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Will Assad Disarm?

Will Assad Disarm?

  • Yes, he'll disarm like a classy lady after a good bon mot

    Votes: 4 15.4%
  • Yes, he'll disarm, but the sneaky b******, he'll keep some on the down low

    Votes: 12 46.2%
  • No, he's faking it

    Votes: 7 26.9%
  • No, we'll bomb him first

    Votes: 3 11.5%

  • Total voters
    26
And yet, you continue with the blind partisanship, because that's apparently more important than things like sovereignty and human life.

I don't think it was right for the United States to get up to its eyeballs in the Middle East, but that was before my time and isn't something I exert a great deal of control over.

To the extent we ARE involved in the Middle East and we do DEPEND on stability in that region: any action that sets the precedent that using chemical weapons is acceptable runs contrary to long established goals of stability in that region for the sake of expanding the regions' economic relations with the rest of the world. That's because cultural and tribal rivalries stretching across countries (the kind that fed into the Iran-Iraq War) provide a pretext to use chemical weapons to radically alter the balance of power in the region. For example, Saudi Arabia tried to bribe Russia to stay out of it because a weakened Syria makes them more powerful, Iran is jockeying with the United States for influence in Iraq because that makes them more powerful, etc.

Each country in the Middle East wants a hegemony over the rest the same as Germany desired in Europe at the onset of WWII. It's why Saddam attacked Kuwait. He thought the West would accept his invasion, but the West decided that such invasions pose far too much of a threat to the power and economic structues of the Middle East, because then Iran, Saudi Arabia, etc, would start gobbling up territories to expand their own influence.

Obama essentially has continued an ancient, fifty-year old policy of promoting stability in the Middle East that demonstrating any use of a nation of power balance-altering chemical weapons, no matter how many backers or supporters that nation might have among the Western powers, cannot be permitted because it runs the chance that EVERY country in the Middle East will begin using chemical weapons to alter the balance of power. If such escalation occurs, the relations of various political factions in the West will be put in an extremely awkward and dangerous position. That's where the "WWIII" talk is coming from.

Ordinarily, Russia would agree. If it was anyone else's boy on the line. It just so happens that Syria is in their in camp, so they want everybody in the West to make an exception to the rule of "no chemical weapons" that all nations collectively agreed violated the common interests of all.

Ordinarily, Republicans would agree as well. But the right-wing media makes it living out of undermining Obama as a leader, and the Republicans find undermining Obama as a leader comes in handy.

Particularly when continuing wars in the Middle East are extremely unpopular with the American people, as the Republicans are in the awkward position of being unpopular.
 
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...Obama essentially has continued an ancient, fifty-year old policy of promoting stability in the Middle East...

A policy that has done nothing but promote a never ending cycle of violence in exchange for short term gains. "...How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"
 
A policy that has done nothing but promote a never ending cycle of violence in exchange for short term gains. "...How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"

The policy is "expensive", but it is something the United States as a country (not just as a government, but every aspect of our society) has invested itself in. For that reason, it is Obama's job to oversee and preserve political equilibrium in the Middle East, as it was the job of all his predecessors both Democrat and Republican down to Eisenhower.

For mostly vile reasons of self-interest, the right-wing has decided it is their job to disrupt, obtrude, and get in the way of that job.
 
I don't think it was right for the United States to get up to its eyeballs in the Middle East, but that was before my time and isn't something I exert a great deal of control over.

To the extent we ARE involved in the Middle East and we do DEPEND on stability in that region: any action that sets the precedent that using chemical weapons is acceptable runs contrary to long established goals of stability in that region for the sake of expanding the regions' economic relations with the rest of the world. That's because cultural and tribal rivalries stretching across countries (the kind that fed into the Iran-Iraq War) provide a pretext to use chemical weapons to radically alter the balance of power in the region. For example, Saudi Arabia tried to bribe Russia to stay out of it because a weakened Syria makes them more powerful, Iran is jockeying with the United States for influence in Iraq because that makes them more powerful, etc.

Each country in the Middle East wants a hegemony over the rest the same as Germany desired in Europe at the onset of WWII. It's why Saddam attacked Kuwait. He thought the West would accept his invasion, but the West decided that such invasions pose far too much of a threat to the power and economic structues of the Middle East, because then Iran, Saudi Arabia, etc, would start gobbling up territories to expand their own influence.

Obama essentially has continued an ancient, fifty-year old policy of promoting stability in the Middle East that demonstrating any use of a nation of power balance-altering chemical weapons, no matter how many backers or supporters that nation might have among the Western powers, cannot be permitted because it runs the chance that EVERY country in the Middle East will begin using chemical weapons to alter the balance of power. If such escalation occurs, the relations of various political factions in the West will be put in an extremely awkward and dangerous position. That's where the "WWIII" talk is coming from.

Ordinarily, Russia would agree. If it was anyone else's boy on the line. It just so happens that Syria is in their in camp, so they want everybody in the West to make an exception to the rule of "no chemical weapons" that all nations collectively agreed violated the common interests of all.

Ordinarily, Republicans would agree as well. But the right-wing media makes it living out of undermining Obama as a leader, and the Republicans find undermining Obama as a leader comes in handy.

Particularly when continuing wars in the Middle East are extremely unpopular with the American people, as the Republicans are in the awkward position of being unpopular.

Well said. My only issue is on our record of punishing chemical weapons use: the Reagan administration had no problem with Iraq using chemical weapons on Iran. And also the Kurds.
 
After weeks of saber-rattling by both sides, the US and Syria are on the brink of war, awaiting an uncertain vote in Congress and the release of a UN report.

But on Monday, the last best hope to avert war revealed itself after Russia and Syria responded to an off-the-cuff, hypothetical statement by Secretary of State John Kerry, seemingly ready to give up the chemical weapons that initiated the crisis.

Will a peaceful settlement pan out, or is this too good to be true?

It is nonsense, a plan that sounds so palatable on its face but is so impossible to carry off that it prevents future punitive action. Deconstructing and evacuating a nations chemical weapons stockpile is a major logistical task in the best of times and for an arsenal as large and dispersed as Syria's (in the midst of a Civil War) it is an implausible task. Who is going to take custody of the weapons? Who will pay for it? Who will evaluate the process? How will it be carried off?
 
It is nonsense, a plan that sounds so palatable on its face but is so impossible to carry off that it prevents future punitive action. Deconstructing and evacuating a nations chemical weapons stockpile is a major logistical task in the best of times and for an arsenal as large and dispersed as Syria's (in the midst of a Civil War) it is an implausible task. Who is going to take custody of the weapons? Who will pay for it? Who will evaluate the process? How will it be carried off?

Yep, those questions have to be answered to our satisfaction before it will work.
 
I believe he'll make a show of giving up some chemical weapons... after he's transferred the majority of his stash to Iraq and Lebanon for safekeeping, to be returned after this all blows over.
 
With the Russians on his case he will disarm all of them. I'm confident of that.
 
Syria won't give up their chemical weapons programs unless Israel gives up it's nukes.

And even if you did get Syria to OK some sort of agreement to have the UN go in and confiscate the weapons it wouldn't matter anyways because their weapons program is indigenous. This means that Syria has the technical expertise and experienced people to make those weapons. UN inspections can't take that away. The only way to do that is assassinate or capture Syria's weapons scientists and technicians.
 
He may fain disarmament as a delay tactic, and may even turn over some of his WMD, but will not capitulate to turning over all his WMD. And Russia will help him.

That is precisely correct. Anyone who doesn't think that he immediately started cacheing some of this stuff for a last-ditch effort as soon as the U.S. started making serious noises is using Hope as a strategy.
 
With the Russians on his case he will disarm all of them. I'm confident of that.

:lamo


:mrgreen: Is this going to work just as well as our deal with the Russians that if we gave up our missile defense in Poland they would get on the Iranian's case to give up their nukes? :mrgreen:
 
After weeks of saber-rattling by both sides, the US and Syria are on the brink of war, awaiting an uncertain vote in Congress and the release of a UN report.

But on Monday, the last best hope to avert war revealed itself after Russia and Syria responded to an off-the-cuff, hypothetical statement by Secretary of State John Kerry, seemingly ready to give up the chemical weapons that initiated the crisis.

Will a peaceful settlement pan out, or is this too good to be true?


I think Assad will cooperate, but who will get the rebels to give up their chemical weapons?
 
Disarming is time consuming and difficult to do under the best of circumstances and requires a significant boots on the ground presence. He's in the middle of a bloody civil war right now. Of course he's not going to disarm. This is nothing more than Pres. Obama eagerly looking to kick this can far down the road and, more importantly, out of the news cycle.
 
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