# Thoughts on Syria? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 31, 2013, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667 "2013-08-31T16:38:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2013, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/21 "2013-09-03T16:43:51Z")
> [@TashaKitty](#): > > On the one hand, America is NOT the world’s police force and needs to stop acting like we are. ? People have said that for years then the same people support wars like the Gulf war and Iraq invasion. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/22 "2013-09-04T02:50:44Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > This is what frustrates me about the Obama administration. They seem to have a huge mental block that prevents them from realizing that the rebels aren’t anybody we want to be supporting. It’s no secret that the rebels are being supported by al-Qaida. We’ve known it all along. It wasn’t any secret that the rebels in Libya were being supported by them, but we supported them anyway, and got bitten on the ass when they bombed our embassy and killed our ambassador. What, like the rebels who were waving the big [French](http://images.smh.com.au/2011/03/18/2240202/kingdom-of-libya-flag-420x0.jpg) and [American](http://www.foreignpolicy.com/files/fp_uploaded_images/120912_Libya1.jpg) flags during the war, and held the [pro-American rally](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2203026/Sorry-America-Libyan-protestors-tout-pro-America-posters-day-U-S-Ambassador-killed--angry-mobs-storming-embassies-Middle-East.html) after the ambassador was killed? Yeah, Al-Qaeda is in Libya, and Syria. And so are ordinary people fighting against their oppressive government. But, frankly, to boil it down into “they’re _all_ Al-Qaeda”\* is oversimplifying, and smacks a little too close to “_those people_ are all just terrorists, anyway” for my liking. \*(Or “they’re _all_ secular pro-westerners,” for that matter!) ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/23 "2013-09-04T03:15:16Z")
> [@Waxwinged](#): > > U.S. should let Syrians sort their own issues out. No need for a war-by-proxies or half-assed bombings. Seriously. We’ve meddled in Iraq and Afganistan already, and look where it got us. Yeah, this. If we keep poking the beehive that is the middle east, it’s possible we’re going to be instrumental in starting WWIII. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/24 "2013-09-04T05:05:07Z")
My thought? I wish that something could be done, but I don’t think anything can be; and even if there were we (America) are certainly not the people to do it. All we’re good at is making things worse, adding to the body count and the destruction. America bursting in, leveling everything in sight and flailing about killing people near-randomly is not what the people of Syria need. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 8:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/25 "2013-09-04T08:46:38Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > My thought? I wish that something could be done, but I don’t think anything can be; and even if there were we (America) are certainly not the people to do it. All we’re good at is making things worse, adding to the body count and the destruction. America bursting in, leveling everything in sight and flailing about killing people near-randomly is not what the people of Syria need. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: Riiiiiiiggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhtttttttttt which is why we didn’t do any good in Bosnia or Kosovo or Libya. And among the powers willing to intervene the United States with all its imperfections is currently the least authoritarian and certainly the least Islamist. Anyhow my two cents is that for better or worse we are the world’s policeman and regardless of Tea Party antics at home or Perfidious Albinion, we should impose a no-fly zone and lob missiles and air strikes to destroy the forces of both Assad and the Islamist militias. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 8:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/26 "2013-09-04T08:52:41Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Listening to Senator McCain rave on about how we “need” to attack Syria just made me realize-this guy is stuck in 1964? America is now bankrupt, drowning in debt…it’s not like the USA that JFK was president of. Have you not read the latest budgets-we are not “drowning in debt” or “bankrupt” but instead our deficit is being rapidly reduced? > [@](#): > > The fact is, we are like the UK in 1956 (Suez)-we have formidable military power, but what if an attack on Syria sends the dollar tumbling? Please explain why the dollar would tumble in the case of an attack on Syria when the Libyan intervention much less the disastrous Iraq War did not produce this effect. > [@](#): > > The UK found out just how impotent they were , when PM Anthony Eden had to stage a humiliating retreat from Suez. Face it, the American people have finally seen though this sham…and we are not going to make the same mistake twice. The Suez Crisis is not remotely comparable to the current situation in Syria-the Russians are not going risk World War 3 over this anymore than we didn’t do anything beyond some logistics aid during the Russian invasion of Georgia. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 9:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667/27 "2013-09-04T09:20:20Z")
> [@TashaKitty](#): > > For too long we’ve interfered in the strife of other countries and whenever we do we wind up getting more innocent people killed and messing up the situation even more. I don’t think this is demonstrably true. We don’t generally make these situations worse, we may not make them better but they are generally seriously fucked up, with some oppressed people getting killed wholesale and a situation that is and has been colossally fubar for a while. We may kill a bunch of people, but the ratio of innocent to not-innocent deaths usually improves after we get involved. Also we tend to speed something to a resolution, even if it’s a sloppy one, which theoretically saves lives over the long run. What really happens in these scenarios is that we take some horrible situation and make it our problem. We’re like the busy-body neighbor who means well and ultimately buys themselves a lot of avoidable grief. In some cases we might stop that neighbor from abusing their spouse, but we may do it by killing the offending spouse and leaving the surviving spouse homeless and lost until they seek refuge with a new kind of asshole partner. But at least this way there’s a chance that new partner will be less bad than the original. We have this endless hope that the victim will instead become strong and independent on their own, but that usually blows up in our face and we end up with them living on our couch and stealing out shit. I could go all day with that analogy. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-syria/667667.md?page=1)