I was afraid my post would elicit that reply.
End of hijack…
To review: a scant dollop of hope. Not much, easily, but when you are writing out the tag for the patient’s toe, even the slightest pulse is a good thing.
American boots, zero. American body bags, zilch. Didn’t even fire any missiles, just threatened to send John Kerry to talk to them some more. Cruel, perhaps, but if stern duty demands…
Tighty righties rolling about on the floor, shrieking in rage and tearing their hair…thousands and thousands. Not bad for a weak and vacillating bloodthirsty war monger.
(my bolding)
Dude, I know good ol’ Bashar is a bloodthirsty genocidal tyrant, but threatening with “The Kerry” may be against some Geneva stuff or something.
Jokes aside. Syria has no easy solutions, no obviuos solutions.
There are only less horrible ones and it’s really unimportant if US lefties find themselves defending military action without Congress approval or US righties decide that wars without a clear “win” scenario are not a good idea.
Let’s not forget that “taking Assad out” means genocide for the Alawites.
And the Christians.
Anyone here want to volunteer to be a WMD inspector for the UN? Where do you find people who would take that job!?
It very well might, but from whence the certainty? Are you gentlepersons privy to some intelligence that the rest of us are not? Certainly, there are rabidly anti-Shia elements within the opposition. But are they dominant? Is it certain, then, that they will make the decisions should Assad be toppled?
Not saying that I know the answers to these questions, only that I am surprised that you do.
I didn’t mean to imply certainty. Just likelihood based on what happened in Iraq. Very similar situation except a lot more Christians in Syria than Iraq.
Ok I’m making a prediction right here, right now, and I’ll put any amount of money on it you care to wager;
No matter what, thousands upon thousands more people will die in the next two months, before inspectors might, maybe, hit the ground (if the plan is hammered out and approved, of course).
Then after that, thousands more will die as well.
Any takers?
That would be a fool’s bet.
Obama never really had a goal or strategy to end the civil war other than saying “Assad must go”. I’m not sure he wants the rebels to win. Many an expert in this area say that his goal is to keep a statement going. Cynical, though, since stalemate = tens of thousands of people die. We could easily intervene on their side and help them overthrow Assad, but at what cost? And I’m not even sure Obama believes his own rhetoric of “Assad must go” without some context of knowing who comes when he goes.
But if we’re supplying the rebels weapons while UN inspectors are in there, that is going to look terrible when those weapons are used against the inspectors. But if we don’t supply weapons, woe be it unto the rebels.
There are no good actions, which is why I favor inaction. Surround the country so it doesn’t spill violence around the region, and let the two sides duke it out.
The administration’s policy has been so muddled on this that it doesn’t surprise me this is happening. It was barely a week ago that Putin saved Obama’s ass, and he had been planning on getting arms to the rebels before then. There were probably some in the pipeline that couldn’t be stopped. Surely this isn’t going to continue…
What I fear is that Assad will need to “clear the area” of dangerous rebels before UN inspectors are allowed in to any given site. If it’s not Assad’s military, whose? Assad can trump up all kinds of imaginary dangers, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t going to be real ones.
So we’re supporting Al-Qaeda elements in the Middle East to poke the Soviets, I mean Russians in the eye? Far out dude, history is so cyclical man!
I just hope to hell Obama knows what he’s doing in aiding the “right” rebels. Lots of risk, but I’m also willing to believe that most of the rebels would rather have al Qaeda out of the country.
I still suspect that no meaningful military aid is going to get to them. In the end, Putin and Obama will pretty much get what they want. Putin gets his client state and military base. Obama gets rid of CWs and the civil war continues as stalemate. Maybe Assad starts consolidating his gains, and we (and Assad) don’t have to worry about another Iraq or Libya.
What “table”? You keep making these cliched statements as if they have any meaning. They don’t.
there is no red line beyond a rather foolish statement made by Obama. His administration agreed it will not press for U.N. authorization to use force against Syria even if Assad reneges on any agreement to give up his chemical weapons. for this Putin promises to look around and give us a thumbs up that all is well.
So did Putin. In fact, he sent ships dedicated to taking out other ships.
He just has to look at Benghazi where American citizens were directly attacked. Obama couldn’t pull a timely decision out of his ass if he had explosive diarrhea.
Is the Russian fleet leaving Syria? No. What has changed in the tiniest way regarding Putin? Nothing. Obama came to him hat in hand and was thrown a bone if he agreed not to vote for an UN resolutions involving use of force.
Obama went to Russia for the G-20 summit and tried to get support from Putin there. It’s always been Obama swinging in the breeze with no internal or international support looking for a way out.
Why did he give Obama what Obama wanted if his ships could take out our ships?
How do you figure Obama got what he wanted? He promised not to support any U.N. resolutions involving attacks on Syria. Looks to me like Putin got what he wanted AND managed to isolate Obama from international support in the process.
What?
Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, head of DOD intelligence, said Thursday it could take as long as seven years to fully account for Syria’s stockpile if a deal is reached.
…
To that end, Qassim Saadeddine, a member of the FSA military council, on Saturday rejected the Russia plan and refused to provide support for the inspections.
“Let the [Russia] plan go to hell,” he said. “We reject it and we will not protect the inspectors or let them enter Syria,” Saadeddine added.
… and who knows, maybe the donkey will learn how to talk.
Obama wanted to punish Assad and degrade Syria’s CW capacity and ability to use CW and to stop them from using them again. Putin has given Obama a verifiable way to achieving that objective.
Obama was not about getting Russia to Ok UN authorized military attacks against Syria. Obama said he would prefer international and Congressional support but has always maintained he did not need it.
Putin had to give up Syria’s CW to avert the strikes Obama was threatening to launch and still threatens to launch if Syria does not comply.
About a week ago Putin did not agree in public that Syria would surrender its CW arsenal to destruction and UNSC Resolutions and control. Now Putin has reached an open deal to do just that and through the UN. Huge change. I’m surprised you can’t see it. Been discussing it for days.