I pulled this diary, because after I wrote it, I happened to turn on Bill Moyers and heard my friend Andrew Bacevich, a 23 year military vet, historian, West Pointer, and superb moral thinker (Limits to American Power, Washington Rules) talking about Syria and he was so cogent, clear, and insightful, that I realized how off the wall I was, and am offerring a precis of his major points, which seem eminently sound.
1) The issue is whether or not the several decades old policy of employing American power--military, covert, overt, through proxies, to stabilize, transform, or fix the middle East, has not worked.
2) Just start at 1980 and tick off Beirut, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, and ask what have we achieved? And the answer is nothing? We've not promoted democracy, raised our standing in the world. Why will initiating a war in this enterprise will produce a different outcome?
3) Wouldn't it be wise to ask ourselves if this military approach is not fundamentally misguided.
On the gassing of children, and the assertion that "We have to do something" (my argument)
Bacevich: Does the death of the children by gas make it more heinous than if they were killed by conventional munitions? I'm not sure it' is. To the extend that moral considerations drive US policy (they don't, but pretend that they do)-----We need to ask, Why Syria and not someplace else. Two weeks ago the Egyptian army killed hundreds of civilians and we did nothing. So why act in Syria and not Egypt.
If our concerns are humanitarian, why is waging war the best way to advance that goal? We could be helping Syrian refugees, for instance, and practicing diplomacy that might actually raise our standing in that part of the world. If we're concerned for the SYRIANS, how will "peppering Damascus with cruise missiles advance that concern?"
"Many suspect this crisis is being driven by domestic politics." Bacevich suspects the President made a mistake, and when Assad called his bluff we have to ask ourselves, "Is credibility worth going to war for?"
Will bombing syria make the memory of Iraq in the Arab world go away? Bombs are going off in Baghdad, killing 65 people. The last time we persuaded ourselves "we needed to act" in Iraq, we created a disaster. Americans paid a price for that, but thousands more Iraquis paid for it and are still paying for it. We also need to expand the subject to examine the "fraudulent" relationship between the American military and our government which allows our leaders to create military adventures while the people stand by and do nothing.
"The truth is that we do not have the power to control what goes on in that part of the world. We can create the illusion with bombs, etc. but we don't."
Bacevich also points out that with the loss of our civilian army, it has made it easier to go to war. The American people decided to jettison the citizen soldier ideal for a professional army. It looked good until the Cold War ended, until it becsme clear that it was no longer America's army but Washington D.C.'s army, regardless as to whether or not the American people had signed up for the enterprise.
Anyway, you can get the gist of his thinking. I urge you to find the conversaton. Bacevich opened a door in my mind and sometimes you just have to say, "I was wrong", eat the nearest Crow and not compoud the error by defending it.