Intervention in Syria?

[longknife]

Do our politicians so readily forget our past “adventures” in the Middle East?

We armed ignorant, 8th Century Afghans to force Russia out of Afghanistan and created the Taliban and Al Qaeda. We drove the Shah out of Iran and ended up with extremists running the government. We refused to back Mubarak and ended up with the Muslim Brotherhood.

And now, in order to save face, our Caver-In-in-Chief wants Congress to give their approval to intervene in a nation made up of a variety of groups who despise one another? And most who despise the USA and all Western Culture.

At what point to the idiots learn? And stop?

[no links as this is my own personal reflections]

Well, here's a link anyway - Remember When the Democrats Called Assad a Reformer? @ Political Pistachio: Remember When the Democrats Called Assad a Reformer?

 

[waltky]

Obama an' Kerry stumpin' on Capitol Hill fer a strike on Syria...

Obama launches push for support on Syria, calls for quick action in Congress
3 Sept.`13 WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama has failed so far to convince most Americans that the United States should launch a limited military strike against Syria in response to a suspected chemical weapons attack by the Syrian government, a Reuters/Ipsos poll showed on Tuesday.

Some 56 percent of those surveyed said the United States should not intervene in Syria, while only 19 percent supported action, the online poll found. Some 25 percent said they did not know what course of action the United States should take. The findings are essentially unchanged from last week and indicated that Obama changed few minds on Saturday when he argued that Washington has the obligation to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for what the United States says was a sarin gas attack that killed more than 1,400 people, including hundreds of children, near Damascus on August 21.

The poll showed that respondents were more likely to support a strike if they were specifically asked about the chemical-weapons attack. Even then, only 29 percent said the United States should intervene, while 48 percent opposed action. Another 24 percent said they did not know. Obama said on Saturday he had decided the United States should take military action against Syrian government targets but has asked Congress to approve the action in an acknowledgement that many Americans have little appetite for new military engagements after more than a decade of war in Afghanistan and Iraq. The U.S. public's reluctance to get involved in Syria closely mirrors public sentiment in the United Kingdom, where Parliament last week voted down a motion to support military action by the United States' closest ally.

In the United States, 65 percent of those surveyed in a separate tracking poll agreed with a statement that said "the problems of Syria are none of our business." In the United Kingdom, a parallel poll by Ipsos found that 58 percent agreed with that statement. Similarly, only 29 percent support the Obama administration's decision to arm anti-government rebels in Syria, while 49 percent oppose that move. Another 21 percent said they didn't know whether they agreed or disagreed with that strategy. The online poll of 1,195 adult Americans was conducted between August 30 and September 3. It has a credibility interval of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.

Obama launches push for support on Syria, calls for quick action in Congress

See also:

Kerry tells Congress the US must act and cannot ignore sarin gas attack in Syria
September 3,`13 WASHINGTON — Secretary of State John Kerry says the debate about military strikes against Syria is not about President Barack Obama’s “red line” that weapons of mass destruction cannot be tolerated.

Instead, Kerry told Congress Tuesday that “this debate is about the world’s red line.” He says it is “a red line that anyone with a conscience ought to draw.”

Kerry, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey were dispatched to the Senate to help persuade lawmakers to support a resolution authorizing limited military strikes against Syria following a chemical weapons attack last month outside Damascus that left hundreds dead, including many children.

Kerry said “This is not the time for arm-chair isolationism. This is not the time to be spectators to slaughter.”

Source

 

[waltky]

Senate panel approves Syria airstrikes...

Obama's top aides continue push for a Syria attack as Senate panel OKs strikes
There is a "100 percent" probability that the Syrian government will use chemical weapons again if the United States does not launch a military strike, Secretary of State John Kerry told members of the House Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday.

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel echoed Kerry's remark, saying "very high" when asked by Virginia Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly about the likelihood of another Syrian chemical attack absent U.S. action. The comments came as Obama's top national security advisers presented their case on Wednesday to members of the House Foreign Relations Committee for a U.S. strike on Syria after the U.S. government accused President Bashar Assad's forces of killing more than 1,000 people with chemical weapons on Aug. 21.

While Kerry, Hagel and Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, answered questions from House lawmakers, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved legislation on Wednesday afternoon authorizing President Barack Obama to strike Syria. The panel voted 10-7 to send the measure to the full Senate, with one senator voting present. The legislation, which could still face attempted amendments, is expected to face a final Senate vote next week.

House members took turns questioning Kerry about the cost of an attack, the role of international partners in implementing a strike and whether there was proof that Assad was truly behind the chemical attack on Syrian citizens. “If we act in a unilateral way, I have huge concerns,” said New York Democratic Rep. Gregory Meeks. “I have yet to hear some concrete things about what the world is doing.” Ohio Republican Rep. Steve Chabot conceded to the panel that a majority of his constituents were urging him to vote down the resolution. "I do want to recognize some serious concerns," Chabot said.

When delivering his opening remarks, Kerry reiterated what he told the Senate committee the day before, arguing that Assad "will read our silence as a signal that he can use his weapons with impunity." But later in the hearing, Kerry made a point to emphasize that the purpose of the strike on the Middle Eastern country was not regime change or even to end Assad’s assault on the Syrian people. “It will not stop the butchery,” Kerry said when pressed by Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Tom Marino. “I wish it would.”

More Senate panel approves strikes on Syria

See also:

Syria crisis: UN says more than 2m have fled
3 September 2013 > More than two million Syrians are now registered as refugees, after the total went up by a million in the last six months, the UN's refugee agency says.

More Syrians are now displaced than any other nationality, says the UNHCR. France and the US are continuing to push for military action over alleged chemical weapons use by Syrian forces. There are suggestions that President Barack Obama may be planning much wider action than the limited strikes that have been publicly proposed. The reports emerged as senior US politicians were set to speak before a congressional committee, to rally support before a vote expected next week on whether the US should launch military action. Tensions remain high in Syria and the surrounding region.

Russia said on Tuesday that it had detected two ballistic missiles being launched towards the eastern Mediterranean coastline, sparking speculation of a connection to the Syria crisis. But Israel later confirmed that it was a joint US-Israel missile test. The BBC's Richard Galpin in Jerusalem says tests like this are usually planned long in advance, but it is still a sign that the Israeli military is taking very seriously the possibility that US air strikes on Syria, if they do happen, could lead to retaliatory attacks on Israel - either by Syria itself or by its ally, the Shia militia Hezbollah in Lebanon.

'Lost generation'

The UNHCR said in a statement on Tuesday: "Syria is haemorrhaging women, children and men who cross borders often with little more than the clothes on their backs." Around half of those forced to leave are children, UN agencies estimate, with about three-quarters of them under 11. Just 118,000 refugee children have been able to continue in some sort of education, and only one-fifth have received some sort of counselling, with agencies warning of a "lost generation" of child refugees ill-equipped to help rebuild Syria in the future. Lebanon has received the highest number of refugees, at 700,000, even though it is the smallest of Syria's neighbours and one of the least able to cope.

There is now thought to be one Syrian refugee in Lebanon to roughly every six Lebanese. Jordan and Turkey have taken in the second and third highest numbers respectively. As well as those who have left the country, a further 4.25 million have been displaced within Syria, the UNHCR says, meaning that more people from Syria are now forcibly displaced than from other country. Pointing out that more than 97% of Syria's refugees are being hosted by countries in the surrounding region, the UNHCR said the influx was "placing an overwhelming burden on their infrastructures, economies and societies". It appealed again for "massive international support" with the crisis.

More BBC News - Syria crisis: UN says more than 2m have fled

 

[dilloduck]

Then maybe the UN should tell all the countries who started and financed this uprising to stop the bullshit and go home.