I have a sneaking suspicion that the rebels are behind it in order to get western powers to intervene, and the US is playing right into their hands (if they're not in on it). I think the "intelligence" that they refuse to release is most probably fabricated. I find it hard to believe that the Syrian government would gas territory it controls, especially while the UN weapons inspectors are there, and don't find it hard at all to believe that the rebels, with known links to terrorist organisations, would. And then there's this from May/June: http://macedoniaonline.eu/content/view/23866/53/
"Terrorists Arrested on Turkish/Syrian border with Sarin Gas"

I'm glad the British parliament decided not to go into it. I was surprised actually - it seems like the first time in a while we've decided against playing 51st state. I don't want my country associating with known terrorist organisations. Us and the US got into that a few years ago back in the 80s and it didn't work out so well.

@ Superdude: Because we (The USA and a few others I believe) signed a treaty with Russia not to put certain military assets in space, one of those assets was strategic missile defense systems. The fear from both sides was that whichever side completed a project like that first could sit back and nuke the other with impunity effectively negating MAD.

I do not understand why I should select between Asad and Al-Qaeda?

It would be nice if we could have a choice, but we don't have a choice. It's not unlikely that the next rulers of Syria after Assad will be worse.

In particular it would be bad if the al-Nusra Front who maintains allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leader of al-Qaeda, and

who is described as "the most aggressive and successful arm of the rebel force

, that is planning to "create a Pan-Islamic state under sharia law and aims to reinstate the Islamic Caliphate", became the rulers of Syria.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Nusra_Front

At least under Assad, the case is such that,

Although Syria's constitution guarantees gender equality, critics say that personal statutes laws and the penal code discriminate against women and girls

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syria#Politics_and_government

With the al-Nusra Front in power, you might see women stoned to death on the streets for flirting, or showing too much skin.

- strike Syrian goverment (60-90 days, no troop needed) and let the terrorists take control of Syria.
- now Syria is the country of terrorists, and US kill terrorists, so US will attack Syria, kill the terrorists, and take control of Syria --> profit. This step may requires several years/decades and hundred of thousands 18-25 yo soldiers.


runtime is about 60-90 days:


runtime unknown, estimate decades:

It is a bad idea. I don't know if this has been said already, but we are going to fight on Al Qeida's side, which we shouldn't do.

@htirwin I do not understand why I should select between Asad and Al-Qaeda? It would be nice if we could have a choice, but we don't have a choice

It is one more totally false statement.

It is one more totally false statement.

Attempting to make it our choice would require a prolonged war with many troops on the ground.

Al-Qaeda associates are poised to take control when they defeat Assad.

I would like to hear you make an argument in support of your statements. Otherwise do you expect me to counter with, "No, your statement is totally false", and you can counter back the same way, and we could make a nice infinite loop of pointless, contentless back and forth.

I'm shocked at how many people disagree with involvement. Assad gassed hundreds of innocent children. Chemical weapons are internationally banned, and to let someone get away with using them encourages other organizations to use them to murder large groups of people. Furthermore, Assad would happily sell chemical weapons to terrorist organizations, which poses a threat to US allies near Syria and to national security.

Failure to act would support chemical weapons and child murder. Using Tomahawk missiles easily allows the US to punish and warn Assad without getting involved in the domestic conflicts in Syria.

What I'd be most concerned about is that Assad could easily launch another chemical attack after we use missiles on him and blame the US for it.

Failure to act would support chemical weapons and child murder.

Failure to act means no such thing. "Supporting" requires us to actually do something to aid him. Nobody here is suggesting that.

None of us like Assad. We don't think he's a great guy or anything. I just don't think it's worth getting involved in. We simply cannot get involved in every occurrence of a breach of human rights. I don't say that on moral ground... I say that because it's fiscally and physically impossible.

Remember the whole Kony thing from last year? Equally (or even greater) evil shit that's going on. What did we do? Nothing. Because it's Uganda and nobody cares about Uganda (they don't have oil). I don't even think it got mainstream media coverage... it only really caught on because of a viral web movement. Or if it was covered... it wasn't until after the web movement popularized it.

(If you don't remember the whole Kony thing:
http://invisiblechildren.com/media/videos/program-media/kony-2012/ )

But does doing nothing mean we supported him? Of course not... that's an absurd claim.

The thing is... this stuff happens ALL THE TIME in the world. A lot more than you think it does. America simply cannot be the world police and deal with all these cases. We don't have the resources, money, stamina, manpower, etc. We have to draw the line at some point.

We just went through 2 major wars. One of which we're still not really done with, and still have major resources invested in. Can we really afford to engage in yet another war? Especially considering the implications of it? (others have noted how the "good guys" in the war are really just more bad guys... and picking sides with either one of them is a bad idea). And considering the state our economy is in?

Using Tomahawk missiles easily allows the US to punish and warn Assad without getting involved in the domestic conflicts in Syria.

Doing a missile strike in a country to avoid conflict. Sound an awful lot like engaging in conflict to me. Only halfassed.

My particular issue with the US doing anything is that the US has a really bad habit of not being able to actually stay consistent with what they are trying to achieve in a military endeavor. It'll start as a small, surgical missile strike as punishment... but then once that goes well, the goals will be raised. And so on and so forth. It wouldn't be the first (or last) time that happened- hell, every single military endeavor since World War II suffered that exact issue (other than Operation Desert Storm, but the precedent that set didn't last beyond that operation). In short, what appears to be a small intervention in Syria would result in far more of a commitment than anyone expected. As usual with any military "intervention" the US has done besides driving Iraq out of Kosovo and Germany out of France.

so if this is true the rebels were caught with sarin gas??? but the government has non watertight evidence?

http://macedoniaonline.eu/content/view/23866/53/

Some times when our secret services or lying politicians don't have watertight evidence but wish they did they say they got watertight evidence and then they dont share it.

EDIT: there is a iranian hacker department thing tho.

ascii wrote:
Assad gassed hundreds of innocent children.

Say the rebels, and say western powers. The UN inspectors haven't said that. All we really know is that children were gassed, but not by whom.

Also, I'm not sure if it's true, but someone said Assad passed complete control of the country to the government back in 2011 and isn't actually running anything.

Disch wrote:
nobody cares about Uganda (they don't have oil)

Neither does Syria, but it does happen to share a border with Iran.

thats like afganistan its not just about how much money they make out of the pipeline that lands in georgia, its that they dont have to negotiate so friendly with russia.

Our leaders are mixed up with business and all sorts of wonky alegiences here and there so we get loads of bullshit propaganda news stories and mock serious politicians/ceo's who give misleading speeches, it must be easier for american politicians to jerk american people, they are generaly more patriotic and love being hyped up.

If I was a US politician and I wanted a war I would have cheerleaders and pyrotechnics, I would walk onstage dressed as a pilot or firefighter and I would be like "DO YOOH LOVE AMERICA" and they would be like "HELLZ YEEEAAAAH" and then i would say it louder and louder until they went nuts and then a giant flag would unroll in the backround and the cheerleaders would salute it and then I would be like "ONE NATION UNDER GOD" and they would be like "ALLELUIA" and then I would be like "DEATH TO IRAN" and they would be like "YEAAAAAAH" and then it would go dark and there would be a spotlight on me and the music would stop and the big TV screens would focus on me crying and then I would be wrapped up in the flag and I would be like "_{never forget 911}" and then the TV's would film people crying in the audience and I would run off stage and it would be quiet....

Then the lights and music would come back on and hendrixes version of the national anthem would play and hundreds of A10 thunderbolts will fly over the stage in lots of arrow shaped formations and aftyer the show if people wanted to leave they would have to exit through a recruitment center.

America is a country that thrives on war. We don't look at the actions of Syria as criminal. Instead we see oppertunity, just another chance to stretch our muscles.

I wish I could move to Canada.

None of us like Assad. We don't think he's a great guy or anything. I just don't think it's worth getting involved in. We simply cannot get involved in every occurrence of a breach of human rights. I don't say that on moral ground... I say that because it's fiscally and physically impossible.

But we're not trying to get involved in every occurrence of a breach of human rights! As I said, there are very straightforward international laws about chemical weapons, namely that they are under no circumstances permitted.

Failure to act means no such thing. "Supporting" requires us to actually do something to aid him. Nobody here is suggesting that. .......... Remember the whole Kony thing from last year? Equally (or even greater) evil shit that's going on. What did we do? Nothing.

I'm not saying that a failure to get involved always means support, because I agree in the case of Kony just because we didn't get involved doesn't mean we supported him. With chemical weapons, however, their usage in World War I led to them being established as horribly unethical, and they were internationally banned because of this. For the international community to establish law because of the immorality of something, and then to allow a murderer to break that law by killing hundreds of children, is to show support of him and to essentially call that law superfluous.

So in the case of Kony's crimes, no matter how deplorable they are, he didn't break international law by using chemical weapons, which is what the Syria strike is all about.

We just went through 2 major wars. One of which we're still not really done with, and still have major resources invested in. Can we really afford to engage in yet another war? Especially considering the implications of it? (others have noted how the "good guys" in the war are really just more bad guys... and picking sides with either one of them is a bad idea). And considering the state our economy is in?

War is considered good for the economy by a lot of economists, but if you're not a Keynesian we can dispute that another time. What's relevant is that we are not going to war with Syria. There is no way congress would support that, and Obama wouldn't either. He's spent a large part of his presidency getting US troops out of the middle east, so he is certainly not going to end his presidency beginning a bloody war that doesn't concern the US.

Doing a missile strike in a country to avoid conflict. Sound an awful lot like engaging in conflict to me. Only halfassed.

You must have misread my post, because I in no way said that we are using missiles to avoid conflict. We are using missiles because they allow us to punish Assad without getting involved in a long-term conflict with him. If we wanted to be involved in the Syrian war, we would send in troops.

What surprises me the most about your response is that you focused on how I pointed out the immorality of chemical weapons and why Assad should be punished for using them, while completely ignoring my main justification for an attack, which is that allowing the use of chemical weapons poses a serious threat to the security of US allies in the middle east, and to the US itself.

As for the people who doubt that Assad's government was the source of the attack, US, Britain, and France's intelligence teams blame Assad as the source of the attack, and Obama has personally said that the US has strong evidence that points to Assad as the culprit. And even if you doubt that Assad was the source of this chemical attack, the Syrian government is known to be in the possession of chemical weapons, which should be punished. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/04/world/middleeast/allies-intelligence-on-syria-all-points-to-assad-forces.html

But we're not trying to get involved in every occurrence of a breach of human rights! As I said before, there are very straightforward international laws about chemical weapons, namely that they are under no circumstances permitted.

International laws is the key word there not United States Laws. And the UN inspectors haven't even confirmed there was a chemical weapons attack that was from the Syrian government. The white house says so but won't show proof...

Why doesn't the UN do something about it then instead of the united states? Since it is a international law it should fall onto the UN to uphold that law not the united states alone.

namely that they are under no circumstances permitted.

What about all the circumstances where they were used in the past and we did nothing about? What is the difference now? Because the president set a red line and now we have to follow through with it so he can save face?

I'm not saying that a failure to get involved always means support, because I agree in the case of Kony just because we didn't get involved doesn't mean we supported him. With chemical weapons, however, their usage in World War I led to them being established as horribly unethical, and they were internationally banned because of this. For the international community to establish law because of the immorality of something, and then to allow a murderer to break that law by killing hundreds of children, is to show support of him and to essentially call that law superfluous. So in the case of Kony's crimes, no matter how deplorable they are, he didn't break international law by using chemical weapons, which is what the Syria strike is all about.

Again like I said above international laws should be handled by the world as a whole, it is not the united states responisbility to uphold them. Also again chemical weapons have been used in the past after world war I and they weren't punished for it so what has changed now?

which is what the Syria strike is all about.

In my opinion the strike is all about politics and nothing more. It is not about teaching Syria a lesson, it is not about human rights, or any of that. If it was about any of them we wouldn't have

1) broadcasted our detailed plans for attack all over the internet and everywhere else so the enemy and anyone who wanted to could read it and know exactly what we are going to do. I am not making this up either you can read exactly what they want to do, where they are going to hit, ect. So the enemy is already moving everything like ammunition and military headquarters into dense civilian territory so we are less likely to use missiles on them.

2) We wouldn't be just lobbing a few missiles at a country because, lets be honest that won't do anything except piss them off. They will still have the chemical weapons and they still will be fighting the war.

War is considered good for the economy by a lot of economists

Then them economist's are idiots in my opinion lol. But as you said that is a whole different discussion.

What's relevant is that we are not going to war with Syria. There is no way congress would support that, and Obama wouldn't either. He's spent a large part of his presidency getting US troops out of the middle east, so he is certainly not going to end his presidency beginning a bloody war that doesn't concern the US.

I hardly see how launching missiles at a country is not going to war with them. But lets just say it isn't going to war I ask you then what is the point of using the missiles then? What will it accomplish? That is the whole problem with this whole thing is it accomplishes nothing. Or even if anything it will piss off the middle east even more and make them hate Westerners even more.

We are using missiles because they allow us to punish Assad without getting involved in a long-term conflict with him.

Again how are a few missiles going to punish him? Specially when we have already broadcasted where we are going to launch them said missiles? If we really wanted to punish him we would send in a seal team and take him out.

What surprises me the most about your response is that you focused on how I pointed out the immorality of chemical weapons and why Assad should be punished for using them, while completely ignoring my main justification for an attack, which is that allowing the use of chemical weapons poses a serious threat to the security of US allies in the middle east, and to the US itself.

But the problem with that justification is that launching missiles isn't going to somehow stop the threat of chemical weapons being used against us. We can just launch missiles at the chemical weapons and blow them up you know. If anything launching missiles will make them hate us that much more and possibility make them use those chemical weapons against us or our allies.

If the reason why we were doing this is because of national defense and to make sure them chemical weapons don't get into the wrong hands we wouldn't be launching missiles at them. We would be sending in troops to get them missiles and take them away.

Because again you can't just launch missiles at the chemical weapons and destroy them.

WASHINGTON -- You simply can't safely bomb a chemical weapon storehouse into oblivion, experts say. That's why they say the United States is probably targeting something other than Syria's nerve agents. But now there is concern that bombing other sites could accidentally release dangerous chemical weapons that the U.S. military didn't know were there because they've lost track of some of the suspected nerve agents. Bombing stockpiles of chemical weapons -- purposely or accidentally -- would likely kill nearby civilians in an accidental nerve agent release, create a long-lasting environmental catastrophe or both, five experts told The Associated Press. That's because under ideal conditions -- and conditions wouldn't be ideal in Syria -- explosives would leave at least 20 to 30 percent of the poison in lethal form.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2013/08/bombing-chemical-weapons-sites-could-endanger-civilians-cause-environmental-catastrophe-experts-warn.html

And even if you doubt that Assad was the source of this chemical attack, the Syrian government is known to be in the possession of chemical weapons, which should be punished.

Well then the US and other countries should be punished also since we have them to.

Sadly I work in a steel factory which developes friction material for construction and military vehicles. When we go to war, business is booming.

International laws is the key word there not United States Laws. And the UN inspectors haven't even confirmed there was a chemical weapons attack that was from the Syrian government. The white house says so but won't show proof... Why doesn't the UN do something about it then instead of the united states? Since it is a international law it should fall onto the UN to uphold that law not the united states alone.

I already addressed your first paragraph in my last post, which you clearly must not have thoroughly read.

As for why the UN is not doing anything, I presume it's because they're waiting for the investigation to be complete, which could take two weeks (though possibly less).

The reason that many countries (e.g. the UK) have decided against action is because they expect the US to act, and they would prefer to let the US act then to act themselves.

What about all the circumstances where they were used in the past and we did nothing about? What is the difference now? Because the president set a red line and now we have to follow through with it so he can save face?

The fact that not all uses have been responded to is a fair point, but whatever happened in the past, Syria signed the Geneva Protocol in 1968, which unequivocally bans chemical warfare, and this is something they should be punished for. So to say "what's the difference now" seems silly. If a murderer wasn't punished 50 years ago, that doesn't mean we shouldn't punish murderer's today.

Again like I said above international laws should be handled by the world as a whole, it is not the united states responisbility to uphold them. Also again chemical weapons have been used in the past after world war I and they weren't punished for it so what has changed now?

I've already addressed this.

In my opinion the strike is all about politics and nothing more. It is not about teaching Syria a lesson, it is not about human rights, or any of that. If it was about any of them we wouldn't have 1) broadcasted our detailed plans for attack all over the internet and everywhere else so the enemy and anyone who wanted to could read it and know exactly what we are going to do. I am not making this up either you can read exactly what they want to do, where they are going to hit, ect. So the enemy is already moving everything like ammunition and military headquarters into dense civilian territory so we are less likely to use missiles on them. 2) We wouldn't be just lobbing a few missiles at a country because, lets be honest that won't do anything except piss them off. They will still have the chemical weapons and they still will be fighting the war.

Could you provide a link backing up your claim them make in 1)?

In response to 2), pissing them off is the point. Whether or not they continue to fight the war isn't a concern of the US, and though they will still have chemical weapons, the idea is to prevent them from being used.

Then them economist's are idiots in my opinion lol. But as you said that is a whole different discussion.

John Maynard Keynes and Paul Krugman are not "idiots."

I hardly see how launching missiles at a country is not going to war with them. But lets just say it isn't going to war I ask you then what is the point of using the missiles then? What will it accomplish? That is the whole problem with this whole thing is it accomplishes nothing. Or even if anything it will piss off the middle east even more and make them hate Westerners even more.

Obama has made it clear he is going to make a focused attack that does not affect the Syrian civil war, or lead to a long term engagement.

Again how are a few missiles going to punish him? Specially when we have already broadcasted where we are going to launch them said missiles? If we really wanted to punish him we would send in a seal team and take him out.

The US has no justification for killing Assad. Missiles are much less risky than a Seal team, and just as effective considering the US's goals.

But the problem with that justification is that launching missiles isn't going to somehow stop the threat of chemical weapons being used against us.

I hold that it does by sending a strong warning, but even if you disagree with that, you have to realize that, as I have said in previous posts, not responding encourages the use of chemical weapons!

We can just launch missiles at the chemical weapons and blow them up you know.

No, we can't do that. Chemical weapons can't be disposed of with an explosion. Bombing their chemical weapons site would be an unimaginably stupid idea.

If the reason why we were doing this is because of national defense and to make sure them chemical weapons don't get into the wrong hands we wouldn't be launching missiles at them. We would be sending in troops to get them missiles and take them away.

I've said multiple times in previous posts why sending in troops is a bad idea (and one that would never pass in Congress).

And you can't just "take away" thousands of tons of chemical weapons. Doing so would be an incredibly complicated operation that would likely get the US involved in the Syrian civil war.

Well then the US and other countries should be punished also since we have them to.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_Weapons_Convention

The US has destroyed 90% of the chemical weapons it possessed in 1997. The remaining 10% are being disposed of, but it is a lengthy and difficult process to complete.

@OP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUIe7SAHJaM

_Wazzak

FRAMEWORK, WHERE YOU BEEN?