis.

It's said that Bandar was educated in the U.S. both military and collegiate. He is also said to have "served as a highly influential Saudi Ambassador to the U.S., and the CIA totally loves this guy."

Prince Bandar's intelligence agency is said to have been the first to bring allegations that Assad's regime used Sarin gas in Feb.

DCE commentary

What kind of person gives someone chemical weapons and doesn't tell them? As a result of the Saudis giving the rebels chemical weapons hundreds of innocent people died. Not mention the fact that evil men here in the U.S. and elsewhere are trying to draw us into a war we have no business being involved in.

Isn't there enough heartache, strife, sickness, poverty, injustice and a host of other ills in this world? These evil men just added more heartache into the world by giving the rebels these chemical weapons. The hearts of the men responsible for this are black and they only care about one thing, destroying nations.

This kind of evil happens because of sin and mankind's rebellion to God's word. Little do these men realize is that nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account, Hebrews 4:13.

Rest assured that God has seen this vile act, and every person involved will have to answer for their crimes against humanity on judgment day. Hopefully, this breaking news will be enough to keep the United States from going to war. The result of bombing Syria will be a match that will light the fuse to an all-out war in the Middle East.

I could've done without the commentary at the end, but I included it because it was part of the original article.

So - if this report is accurate, the rebels were given what turned out to be chemical weapons, accidentally set a few off, and gassed their own people.

[Josh]

We'll just have to wait and see on that.

[rhoenix]

We'll just have to wait and see on that.

Yeah, I'm not taking it as solid truth either, considering the source. I mean, "they gave us weapons, and didn't tell us they were chemical weapons! those bastards!" doesn't sound right to me either.

Even so, it was posted as such.

[Josh]

Well it does fall into a fine spectrum of fellow claimants as Ron Paul, Vladimir Putin, and Pat Buchanan. But shit, that's why there are people on the ground to sort this shit out.