“ ‘Never again’ is a challenge to nations. It’s a bitter truth — too often, the world has failed to prevent the killing of innocents on a massive scale. And we are haunted by the atrocities that we did not stop and the lives we did not save.” So said President Obama earlier this year at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. One wonders, in light of what is happening in Syria, how he can fail to be haunted by his administration’s unwillingness to do more to end the bloodshed there.
Especially as one reads news items such as this one: “At least 30 people, and possibly more than 100, were killed in Syria on Thursday in the northern Raqqa Province, when government warplanes bombed a gas station crowded with people, according to activist groups.”
It is true it is beyond America’s power—or at least the amount of power that any American wants to employ—to end all the killing in Syria. That would take a massive ground intervention which no one is proposing, and even the dispatch of large numbers of troops could simply lead to more fighting, as in Iraq. But it is not beyond America’s power to ground the Syrian Air Force before it carries out more such atrocities. Airpower is one instrument of power that can be safely employed in Syria. It would take only a few days for the U.S. Navy and Air Force to take down all of Syria’s air defenses and thus ground the Syrian Air Force before it kills again. Many allies, from France to Turkey, would cheer us on if we did so and cooperate to enforce a no-fly zone.
Yet President Obama refuses to give the order to act. This is a haunting abdication of power that shows the hollowness of talk about a “responsibility to protect” the victims of mass killings.
The belief that the US is directly&militarily responsible for every f–ed up situation on this planet is folly on multiple levels. nBTW,we're bankrupt,should we go into further debt for every external cause that appears urgent? n nNO CAN DO
We should stay out of the Syrian mess. I don't trust those who might replaced Assad. This less than perfect man is substantially more secular than the Islamic extremists.
While I understand the sentiments of the posters above, this is a regime with chemical WMDs that will dispurse them to terrorist groups when it falls (and it will). We need have aviation operations (such as NFZ) already going when this happens.
No the best outcome is precisely what is happening right now. Low level grinding interminable civil war that few care about or notice. As long as Assad doesn't give his chemical weapons to Hezbollah he can continue to kill whomever he likes for as long as he likes and the Salafist loons can kill as many of Assad's people in kind. Current course and speed it will take them a hundred years to run out of Syrians. n nBecause as soon as he gives chemical weapons to Hezbollah and they use them, that's the end of Syria and Hezbollah. The Israeli response will be jaw dropping.
I am still rooting for the rebels and hope they will hang Assad from a lamp post. But I would not spend a nickel, much less weigh in militarily on their side, to bring that about. Anyone who does not yet see with utter clarity that we have no stake in boosting any of these supposed Arab reformers or rebels after what has transpired in Egypt and Libya is a damn fool. Hands off and let them kill eachother.
Empress, I agree with you. No matter who gains the upper hand in Syria, there is one eternal truth—hating Israel and acting as though the Zionist conspiracy is in league with whichever enemy is the enemy du jour. Reality is unfolding as it should–call it Divine Will or inevitability. There are no sides to take. Both suck!
"According to activist groups"? Is that the latest euphemism for foreign backed, foreign paid, foreign terrorists? This isn't a people's revolution, this is a deliberate foreign intervention to tear another Middle Eastern country apart. Cui Bono?
"It would take only a few days for the U.S. Navy and Air Force to take down all of Syria’s air defenses and thus ground the Syrian Air Force" n nI doubt this seriously! Suppressing the Syrian air defenses and Air Force would NOT be a cakewalk and I'm certain there would be loss of allied/American/NATO life and aircraft.. The Syrian Air Force is NOT the Libyian Air Force!! n nWhile I have no doubt we would prevail, walking into this with our eyes closed to the dangers would be foolish indeed. I'm NOT arguing against a no-fly zone, I'm just being a realist.