The Positioning on Syria

What gear do you start your car in? When you get in your car, put the key in the ignition – or press the button – and your car starts, what gear is your vehicle in? I don’t drive a stick, I drive an automatic, so my car is in Park. Sticks, if memory serves right, you would normally put them in neutral and engage the parking brake when you park so you start with the parking brake engaged and in neutral. Might start in 1^st, but definitely need that brake.

I raise this question because I happened to flick past MSNBC last night a little before 9 PM. They’ve got a show on called “All In with Chris Hayes”. The host, Chris Hayes, is opposed to military action in Syria.

Now, as you may know, I voiced support for a military response to the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons. I differentiate between intervening over the civil war and intervention in response to the use of chemical weapons, which I don’t think is a minor distinction, though I will admit is riddled with irony and effectually a minor one in terms of the result of the response.

I’m not here to get into that part of it.

But one of Chris Hayes’ guests made a point about the way people view issues, this case military intervention overseas, has much to do with where you start from. What is your default position? What gear do you start in?

The question I started off with is a bit facetious. But I do think it is applicable to the current paradigm. Most people believe in a default position; “definitely you need the military strike, that’s obvious from the start” or “no, there is absolutely no need for the military to get involved, there never is”. I don’t know which aligns with which, but to me this is like either starting your car in drive or reverse (2^nd or reverse in a manual).  

Obviously you don’t start your car in your driveway like that. You’ll either end up running into your garage/house, or backing into the middle of the street. Obviously your start with the car in Park, or Neutral, or however it is you get your car in place to stay in place and not start moving when you start the engine.

And there’s a good reason for that. Before you start driving off somewhere you want to get your bearings of where you want to go, if your path is clear, etc. That would seem like the obvious way to approach most, if not all, issues of any sort of importance. Start in neutral, figure out which way you need to go, and then either drive forward or reverse.

I tried to take that position here on this issue. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be a prevalent first response.

If you go back to my post last Friday, I stated that if the evidence was there, and was believable and reasonable, then I didn’t think there was any reason to not send a strong message. Going into this I thought that the biggest issue would be with the evidence – would the UN be able to confirm whether or not chemical weapons were used, would there be any proof that it was in fact the Syrian regime and not the rebels. To my surprise, there is very little attention to that aspect of everything. Instead the focus has been on whether a military response should be used at all.

I didn’t expect that. Coverage of the events in Syria for weeks have been passive condemnation of the fact that we, the United States specifically the international community in general, had not done more in Syria; had not sent in troops to put down the Syrian regime and help the rebels overtake the country. Given the rationale that much of the media seemed to be pushing, I was frankly a little surprised by the way in the last week or so that so much of the media has seemed to do a complete 180.

But at the same time I understand a little bit of where that comes from. The job of the media is to be the skeptic. The job of the media is to look at the situation from every angle, report the facts, and occasionally make informed determinations in the affirmative (also known as opinions). That would be a reasonable explanation, if not that they were collectively so firmly in the opposite camp literally days earlier.

Nor am I suggesting that there is no room for skepticism or debate. Before President Obama even affirmed that he wanted to seek Congressional approval, I said it made more sense that he do so. That approval obviously was going to mean some period of debate. However, I have heard no suggestion of alternatives from the skeptics, which is I think the definitive responsibility to any contrarian. It’s called constructive criticism. Even if delivered in a snarky or rude way, an alternative suggestion is necessary.

The opponents to military action have produced some cause for hesitation. They note foremost the weariness of war that we have in the US. That is a powerful argument because we are indeed as a broader public very tired of war. We as a nation have been far too involved in military conflicts around the world, for more than a decade. We have a lot of problems. The cost in dollar terms for military action in Syria is vast and could just as easily be applied to our domestic affairs, or alternatively could be used for humanitarian aide in the same Syrian conflict.

But war weariness I do not think applies here. We do not have the luxury of choosing when bad things happen. We don’t get to choose when something happens that calls for our attention. What we do control is how we react to them. And certainly we can spend the money of war on our domestic issues, or even to not accumulate more debt. Alternatively if there is just a moral or otherwise compelling need to spend money, humanitarian aide would be what should be spent on, not military attacks. This argument I think can almost always be made.

I would agree with those points except for one salient point that I think has continually been diminished, which is that this is not solely in response to the existence of a war in Syria. The war in Syria has gone on for more than two years. I would be opposed to military action if it was just to get involved in a civil war in another country.

But I do sincerely believe that the use of chemical weapons is a serious and grave step. A hundred years ago we as an international community determined that the use of chemical weapons on a battlefield, with some noted exceptions. We have treaties similarly applicable to nuclear weapons use, proliferation, and development.

So here is my central question in everything that has been going on; what is the suitable response when a nation determines that it is acceptable to use chemical weapons in a war it is fighting? In the hierarchy of banned weaponry, the international community holds chemical weapons just below nuclear weapons. If there is no response to the apparent use of chemical weapons, is there reason to believe there will not be one in response to a nation trying to obtain nuclear weapons, or apparently moving to use them? Because if that is the case, why then are we expending so much effort trying to prevent North Korea from expanding its nuclear arsenal, or make sure that Iran does not obtain one? Why have we spent millions and millions of dollars securing loose chemical and nuclear weapons stocks around the world for the last few years? You may not know it, but we have spent tons of money the past several years covertly securing these weapons so that other nations would not use them against their people, or allow them to fall into the hands of those who would, or terrorists.

Do we sit back then and shout from the fringe that we have moral indignation towards violation of international conscience by use of chemical weapons, but won’t do anything about it? What then is the purpose behind the international law if there is no burden of enforcement? There are just some things you cannot accept on an honor code. Obviously the Syrian regime didn’t see any reason to not at least tempt fate by trying to get away with using chemical weapons. If there is seen no response, is there any reason for him not to try again, knowing now that the global community will just turn the other way and say we were just too tired to do anything about it? That we didn’t feel like spending time or money on it?

War is a terrible, terrible thing. The use of military force has been too prolific for insufficient reason. But that is not a reason for inaction, for complacency, or for refusal of viewing reality. Iraq was a terrible, terrible mistake in American history. Arguably it was criminal. But at the same time it is not the beginning and the end of American history. There are lessons to be learned from that horrid experience. Simply covering our eyes and ears is not the lesson that should be learned. What structurally went wrong? What actions should or should not have been taken? How do we avoid making the wrong turns? You get lost on the road, you don’t cut up your driver’s license and say you’re never going to drive again. You plan the tip better next time. We took a horrible wrong turn with Iraq and got ourselves lost. Now is the time we should focus on forming the right plan for action. 

I started from neutral. I figured out where I think the best direction to go would be. I've considered the possibilities as best as I can. I may be wrong, but the only question I have not seen anyone offer an answer to is what happens a day, week, month, year later if we don't offer a tangible response to the actions of the Syrian government. Is that better or worse than action now? Starting from neutral I have confidence that I have well reasoned my final position. Can those starting from someplace other than neutral express the same confidence?