Sounds good to me.
[QUOTE=Thomas Paine]
The World is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.
[/QUOTE]
I think that we lost some face in the region, but that is better than reluctantly bombing some stuff after two month’s warning. For a while I thought we were going that way.
To be clear, Obama shouldn’t have drawn a red line at chemical weapons when he clearly wasn’t prepared to back it up. As soon as the intelligence came back (a couple days after the attack) he should have loosed a couple dozen cruise missiles on Syria’s command and control centers and gone on TV the next morning to explain to the American people why he did it. The Saudis and Israelis would have been more than happy to give us a list of places to hit and both are now royally pissed at us.
Obviously, there would have been some civilian casualties, but given Obama’s prolific drone use, I’m surprised this would be a consideration. Maybe they administration was worried about burning bridges with the Iranians and the nuclear negotiations. That’s the only possible reason I can think of for NOT attacking when we already drew a red line.
Of course, once the administration asked Congress for authorization, it was way too late to do anything. Either do it immediately, or not at all. Since they didn’t do it immediately, I’m glad they didn’t do some half-assed strike later.
I am not sure Russia understood that this is what they should have been wanting too. If they had it could have and would have happened long before. I think they were imagining that Assad could get away using them and fairly quickly regain complete upper hand and control. They are not getting that but they can live with that circumstance as long as for now we don’t get to be the dominant influence when all is said and done yet either. Stalemate there with some decrease in the risk of it exploding much bigger or WMDs going who knows where (which bombing would not have much prevented) is the current best possible.
In my last post I listed what I see as concerns for U.S. interests, looking only through that lens. My read is that those interests are being pretty well met right now under some very volatile circumstances that could go south from the U.S. interest perspective very big with any misstep or overplay. It would also be nice to reduce some suffering but reality is that reducing suffering for the Syrians on the ground is not synonomous with what is best for U.S. interests.
I see the U.S. getting and not getting as much of what it wants as Russia is. The fact that Russia got most of the credit also made them have ownership for making it work. That is in our best interest, and are the teeth that matter most.
Our stated policy was “Assad must go”. Russia wants Assad to stay. (The CW thing is minor in comparison, considering he’s killed 120,000 civilians.)
Which happened? Is Assad in a better or worse position than he was in August?
Assad is in a better position, but so is the US (because no war), and so is Russia. There are probably some Syrians who are in a worse position, but short of Assad voluntarily stepping down, I don’t think there was a better possible outcome.
Just to be clear, I don’t think Obama would have led us into a full on war. If you want to call 2 days of bombing a war, I’m OK with that, but I usually only call it a war when the other side is shooting back. Russia gave Obama a chance to save face when he went all bombastic on the world stage and found out he had almost no support-- not in the international community, not in the UNSC, not in Congress, and not among the American people.
The outcome we should have been shooting for (pardon the pun), and apparently still are, is a negotiated settlement. Assad was getting weaker and might have been forced to do that, but now he’s nicely ensconced in power, and with little reason to negotiate with the opposition over anything. As the opposition gets more desperate, they turn more and more to Islamists, and now no one is really that keen on them gaining an power anyway.
I feel differently- I think that we would be in a worse position today if we had sent airstrikes.
I do, too. I hope I didn’t give you the impression that I thought we should have. I’m GLAD that Putin gave Obama an easy way to save face. Obama had backed himself into a corner, and many of us were holding our breath hoping he’d find a way out.
So, yeah, things worked out OK for us. But I saw two men playing the diplomacy game-- except Putin was playing chess and Obama was playing checkers.
International diplomacy is not a zero-sum game. It’s quite possible for something to be good for Russia, and good for the US. In fact, the notion that such things are possible is the very foundation upon which diplomacy is built. Did Russia get a better deal than the US? Maybe. But we both got good deals.
Again no. Our stated policy is to promote self-determination for the Syrian people. Assad has been encouraged to step aside as he prevents that but our stated policy is that it is not up to us to make Assad step aside or to remove him.
OTOH Russias stated policy is not having Assad stay, but to “peaceful dialogue enabling Syrians to develop a compromise plan for their own future.” Explicitly they are not aiming at “protecting the Syrian government, but international law.”
Yes, I believe that the sancity of international law is Russia’s actual interests just as much as I believe that the U.S. government’s actual true primary interest is democratic reform for its own sake. Or even the many thousands of civilians deaths. Somehow I think you know better as well, but stated policy is stated policy.
If this was not agreed to then air strikes would have been necessary but I know that you know how little they would have accomplished. They would not have destroyed any chemical stockpiles and odds are that such would not have been the targets. The best possible outcome would have been to degrade the ability to deliver them and to motivate not using them in the future. The risk of the CWs going who knows where, an outcome that the U.S. government actually really does care about (as should the Russians) would if anything have been increased by destroying the security around them. Attempts would have been made to extract a cost without decreasing the security but it would not have been perfect or highly effective. They would have been a least poor option.
A negotiated settlement would be nice but eliminating the WMDs before the ability to protect them goes to hell is job one. Then deal with fantasies of a settlement. Assad if anything mut be lulled into enough of a sense of security to not feel an existential threat for that to happen. I’m fine with him percieving that if that emboldens him to comply. To me Syria is a car driven by a drunk that has crashed and that is on fire. There is little likelihood of a great outcome here but what Obama’s team is managing to have happen is removing some explosives that happened to be in the backseat of the car. The car might not end up in great shape but the risk of an explosion that destroys the whole neighborhood and impacts the whole city is much reduced.
If Putin is playing chess he’s only thinking one move ahead, excited that he’s captured a pawn. Obama, I believe is more concerned about the whole game.
Do you disagree with any of what I had listed as the likely real concerns and goals of the U.S. government? Do you actually believe that the U.S. is mostly concerned with democracy for its own sake and with saving the lives of Syrians for its own sake? Do you actually believe that Putin mostly cares about the sancity of international law? How do you judge current outcomes based on those RealPolitik U.S. interests?
Neither Russian nor the U.S. interests are served by CWs going missing. Both want some stable solution to the mess. For now a bloody stalemate is the stability that both sides can live with, given the possible alternatives, while the CWs going AWOL risk is being reduced. Once that is done next moves will be taken. To some degree Russian interests and ours overlap … getting them to believe that actually doing things is their idea and their prestige would be amazing.
I do not see the end game going as Assad crushes all opposition and remains in power. I do see that Russia’s concerns about how this might impact them vis a vis their internal security issues with Chechen extremists and separatists will be mollified in however it gets played out however.
I agree. And I’d like to ask everyone looking down on the President to imagine that from this day forward, we go from Country A to B to C, talking of red lines while stating goals X and Y and Z – and every time, the Russians then act like a good cop to our bad cop, at which point we invariably get our way.
Would the talk still run to checkers and chess? Would we wring our hands and look to the skies and cry out, oh, when will our long national nightmare be over?.
OK, let’s just stop right there and get our facts straight.
The Washington Post, Aug 18, 2011 (That’s 2011, folks, not 2013):
May 16, 2013:
Obama, Erdogan agree al-Assad must go
So, yes.
Let me guess what your costume was on Halloween: The Scarecrow! Got straw?
Yes I quoted for the whole statement before. Again the “policy goal” stated, well restated, in that speech was that the United States supports the future of Syria being determined by its people and that Assad was standing in the way of that so he should step aside. Explicitly stated was that
And really. You are not so naive as some. You no more believe that the real concern of the United States government is either the small change of Assad stepping down or even the establishment of a democratically elected government, than I do or you believe that Putin really is primarily concerned with the sanctity of international law other than how it applies to the world leaving Russia to deal however it wants with the Chechens.
The United States government cares that the CWs do not get loose. It cares about containing the fire to within Syria. It cares about not further empowering either Al Qaeda or Iran. It cares about international economic stability and is conscious that the fire not being contained would threaten that. It cares about limiting the power of those who would actively work against U.S. interests and furthering the influence of those who would be more likely to work with the U.S. at least some of the time. In that chess game Assad is at most a knight if not a mere pawn. The CWs are bishops. Al Queada and Iranian interests are at least rooks.
Seriously, do you really believe that toppling Assad is what the U.S. government or Obama cares about other than to the degree it tactically serves those goals?
Chemical weapons are a sideshow here. No one internationally is really concerned about them. Syria has already killed plenty of people with conventional weapons and will gleefully continue to do so until it defeats the rebels. I seriously doubt Russia is concerned about the minuscule threat posed by Chechen rebels improbably getting their hands on Syrian chemical weapons. The Russians care about one thing: keeping their man in power and counterbalancing US power in the region.
I can’t decide if the Obama administration got caught out trying to sound tough on Syria because they assumed Assad would never dare use chemical weapons (a bad assumption since his dad never hesitated), or if they secretly wanted to expand their support of the rebels and assumed that a documented chemical attack would swing domestic and international opinion that way. Either way, the red line talk backfired spectacularly, we got trapped in this irrelevant chemical weapon debate and, with our tail tucked behind our legs, humbly accepted the Russian way out.
It was perhaps a win for Obama domestically, since the public REALLY REALLY doesn’t want to get involved in another conflict and the Republicans have zero foreign policy credibility with their Bengazi nonsense.
It was a total loss for our allies in the region, whom we annoyed and antagonized. (However, it should be pointed out that our national interests do not always align with Israel and Saudi Arabia, so going our own way isn’t a total disaster.)
I say all this as someone who would vote for Obama a third time if I could. I doubt Romney would have handled this better and McCain would probably have personally joined an al-Qaeda affiliated rebel group. But just because the Republicans are currently a joke, it doesn’t mean that this whole difficult situation wasn’t clumsily handed and nearly completely bungled. Obama can do better. He must.
This civil war has been going on for over 2 years, and it’s only recently that the specter of CWs arose. Our stated policy for years was “Assad must go”. Now, in the interim, there was a use of CWs, and a tactical decision to address that. But it changes the equation of the region not a whit.
CWs are a distraction played against the larger geopolitical strategizing by Iran and Russia to marginalize the influence the US has there. Now, I’m a pretty strong isolationist, and so I’m actually happy to see us slapped down. I don’t want us invlvoed in every conflict in the ME. I don’t want us bombing them for any reason. But let’s not pretend that that is what Obama was trying to do.
I think we will just have to differ on how much concern there has been about the chemical weapons going rogue and how much the powers that be have relied on Israel bombing supplies that seemed to be moving out of the country. If you think that Russia is not concerned that a collapsing Syria would allow CW to get into the hands of Chechen terrorists then I think you are very mistaken. If you think the U.S. is not concerned about the consequences of those weapons being used against Israel and Israel’s possible responses I also think you are wrong.
I see your point there. I certainly wouldn’t want a ground invasion of Syria unless some whole new situation developed.
However I think carefully targeted airstrikes against Syrian ground forces may do some good for the rebels.
I’m merely relaying that, if every attempt at diplomacy ends in a manner significantly similar to how this one seems to be playing out, I’d be utterly delighted. I therefore can but praise this one, exactly as I’d praise more of the same: no American troops injured, the Secretary of State says “do this, or else,” and the Russians then add “take them up on the ‘do it’, not the ‘or else’.” And then “do it” ensues.
If that happened every time, I’d cheer. If it happens this time, I’d cheer. If you’re not cheering the latter, I genuinely don’t know why you’d cheer the former. If you wouldn’t cheer the former, I genuinely don’t know why. How is that a straw man?
Getting Assad to destroy his chem weapon production is significant. I don’t think he will be able to get away with rebuilding it now that we’re all watching.
The chem weapons are still out there though. It will matter a lot if they get used again- anywhere, Somalia, Iran, against AQ-backed rebels, I don’t care, another chem weapon incident would be a disaster. It is too soon to say if we have avoided that outcome. There’s no saying if a war would prevent that outcome better- I think a war would have made a chem weapon incident more likely. The civil war is a disaster, sure, but that is and will remain sort of their problem. Heck, killing each other is the one thing Syrians can agree on.
So, major win for the White House for achieving our objectives without going to war. Our policy can remain, “Assad must go.” It is all a matter of what we are willing to do to get there. How many years did it take to get rid of Saddam? Might we yet rid Syria of Assad in less time than that, via Obama’s approach?