Obama's War of Choice in Syria

7/30/2019 Obama's War of Choice in Syria

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Obama's War of Choice in Syria Isn't

Defensive or HumanitarianPosted: 08/27/2013 12:02 pm

The seemingly impending war the U.S. is about to launch on Syria is not about

saving people from the Assad regime's violence. That is glaringly true given what

the Obama administration is actually planning to do.Airstrikes. No, not the kind that will last for months until the Assad regime is

toppled. Regime change is pretty explicitlynot the goal. Instead, the Obama

administration and senior officials speaking to the press have suggested theairstrikes will be limited.Limited to what? Is the goal to bomb the Assad regime's stockpiles of chemicalweapons so that he can never again use them on his own people? According to Mark

Thompsonat Time, taking out Syria's chemical weapons caches "is fraught with perils,"

because not only is the U.S. unsure of where they are located, but bombing them could

create "plumes of deadly vapors that could kill civilians downwind of such attacks." If

Obama takes this route, he'll kill more civilians with chemical weapons than would have

died without a U.S. military response.Instead, Obama may target "military, and command and control, targets -- includingartillery and missile units that could be used to launch chemical weapons -- instead of

the bunkers believed to contain them." Ok, and what appreciable effect will this have?On the one hand, such strikes wouldn't amount to leveling Assad's entire military

infrastructure since Obamais intent to"maintain the functions of the state" in order

to avoid a power vacuum that would boost the al-Qaeda-linked rebels and possibly allow

them to get their hands on Assad's chemical weapons (whichthey have said they would
http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/08/13/obamas-confused-syria-policy-proanti-assad-proanti-rebel/http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/08/13/obamas-confused-syria-policy-proanti-assad-proanti-rebel/http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/27/mission-all-but-impossible-destroying-syrias-chemical-weapons-from-the-air/?xid=rss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/27/mission-all-but-impossible-destroying-syrias-chemical-weapons-from-the-air/?xid=rss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/27/mission-all-but-impossible-destroying-syrias-chemical-weapons-from-the-air/?xid=rss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/27/mission-all-but-impossible-destroying-syrias-chemical-weapons-from-the-air/?xid=rss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/01/14/us-policy-in-syria-to-maintain-functions-of-the-state/http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/01/14/us-policy-in-syria-to-maintain-functions-of-the-state/http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/01/14/us-policy-in-syria-to-maintain-functions-of-the-state/https://twitter.com/jwcglaser/status/372090687602581504https://twitter.com/jwcglaser/status/372090687602581504https://twitter.com/jwcglaser/status/372090687602581504http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/01/14/us-policy-in-syria-to-maintain-functions-of-the-state/http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/27/mission-all-but-impossible-destroying-syrias-chemical-weapons-from-the-air/?xid=rss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/08/13/obamas-confused-syria-policy-proanti-assad-proanti-rebel/


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use). As Phil Giraldi, former CIA intelligence officer,told meback in March, "Obama

has come around to the view that regime change is more fraught with dangers thanletting Assad remain."On the other hand, these limited airstrikes against a selection of military targets

might encourage Assad to act out with even more fury and indiscriminate violence, just

as Clinton's initial bombing of Serbia caused Milosevic to dig in his heels before

eventually giving up (most of the Serb atrocities against Kosovar Albanians occurred

after the U.S. bombing).So U.S. airstrikes won't neuter Assad's ability to continue to fight, may prompt

worse violence from Assad, and may even directly kill more Syrian civilians.It seems clear these airstrikes are not about preventing more regime violence or

saving the Syrian people. So what are they about?According to Thompson, "U.S. defense officials are weighing air strikes to punishAssad's government for their suspected use of chemical weapons." As former State

Department official Aaron David Millerwroteyesterday, Obama is planning "a single

retaliatory attack that strives to make a point rather than a difference."Punitive war. That's something I'm betting the Norwegian Nobel Committee never

would have predicted a recipient of their peace prize engaging in. This is not defensive

war, since the Assad regime doesn't present even the remotest threat to America. It

isn't a humanitarian war either, since U.S. airstrikes won't cripple the Assad regime'smilitary capacity and may even get more civilians killed.Obama is waging a war, as Miller explained, "to make a point." Given the fact that amere9 percentof Americans actually support a U.S. military intervention in Syria, I

wonder what it would do to public opinion if Obama was honest with the Americanpeople about his petty disciplinary war. If the president sat in the Oval Office and

told the American public that he was bombing another country, not to protect

Americans or even Syrians, but "to make a point" or "punish" the Assad regime, with no

greater utility, I seriously doubt the mission would gain any legitimacy in the eyes of

voters.With a backbone like an earthworm, President Obama is bowing to pressure - not

from the American public or from Congress, but from "foreign-policy experts andpoliticians," as Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign

Relations,describedit -- to go to war for his own "credibility."Obama told the world that Assad's use of chemical weapons would be a "red line"

that would prompt U.S. military action. So, to protect Obama's reputation as a

reliable war-maker who keeps his promise to bomb people, we have to go to war in

Syria? It's difficult to imagine a weaker case for using international force.
https://twitter.com/jwcglaser/status/372090687602581504https://twitter.com/jwcglaser/status/372090687602581504http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/03/14/obamas-pro-assad-policy/http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/03/14/obamas-pro-assad-policy/http://antiwar.com/blog/2013/03/14/obamas-pro-assad-policy/http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/obama-will-bomb-syria-95902.htmlhttp://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/obama-will-bomb-syria-95902.htmlhttp://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/obama-will-bomb-syria-95902.htmlhttp://news.yahoo.com/syria-war-escalates-americans-cool-u-intervention-reuters-003146054.htmlhttp://news.yahoo.com/syria-war-escalates-americans-cool-u-intervention-reuters-003146054.htmlhttp://news.yahoo.com/syria-war-escalates-americans-cool-u-intervention-reuters-003146054.htmlhttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/08/25/obama-s-new-syria-options.htmlhttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/08/25/obama-s-new-syria-options.htmlhttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/08/25/obama-s-new-syria-options.htmlhttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/08/25/obama-s-new-syria-options.htmlhttp://news.yahoo.com/syria-war-escalates-americans-cool-u-intervention-reuters-003146054.htmlhttp://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/obama-will-bomb-syria-95902.htmlhttp://antiwar.com/blog/2013/03/14/obamas-pro-assad-policy/https://twitter.com/jwcglaser/status/372090687602581504


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Which brings us to a final point: for this apparently imminent U.S. bombing raid to be

legal, it has to get the approval of both the U.S. Congress and the United NationsSecurity Council. Congress is likely to push back on Obama's call to war and Russia and

China are sure to veto any proposal at the UN.So on top of this being a war of choice with no humanitarian utility beyond makingObama feel tough and reliable, it is also sure to be a violation of the Constitution

and international law. Couple this with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Martin

Dempsey's warning back in April that "unintended consequences are the rule with

military interventions of this sort," Obama's new war in the Middle East is

shaping up to be a doozy.

Documents

Obama's War of Choice in Syria