Can there be a group anywhere in the world today more disappointed in United States foreign policy than those fighting the Syrian regime?
On Sunday, just after the international conference on Syria held in Tunis, Secretary Clinton delivered her view of the current situation in a series of television interviews, conducted even as Assad’s regiments shelled Homs and added to the civilian death toll. Clinton used the occasion of Assad’s slaughters to smear the Syrian opposition, explain why they should not be armed — and then amazingly add the demand that Syrians step up their opposition to Assad if they are to be worthy of our help.
First comes the smear. To the BBC, she said, “We have a very dangerous set of actors in the region, al-Qaeda, Hamas, and those who are on our terrorist list, to be sure, supporting — claiming to support the opposition . . .” With CBS, she went further: “And to whom are you delivering [arms]? We know al-Qaeda. Zawahiri is supporting the opposition in Syria. Are we supporting al-Qaeda in Syria? Hamas is now supporting the opposition. Are we supporting Hamas in Syria?”
Second is the explanation of why it is futile. To the BBC, she said “I think that there’s every possibility of a civil war. Outside intervention would not prevent that; it would probably expedite it.” For CBS, she explained that “the problem for everyone is you have a ruthless regime using heavy artillery and tanks that are war weapons of the greatest impact against defenseless people. So there will be — and I’ve said this before — there will be those who are going to find ways to arm these Syrians who are under attack. But even if they are given automatic weapons against tanks, against heavy artillery, the slaughter will go on.”
Third was the complaint that Syrians — who have been dying by the thousands over the last year, refusing to stop their protests in the face of machine guns and tanks — are too timid. Clinton told CNN that “I think that the Syrian people themselves need to start acting on behalf of their fellow Syrians. Where are the people inside Syria who are going to demand that men, women, and children cannot be assaulted and left to die, given no medical care, no food, no water?” She was even clearer with CBS:
And what I’m at — I’m wondering is what about the people in Damascus, what about the people in Aleppo? Don’t they know that their fellow Syrian men, women, and children are being slaughtered by their government? What are they going to do about it? When are they going to start pulling the props out from under this illegitimate regime?
INTERVIEWER: You’re sending a message to them?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Yes, I am.
This is an amazing policy combination. First, she appears to argue that our intelligence agencies are so inept they cannot identify terrorists and cannot find any way at all to get arms to Syrians — as opposed to Palestinians from Hamas or other foreigners from al-Qaeda. And she appears completely oblivious to the argument that by failing to join or support the fight against Assad, we create a vacuum that Sunni terrorists may populate. Second, she suggests that precisely because Assad is using tanks and artillery to attack the population, we cannot aid them because our military assistance would be too limited. They are better off dying, this argument logically holds, than fighting back. Their bravery in fighting for the past year with such limited arms is to be rewarded with the complaint that the odds are just too heavily stacked against them. Then comes the coup de grace: After saying we won’t help, after saying that outside “intervention” would only lead to more violence or “civil war,” after noting the disparity of arms between the citizens and the state, she demands that they rise up. She was, she acknowledged, “sending a message.”
This policy is so devoid of logic and moral underpinnings that it cannot last much longer. Aid will get to the opposition, if only from Arab states, to counterbalance the massive support coming to Assad from Hezbollah, Iran, and Russia. Sooner or later the United States is likely to encourage, and even supply, help to the opposition. Our moral outrage at the murder of civilians is matched in this case by the strategic gains that will accrue when the only Arab regime allied with Iran and Hezbollah falls. But what a lesson this is teaching to those inclined to challenge dictators elsewhere.
And what a lesson for the Israelis, worrying about Iran’s nuclear-weapons program. Clinton told the BBC that one reason we can’t act is that “we don’t have the United Nations Security Council approval, legitimacy, credibility that comes with the international community making a decision.” Israelis learned long ago that the “international community” will be happy to sit idly by while their nation is attacked and the Security Council is, as in the Syrian case, tied up in knots. If you want to see the case for Israel acting on its own, Clinton’s comments on Syria are enormously persuasive. Take care of yourselves, gents, is the only logical lesson to be derived.
The worry with this "disappointed opposition" is that they will turn out to be exactly like the opposition everywhere else in the Middle East: just the next group of murderous thugs that hates us more than the last group of murderous thugs.
The only constant in this Arab Spring is that where the first murderer might have let Christians live and breath in the country (because of some political advantage they offer), the second group does not. See Egypt, see Iraq, or just throw a dart blindfolded at the Middle East. Already we are getting reports of the "disappointed opposition" burning churches in Syria and killing Christians.
I would happily pull the trigger that puts a bullet through Mr. Assad's head, but killing an evil just to put an equal or greater evil in charge that is already at work to kill off the few remaining Christian enclaves, is nuts.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHear hear! Krikorian has been, I think, the *only* voice on the Corner trying to stop this flood of tut-tutting about how we need to start another war in Syria. It's their darn business. If they manage to overthrow Assad, we should welcome a new government as a potential new friend of America. But, they're probably even CRAZIER Islamists who disagree with Assad largely about how violently they should suppress Christians and women. Let's stay as far away from that cesspit as possible.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhat both you, ds, and Rocket J. Squirrel are missing is the over-arching fact that the Syrian regime is a surrogate for Iran in the Arab world, (they are to Iran as Bulgaria once was to the Soviet Union), and that fact should guide our policy above all others.
Syria is not Libya -- As bad as Ghaddafi was, he was not the worst possible choice in Libya -- as we're currently seeing.
But Syria is different -- both the regime and the rebels are made up of equally dangerous anti-American anti-Israeli terrorists -- the only difference between them being that one mob is pro-Iran and the other is anti-Iran.
In the circumstances it behooves us to help the anti-Iranian mob.
We should harbor no illusions about "nation-building" or any such nonsense. We should keep our eye on the national interest ball -- and in this case that ball is Iran.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJack Jolis, part of the national interest is to improve the image of the US in the middle east. And you start with doing a sincere humanitarian mission such as establishing corridors. You don't always have to do it the cowboy way and get full blown war and boots on the ground... And you're plain wrong on calling the defected free syrian army that refused to shoot at fellow citizens 'mob'.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseA couple things Abrams discounts is the possibility that Team Obama has clammed up after things they learned upon "leading from behind" in Libya. And that their frustration is really geared at the derailment of the precious "peace process".
It appears that they learned that they were helping in Libya some of the very same people on their own enemy lists, and they don't want to repeat that. Also, people like Rodham have no illusions about groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, who are on record as vowing to kill the Syrian Alawites.
There are no easy answers, including arming the Syrian people. But to be bristling with hostility toward those same people -- the ones who were the victims of the Assad family all these decades -- I agree is heinous.
It's as if the administration is palpably peeved that Assad has no credibility anymore, and they're taking their frustration out on the Syrian population for inconveniently derailing the "peace process".
Let Abrams know that is what's really going on here. The zeal to create peace where none exists -- without war -- is an irresistible prospect for the average tuchus at Foggy Bottom.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFrom some reports, Syria has a long list of very nasty things, up to and including nerve agents.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI shudder to think of such things falling into the hands of Al Queda, or any of the other groups of middle eastern mad men.
"Can there be a group anywhere in the world today more disappointed in United States foreign policy than those fighting the Syrian regime?"
Why on Earth am I supposed to care about whether non-Americans are "disappointed in United States foreign policy"?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGood point, Bart. (My CAPTCHA: "save face". Isn't that where these kinds of things always end up, in the end?)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI agree with Bart on this completely.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYour F.r.
Maybe the plan all along has been to get Israel to do the dirty work of stopping the Iranian nuke program, which gives Obama plausible deniability and someone else to blame if things get difficult.
At this point, the most cynical assumptions about Obama's motives are probably correct.
As for Syria? I don't think there is any plan at all. If it doesn't get Obama votes in battleground states, he probably doesn't care.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOK. But isn't it equally fair to say "If Americans have no national interest in Syria, he doesn't care?" And isn't that fine?
We shouldn't care about Syria. It's irrelevant to us. That a bunch of Islamists are slaughtering a bunch of other Islamists -- every one of whom would love to behead every infidel he could lay his hands on -- is of no national concern to us. The fact that it is of no electoral concern to the President is a concrete manifestation of this irrelevance.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI agree with qualification that goes with it (as I am sure you also imply), that while I care about the flagrant massacre of unarmed people, this isn't OUR fight. There are no American interests at risk. It is hypocritical for the world to lament American involvment around world then cry out for our help when there is tragedy like this.
Syria - all of them - are NOT friends of the US and never have been. Seems that everyone loves America when they have an AK-47 or a tank barrell in their face.
We must learn for once when to get engaged and when to NOT. If Clinton/ Obama were only moderately adept at foreign policy, perhaps they could use some of their "politicking" skills to paint Russia and China as the villains and let the world draw its own conclusions. Use this as a training lesson on the moral equivalence of the US vs all other countries. Aaah, but I forget - Obama believes the US IS merely equivalent to all other nations.
The ultimate point is - and I believe all Americans believe this to be true: DO NOT put one American solider's life in danger to support / aid/ help ANY of these people. It is NOT worth one American's life - not at this point at least.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe should care for two reasons.
1) Civilians are being slaughtered.
2) Whatever happens in Syria will have ramifications throughout the middle east.
Now the question gets to, should we do anything about it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe answer to that is no.
Fighting in Syria is a fools errand.
Not because we can't win... of course we can, we could arm the Syrian rebels and crush Assad's heavy weapons with air strikes. But if Neocons haven't been chastened by our attempts to evangelize democracy over the last decade, they won't be chastened by anything.
It is time to go back to hard nosed, Kissengerian Realism. Do we gain anything by aiding the Syrian rebels? Maybe we knock out an old enemy. However, the notion that this results in a free, western style democracy is dubious at best (and outright naive at worst.) We saw what happened when Palestine started to have freer, fairer elections... they elected Hamas. And there appears to be a solid chance that similar groups will gain at least some power, if not outright majorities, in Egypt and Libya.
Assad is a horrible person, a murderer and a tyrant. But the United States is not knight errant always looking for the next dragon to slay, and our founders certainly did not envision that as their project. Absent some critical U.S. interest that is better served by destabilizing Syria than by leaving Assad in power, there is no good reason to intervene.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhile the Obama/Rodham Clinton foreign policy team could screw up an iron ball with a rubber mallet, and therefore should be kept as far from Syria as possible, including being prohibited from talking such nonsense about the situation there, that is not the same thing as having no American interests there.
That the Assad government uses proxies, and is itself a proxy, to kill Americans around the world makes it of national interest what's happening over there. Certainly, there is a very good chance that Islamists will insinuate themselves into taking power, if they don't do so outright, upon Assad's exile, overthrow or death. That only means our current foreign policy operators, still driving with learner's permits, will only make things worse.
The inability to influence any outcome with a positive, or less negative, result for America should not be equated with having no national interests in the events in Syria, however.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Can there be a group anywhere in the world today more disappointed in United States foreign policy than those fighting the Syrian regime?" How about the Egyptians who we freed from Mubarek, only to now find themselves under the thumb of the Muslim Brotherhood? This was a Hillary promoted military action.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf I remember correctly, the last thing she said about Assad was that he was "a great reformer".
The situation in the Middle East is enough of a mess. The last thing they, or we, need is a mindless politician like Hillary Clinton confusing everybody everywhere. This is a lady who thought that her husband's well-known dalliances were the product of a "vast right-wing conspiracy", and now she is the brain trust of our foreign policies? God help us all.
The fact is that the choice in Syria appears to be between an Iranian/Hezbollah client and a Al-Qaeda/Hamas opposition. So no matter who wins, we're not helped out. And this administration won't be helping Christian refugees if the Assad regime falls, guaranteed.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWho are the folks we would be giving arms to?
What kind of government would replace the Assad regime?
How do you know?
Where is there any logic in the article? It is simply an emotional appeal to irrational action.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHow, exactly, is it a smear to say that We have a very dangerous set of actors in the region, al-Qaeda, Hamas, and those who are on our terrorist list, to be sure, supporting — claiming to support the opposition . . .”
. And Syria cannot be viewed in a vacuum., The Muslim Brotherhood has taken over in North Africa with the Salafis of all stripes getting 70% in the Egyptian lower house and 80% in the upper legislative branch. In Libya, Al Qaeda in the Maghreb is now active and people we fought in Afghanistan are now in the leadership. Why should we imagine that Syrian Sunni Jihadis, who killed Americans in Iraq, are not involved as they claim to be?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis is exactly correct, as the Muslim Brotherhood, Al Qaeda, and now Hamas all support the rebels and are helping them. (Hamas at least now supports them.) In so far as non-Sunni Muslims are being attacked by these mobs of democracy supporters, or whatever Abrams wishes and pretends them to be, what are we to think of them? Already, one monastary has been raided External Link
The reason is clear. If these facts are facts, then Abram's delusions are unsupportable. Worse, his position of aiding and abetting these groups could be construed not just as evil, but as treasonous.
Abrams is part of the cabal of neo-cons who rattle sabers and want to involve the U.S. in every dustup in the Middle East. The world surely would be better off without Assad, but I'm not convinced that his replacements would be any better. I don't see pro-U.S. democratic systems breaking out in Egypt, Libya, or Tunisia. It's up to the Syrians themselves to find a way. I don't buy the neo-cons' human rights arguments. They have always turned a blind eye to the egregious practices of the Saudi regime. They say that isn't our fight. If so, neither is anything that is happening in Syria.
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