Hagel: Evidence of chemical weapons use in Syria

For a start the UK and the USA can not afford to get embroiled into another conflict in the Middle East. We have no money and we also do not want to see any more of our young servicemen coming back in body bags, in a conflict thousands of miles away.

There are no good sides to be backing in this conflict. Assad is a brutal dictator yet maintains the rights of a diverse ethnical make up of Syria. 10% of which are Christian. The FSA may have been made up by protesting Syrians, but the flicker of Al Qaeda that existed in the rebels has now become a flame, doing the majority of the fighting.

How can any government justify helping either side?

reply to post by woodwardjnr


It's just the hypocracy which tells us we shouldn't be meddling in the internal affairs of Syria. Everything Assad has been blamed for I'm sure a country somewhere else in the immediate region is guilty of. What is so different about what has happened in Syria and the below? Why aren't we sending weapons and aid to the protesters so they can be free from the oppressive dictatorship?

Saudi political prisoners

Scores of Saudis took the streets of Buraydah on Tuesday despite a regime ban on public gatherings to express solidarity with political prisoners.

They also called for the immediate release of the 23-year-old political activist, Hood al-Aqil, who was arrested in March after Saudi forces raided his house in the city.

Activists say there are over 40,000 political prisoners, mostly prisoners of conscience, in jails across the kingdom.

According to the activists, most of the detained political thinkers are being held by Al Saud regime without trial or legitimate charges and that they were arrested for merely looking suspicious.

Nice to see the thought police only exist in Syria and Iran. And if you look at the picture provided, the protest is much larger than what started in the country of Syria.

reply to post by woodwardjnr


Hm. Maybe I read too much into that but isn't that a little like putting different values on people's lives?
I mean, these servicemen, aren't they trained, equipped and even paid and employed for war, on a totally voulantary basis? How does that relate to all the hundreds of thousands of dead, wounded and displaced unarmed civillians, including children and elderly?

You know I like and respect you woodward, so it is not about offending you, I know you are a cool guy but I just felt the need to put some perspectives on that. You are totally accurate on the other stuff though; justifying an intervention by any state would be very tricky but if the Security Council would support it, it would more be the community backing it.
I am trying not to be overly idealistic here and at the same time not overly pesimistic either...

Both sides, or actually all sides are acting really bad here. I personally think it just a matter of who has what resources to kill with not what side they belong to. Would there be an intervention it would have to be to pacify all participants like in the Balkans (may be a matter of definition in that case though).
Just supporting the FSA, who ever the hell they are, with money and supplies is probably going to turn out like Afghanistan in the early 80's.

Originally posted by DarknStormy
reply to post by woodwardjnr

 

It's just the hypocracy which tells us we shouldn't be meddling in the internal affairs of Syria. Everything Assad has been blamed for I'm sure a country somewhere else in the immediate region is guilty of.

That simply is just not the case:

Syria responded to months of peaceful protests with brutal force involving indiscriminate air and artillery assaults on residential areas and apparent targeting of civilians, and torture, which constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity, pushing the political confrontation into an internal armed conflict. The opposition is increasingly conducting offensive operations. Some opposition forces have carried out serious abuses like kidnapping, torture, and what appear to be extrajudicial executions. The spread and intensification of fighting have led to a dire humanitarian situation with hundreds of thousands internally displaced or seeking refuge in neighboring countries.

he air strikes Human Rights Watch documented killed at least 152 civilians. According to a network of local Syrian activists, air strikes have killed more than 4,300 civilians across Syria since July 2012.

HRW

Another classified document, dated April 13, contains an order from Maj. Gen. Ali Mamlouk, head of the Syrian Intelligence Agency, to Col. Hafez Makhlouf, the cousin of President Bashar al-Assad, to head to Homs for the purpose of moving a batch of land-to-land missiles, to be used against the civilian neighborhoods protesting against Assad’s regime.

Al-Arabiya

I don't know where else this is happening at the moment, in the immediate area at least. It was briefly like this in Libya yes, but NATO came in and sorted that out just in time with nothing but one (1) allied casualty: an US airman who died in a traffic accident on his way to the airbase. In Italy.
And I totally do not buy that silly "we in the US are also oppressed" bullcrap. Such talk is out of its element, typically written from the comfort of someones nicely heated and well fed home.

Much of the discussion in this thread I find 1) badly informed about just how severe the situation in Syria really is and 2) very much USA-centric.
About the latter, I guess it gives itself but this is really about the UN and whether it wants to keep some legitimacy or not. The US is the greater contributary, that is true, but this is about the system.

The war in Syria is as much about factions of Sunni and Shia Muslims fighting with Iran siding with Syria and Qatar and Saudi Arabia helping the opposition. While UK, US and France have a vested interest in the war, particularly to get at Iran, some of the Arab countries have a much higher interest in this war.

I remember when the Balkan war was in full swing (and I think there are parallels here) then both sides were accused of firing on their own people to get a shock reaction to the rest of the world. Really hate to put the theory forward but this could easily have happened to provoke the west into the war.

Weird that...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by templar knight


Your analysis is right on.
What I argue is that this has been going on for far too long, has gone all too wrong and is risking a serious breakdown of the whole region, which might further escalate into a massive conflict.
Add to that the unusual level of brutality in the Syrian civil war (as if there is "usual brutality"...you know what I mean).

Besides, if chemical weapons are being deployed, why not radiological or even nuclear?
The world community must draw a line here and now.