![]() ![]() Their incentive to acquire nukes only increases. ![]() ![]() ![]() Iranian leaders might well note that the United States attacked Iraq and Syria, but not nuclear North Korea. voters see the consequences of a Syria strike as costly, imagine how they’ll feel when they contemplate the price tag of bombing Iran. And seeing how hard it has been to get even a limited strike approved by Congress, this will hardly scare them. Iran, like the rest of the region, doesn’t believe a possible American intervention in Syria would be over WMD. It is not enough in any case to go to war over “credibility” that’s the kind of thinking that got us into Korea and Vietnam. Intervention will only increase that anger and suspicion. The problem is not the absence of American will to intervene, but lack of trust in American aims. What credibility? Arabs think America intervenes too much, not too little, and conspiracy theories blame the United States for most problems in almost every country. credibility is on the line if Obama doesn’t act. Further weakening Assad’s control over his chemical arsenal would increase rather than decrease the possibility of such weapons falling into the wrong hands.Īs for Hezbollah, Assad’s critical ally, if he is going down, the chances that he will try to hand the group chemical weapons increase, not decrease. What’s more, Syria is awash in jihadist groups, including affiliates of al Qaeda. Terrorist groups don’t care about international norms they are the anti-norm, and they are also less sensitive to deterrence the only thing preventing al Qaeda from using WMD against its enemies is its lack of WMD.īy Timothy J. If we don’t act, terrorist groups and militias may draw the lesson that they can use chemical weapons with impunity. Whether or not we intervene, if Assad is going down, nothing - especially not “norms” - will stop him from using them. In desperation, of course, leaders will often do the unthinkable. But the use of chemical weapons against the helpless is different from using them against states that can retaliate since 1973, Assad hasn’t sent a single soldier to try to liberate the territories occupied by Israel since 1967, knowing what Israel could do to him if he tried. Then there’s Israel, often seen as threatened by Assad’s arsenal of poison gases. In fact, one of the weaknesses of the evidence against him is that, in the absence of a real smoking gun, the administration still hasn’t explained why he used them in the first place we know he is ruthless, but he had other means and he stood to lose more than he would gain. The Syrian leader doesn’t need to use them against his own people, especially when Russia is more than happy to supply him with conventional arms. If we don’t act, Bashar Assad will use chemical weapons again. Security Council support, in a case that’s clearly not about self-defense)? 2. How can one defend international norms by going against international majorities? How can we defend one norm (a prohibition on the use of chemical weapons) while breaking another (attacking another state, without U.N. Here are nine examples of the contradictions in the case presented so far: 1. The American people might not be foreign-policy experts, but they know a weak argument when they see one. But the reality is that every central point the president, the administration, and war supporters have made has been almost impossible to defend. The American public’s skepticism is often blamed on war-weariness. He bent over backwards to assure the American people that any actions he takes will be strictly limited (though the United States does not do “pinpricks,” he insisted). In his speech Tuesday night, the president focused narrowly on the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons, casting them only indirectly as threats to U.S. He doesn’t have the votes, and he knows it. He is fighting a losing battle to persuade the world, the American people, and Congress that an attack on Syria is necessary. One could almost see his relief that Russia has provided what may be a face-saving proposal that allows him to pull back from war while claiming victory. President Obama’s speech Tuesday night was the address of a deeply conflicted man. ![]()
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