The Savage Wars of Peace: Syria's Civil War

This weblog has long advocated for an American foreign & national security policy based upon aggressive intervention around the globe; I've causally referred to my wish to see America get into, on a full-time basis, the "arsehole-killing business," or A.K.B, though there is nothing casual about my desire to see this policy implemented. This weblog (yes, I am enamored of The Economist's habit of referring to itself as "this newspaper") has long criticized the Obama administration for its impotence & paralysis regarding the horrors of the Syrian civil war: Wayback Machine (scroll down to "Foreign Policy & National Security"). This author now finds himself in the unaccustomed position of defending President Obama's nascent plans to attack the Syrian Arab Republic without seeking "authorization" from the Congress, despite the unpopularity of this position. Make no mistake, though, I guarantee you that I will be dissatisfied with whatever our military response is, for it surely will not go far enough.

The Syrian Arab Republic, the Syrian dictatorship of the Assad dynasty & the Ba'ath Party, is an enemy of the United States & the Western liberal democracies (N.A.T.O. & beyond, including the State of Israel; hereafter, "the West"). The Syrian Arab Republic supports terrorism; seeks the annihilation of Israel; fought a covert war against the Coalition in the Republic of Iraq; possesses weapons of mass destruction (chemical weapons, & has covertly sought the atomic bomb); occupied & dominated the Lebanese Republic for decades, & still arms & supports Hezbollah; is an ally of Iran & the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea); & oppresses its own populace, both through an anti-democratic government & by the privileged rule of the Alawite (Shia) minority over the Sunni majority & the Christian & Druze minorities. The Syrian Arab Republic was developing the atomic bomb, in secret, before that effort was bombed out of existence by Israel, in '07. The Syrian Arab Republic is an old-school authoritarian state, an affront to decency & every man's inherent right to liberty. The overthrow of the Syrian Arab Republic was in the interests of the United States & the West long before the Arab Spring erupted into civil war, long before the recent apparent use of chemical weapons to wage that war.

Military intervention to displace the Assad dictatorship & the Ba'ath Party apparatus & replace it with a friendlier government that would set Syria on the path to liberal democracy was advisable before the supposedly confirmed use of chemical weapons; now that poison gas has been used, such intervention becomes imperative. There are only three possible outcomes of the civil war in Syria: the Syrian Arab Republic survives, a more pro-Western government such as the Syrian National Coalition comes to power, or a jihadist, anti-Western government comes to power. The best time to act was two & a half years ago, when the civil war had just begun. In those days, jihadists had not yet become dominant in the opposition to the Assad regime & "moderate" elements could have acted in concert with U.S.-led Western forces. To-day, if the Syrian Arab Republic falls it will almost certainly be replaced by the al-Qaeda-affiliated jihadist factions such as the Al-Nusra Front & the Islamic State of Iraq & the Levant (formerly al-Qaeda in Iraq, A.Q.I.). If such jihadist organizations gained control of the Syrian Arab Republic stockpiles of chemical weapons, it would be nothing short of a catastrophe. The only realistic way to replace the Syrian Arab Republic with a Syria that is not inimical to the West is to intervene.

Earlier this week, on the spur of the moment, I posted the following to the FaceSpace. It is never my intention to rob the Peter of The Secret Base to pay the Paul of the FaceSpace, but sometimes my sloth & my vanity conspire to do just that & I allow myself to be lured in by the potential for a bigger audience on the FaceSpace, forgetting the sagacious maxim that quality is more important that quantity.

A note to my fellow right-wingers/conservatives: Yes, in '07 Senators Obama & Biden said that the President of the United States did not have the authority to act militarily without the explicit approval of the Congress, except in cases of imminent threat, & yes, in '13, as before in '11, President Obama & Vice President Biden are preparing to do just that, to act militarily without the explicit approval of the Congress. But the important point it not that they are hypocrites. They are hypocrites, undeniably so, but to insist upon this point above all others, such as America's vital national security interest in making sure all potential enemies no that the use of W.M.D. such as chemical weapons will bring down upon their heads the wrath & fury of the world's most powerful war machine, is to give credence to the absurd & incorrect positions articulated by Messers. Obama & Biden in '07. Do you really want to argue that then-Senator Obama was right? That then-Senator Biden was anything but a buffoon for bandying about the idea of impeachment? Both men were wrong, terribly wrong, in almost everything they said in '07. Do not now pretend that they were right then in order to say they are wrong now.

A longer discussion of the checks & balances 'twixt the the President of the United States—the commander-in-chief of the armed forces—& the Congress of the United States—solely empowered to declare war—is to follow, as is a discussion of the various options for waging war against the Syrian Arab Republic, from a punitive barrage of cruise missiles to a full-blown invasion aimed at regime change.

As ever, comments are most welcome.

Crime & Punishment
The only just sentence has been handed down in the trial of Major Nidal Hasan for the Fort Hood Massacre: Hasan-link. Now comes the long battle to see that justice is served, against a military justice system that too often seems to care not a whit for justice.