[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Mail]  [Sign-in]  [Setup]  [Help]  [Register] 

"Analysis: The Final State of the Presidential Race"

He’ll, You Pieces of Garbage

The Future of Warfare -- No more martyrdom!

"Kamala’s Inane Talking Points"

"The Harris Campaign Is Testament to the Toxicity of Woke Politics"

Easy Drywall Patch

Israel Preparing NEW Iran Strike? Iran Vows “Unimaginable” Response | Watchman Newscast

In Logansport, Indiana, Kids are Being Pushed Out of Schools After Migrants Swelled County’s Population by 30%: "Everybody else is falling behind"

Exclusive — Bernie Moreno: We Spend $110,000 Per Illegal Migrant Per Year, More than Twice What ‘the Average American Makes’

Florida County: 41 of 45 People Arrested for Looting after Hurricanes Helene and Milton are Noncitizens

Presidential race: Is a Split Ticket the only Answer?

hurricanes and heat waves are Worse

'Backbone of Iran's missile industry' destroyed by IAF strikes on Islamic Republic

Joe Rogan Experience #2219 - Donald Trump

IDF raids Hezbollah Radwan Forces underground bases, discovers massive cache of weapons

Gallant: ‘After we strike in Iran,’ the world will understand all of our training

The Atlantic Hit Piece On Trump Is A Psy-Op To Justify Post-Election Violence If Harris Loses

Six Al Jazeera journalists are Hamas, PIJ terrorists

Judge Aileen Cannon, who tossed Trump's classified docs case, on list of proposed candidates for attorney general

Iran's Assassination Program in Europe: Europe Goes Back to Sleep

Susan Olsen says Brady Bunch revival was cancelled because she’s MAGA.

Foreign Invaders crisis cost $150B in 2023, forcing some areas to cut police and fire services: report

Israel kills head of Hezbollah Intelligence.

Tenn. AG reveals ICE released thousands of ‘murderers and rapists’ from detention centers into US streets

Kamala Harris Touts Mass Amnesty Offering Fast-Tracked Citizenship to Nearly Every Illegal Alien in U.S.

Migration Crisis Fueled Rise in Tuberculosis Cases Study Finds

"They’re Going to Try to Kill Trump Again"

"Dems' Attempts at Power Grab Losing Their Grip"

"Restoring a ‘Great Moderation’ in Fiscal Policy"

"As attacks intensify, Trump becomes more popular"

Posting Articles Now Working Here

Another Test

Testing

Kamala Harris, reparations, and guaranteed income

Did Mudboy Slim finally kill this place?

"Why Young Americans Are Not Taught about Evil"

"New Rules For Radicals — How To Reinvent Kamala Harris"

"Harris’ problem: She’s a complete phony"

Hurricane Beryl strikes Bay City (TX)

Who Is ‘Destroying Democracy In Darkness?’

‘Kamalanomics’ is just ‘Bidenomics’ but dumber

Even The Washington Post Says Kamala's 'Price Control' Plan is 'Communist'

Arthur Ray Hines, "Sneakypete", has passed away.

No righT ... for me To hear --- whaT you say !

"Walz’s Fellow Guardsmen Set the Record Straight on Veep Candidate’s Military Career: ‘He Bailed Out’ "

"Kamala Harris Selects Progressive Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as Running Mate"

"The Teleprompter Campaign"

Good Riddance to Ismail Haniyeh

"Pagans in Paris"

"Liberal groupthink makes American life creepy and could cost Democrats the election".


Status: Not Logged In; Sign In

Opinions/Editorials
See other Opinions/Editorials Articles

Title: The Bad/Good Idea of Removing Assad
Source: [None]
URL Source: http://patriotpost.us/opinion/victo ... adgood-idea-of-removing-assad/
Published: May 24, 2012
Author: By Victor Davis Hanson
Post Date: 2012-05-24 08:46:43 by We The People
Keywords: Foreign Policy, Conservative, Neoconservative
Views: 814
Comments: 1

Who could not despise the tottering Bashar al-Assad dictatorship in Syria?

The Syrian strongman has killed some 10,000 protestors over the last year; thousands of Syrians are now refugees.

The autocracy arms and aids the terrorist organization Hezbollah. It targets democratic Israel with thousands of missiles, and still does its best to ruin neighboring Lebanon.

Theocratic and terrorist-sponsoring Iran has few allies -- but Syria remains its staunchest. Almost no country over the last half-century has proved more hostile to the United States than has Syria.

With sanctions not working, and with the Chinese, Iranians and Russians not eager to see Assad go, there is lots of talk that the United States and its allies must intervene to help the outmanned and outgunned Syrian opposition -- either with arms supplies, training for insurgent groups, or air cover.

At first glance, such a humanitarian intervention seems a good idea. A well-armed insurgency might fight its way to Damascus. Or we could bomb Assad out of power like we did Slobodan Milosevic from Serbia, or Muammar Gadhafi from Libya -- and without the use of ground troops or loss of American life.

Would not the spread of the Arab Spring to Damascus be wonderful -- especially given that it would weaken Iran and Shiite terrorist groups that have long killed Americans? Would not fewer die from collateral damage than from Assad's thugs?

But intervention, even if by air or through stealthy military assistance, requires some sort of strategy, and right now the United States does not seem to have any coherent one. We expected that post-Gadhafi Libya, and an Egypt without Hosni Mubarak, would be far better. They might be some day. But right now, emerging Islamic republics are hardly democratic. Some seem every bit as anti-American as were the dictatorships they replaced -- and could be even more intolerant of women, tribal minorities and Christians.

The point is not that we should only support idealists who promise an Arab version of Santa Monica, but that we do not oust one monster whom we are not responsible for only to empower one just as bad whom we would be responsible for.

Our three last interventions in the Middle East offer all sorts of different lessons, but one common theme predominates -- those whom we wished to help didn't seem to appreciate it. In Afghanistan, after a decade-long investment of blood and treasure, America is scheduled to withdraw in two years without any guarantee that Afghanistan won't be ruled by the Taliban, as it was in 2001. Our biggest problem seems to be our allied Afghan friends, who keep rioting and blowing up their American partners.

We successfully removed Saddam Hussein from Iraq. And by nobly staying on with thousands of troops, we defeated an insurgency and finally birthed a constitutional system in Iraq that is still viable -- but at a cost that the American public felt was not worth the eventual outcome.

In Libya, the model was to boast of United Nations approval, insert no ground troops, bomb Gadhafi, and support the insurgents. But because we far exceeded the very U.N. resolution we bragged about, we are not likely to get another such resolution for Syria. A bypassed Congress won't want to be snubbed again in favor of the U.N. And so far the Libyan air campaign has reminded us that if we do not send in ground troops and risk casualties, we have absolutely no influence on what follows.

Since we went into Afghanistan and Iraq, the United States has borrowed more than $9 trillion and is currently running serial $1 trillion deficits. We no longer pay for our wars, but instead borrow the money from the Chinese and others who calculate how to profit better than we from the ensuing chaos.

After lots of interventions, we have learned one thing about loud Arab reformers, especially those who were educated at Western universities: They damn us for supporting their dictators; they damn us for removing them; they damn us for interfering in their affairs when we help promote democracy; and they damn us as callous when we just let them be.

These cautionary tales do not necessarily mean that we should not help the Syrian dissidents, only that we must ask ourselves who exactly are these guys, how much will it cost to see them win, and when it is over will our new friends rule any more humanely and competently than the monsters that we remove?

And one final consideration: If intervening in Syria is to be a humanitarian venture, why would saving lives there be any more important than saving far more lives from far more dictators in Africa?

Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

#1. To: We The People (#0)

The Bad/Good idea of removing the USSA from the MENA.

And Israel shortly before.

mcgowanjm  posted on  2012-05-24   8:53:52 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Mail]  [Sign-in]  [Setup]  [Help]  [Register] 

Please report web page problems, questions and comments to webmaster@libertysflame.com