Why the West Needs to Get Its Act Together About Syria

Hi everyone!

While I am certainly not a warmonger and I believe that the American invasion of Iraq in 2003 was a serious misstep in foreign policy that has thoroughly messed up the U.S. approach to the Middle East, it is unconscionable to allow the devastation that's occurring hourly in Syria to go on any longer. I understand the West's reluctance to intervene militarily as it comes so shortly after the debacle that was Iraq. However, as the U.S. and its European and Arab League allies continue to dither on whether or not to put forces on the ground in Syria or to, at the very least, arm the Syrian opposition, the massacre continues without any sign of Assad backing down or halting the violence of his own volition.

It's painfully obvious that anything less than overt aggression is not going to work. The world should have learned its lesson back in December when the well-intentioned Arab League observer mission crashed and burned. What was the result? Pro-Assad forces ramped up their bloody campaign and killed multitudes without batting an eye. The observers had their hands tied as they were under the constant supervision of Assad loyalists.

Then just last month we saw the the failure of the United Nation Security Council's resolution calling for Assad to transfer power to a vice president as a precursor to new elections. What happened then? Russia, China, and India vetoed the resolution because they were more concerned with preserving their business interests in Syria than saving lives. (And of course in the case of Russia, it didn't want to be seen condoning anything that reeked of regime change because its in the midst of its own contentious election drama.) As a result, Assad saw this as something akin to an endorsement for his brutality. Ever since, he's amplified his tactics by laying unrelenting siege to the city of Homs.

Last week the United Nations General Assembly put the same resolution to a vote. It passed but again without Russian support, the resolution was rendered more symbolic than anything. So now we have another meeting to talk about Syria scheduled for Friday in Tunis that brings together a new government body called the Friends of Syria. China hasn't said whether it's going to attend while Russia, not surprisingly, has said it wouldn't be sending any delegates. Instead, according to reports in today's New York Times, Russia has sent a couple war ships to its port in Tarsis, on the Syrian coast. There were reports yesterday that Iran had done something similar, but the veracity of this remains unproven.

So amidst all this international handwringing and committee-organizing, it appears that the opposition movement within Syria is becoming more and more splintered. Military experts and terrorism analysts claim that there's a strong possibility that al Qaeda has moved into Syria from Iraq and is fighting on behalf of the insurgency, which certainly makes the situation all the muddier. And all the while, men, women, and children who want nothing more than a better life and personal freedom are being slaughtered with impunity.

If we're not ready to put troops on the ground, we can be arming the opposition. We can put covert operatives within Damascus. We can (and should) be helping the Free Syrian Army come together in a cohesive and united form that stands a chance of effectively beating back the government forces. We also should be working with exiled Syrian political groups and politicians to build a platform upon which a new post-Assad government can be developed. It's not going to happen overnight as Assad does command strong loyalty among the armed forces, his Alawite clan, and the Christian minority. But we need to lay the foundation for a Syria without Assad. As I've written here before, we'd be killing two birds with one stone: 1) getting rid once and for all of another brutal dictator and 2) cutting off Iran's conduit both militarily and logistically to Hamas and Hezbollah, its proxy threats in the region.

The alternative? The genocide of an entire population, the continued strengthening of Iran, and yet another haven from which al Qaeda can export its hate and violence to the rest of the world.

You choose.

Ciao.