US going to war in Syria???

[Melensdad]

I've been following this for quite a while. It looks like the US might be setting the stage for invading Syria. Its just a push north from Iraq to cross the border to take out Syria. Syria is fairly well established as a terrorist supporting state.

So Pres. Bush is handing the problem over to the United Nations. I suspect the UN will hem and haw over this for 6 months to a year, doing their normal hand wringing, followed by blame shifting and ultimately it will lead to demonizing of the USA. At which point the US will be stirred into a frenzy and go to war (without UN backing, again) ??????

See this news story from today: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051021/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_syria

 

[bczoom]

So Pres. Bush is handing the problem over to the United Nations. I suspect the UN will hem and haw over this for 6 months to a year, doing their normal hand wringing, followed by blame shifting and ultimately it will lead to demonizing of the USA. At which point the US will be stirred into a frenzy and go to war

That's the part I don't understand. It was a UN investigation who's results were given to the President. GW commented and turned it back over to them. Like you said, the UN will do their thing (whatever that is...) for months and then probably not do anything other than say we're bullies for wanting to get the issue addressed/resolved.

 

[OkeeDon]

So, Bob, just out of curiosity, how do you feel about that? Good move or bad? Right or wrong thing to do? Responsible or not? Would you vote again for this administration, or do you still believe that anything this administration does, no matter how stupid or how many peope are killed, is better than what Kerry would have done?

 

[Melensdad]

I think this administration, which I held my nose and voted for, is still the better choice given that Kerry is, in my opinion, a disingenous liberal who pretends to be so much that he is not. That said, and that having very little to do with the real question at hand, I think that going into Syria now would be a mistake. I never supported invading Iraq. I fully supported invading Afghanistan. I probably would fully support invading Syria.

 

[bczoom]

I never supported invading Iraq..... I probably would fully support invading Syria.

Why are you OK with Syria but not Iraq?

 

[frank_f15]

I don't see the US going into Syria or anyplace else for that matter, we don't have the men or the material to engage in another front. Iraq was Big mistake, and Syria at this point would be a bigger folley, hey but with the COWBOY you never know.

 

[bczoom]

I guess my big question is what would be our plans/intent if we went into Syria? If it's just to get even for the assassination, that would take about 4 Navy Seals and we'd be done.

 

[Melensdad]

Frank, I totally agree that we could not go into Syria now. "NOW" being the key word. One or 2 years on, we should be in a much better position. That said, Syria is small, its army is inconsequential, so from the conquest standpoint we could take them out far faster than we dominated Sadam's army.

Syria, however, a hotbed for terrorist activity. That is not even open for debate, it is known and beleived by all rational nations. Compared to Iraq, where we had questionable evidence, any question suggesting that Syria is NOT supporting major terrorist activity, fostering it, helping to develop attacks, etc is simply not supportable. Syria is undoubtably a terrorist state, it controls Jordan, despite the pullout of the Syrian army, it still has secret police running much of Jordan. Under some conditions where we essentially prove in a world forum that Syria is resposible for supporting this activity, then I would support a full assault on that nation. When Hafasd Al Assad died, his son took over, basically kept his dad's cronies in power and added his own thugs to the mix.

We would encounter substantial insurgent resistance after the fact.

 

[dzalphakilo]

Let's not confuse "war" with "police state".

We won the "war" in Iraq, it's the "policing" (sp?) that we (or ANY other military) has issues with.

Any country in the mideast will be a "hotbed" for conventional military forces of the United Sates. That is a given.

We can win any "war" in the mideast, the question is can we stay there? The answer is no.

Amercians in general have no "clue" about other cultures.

 

[Melensdad]

Let's not confuse "war" with "police state".

We won the "war" in Iraq, it's the "policing" (sp?) that we (or ANY other military) has issues with.

Any country in the mideast will be a "hotbed" for conventional military forces of the United Sates. That is a given.

We can win any "war" in the mideast, the question is can we stay there? The answer is no.

Amercians in general have no "clue" about other cultures.

Ah the beauty of a small outlaw nation like Syria is that the military could go in and do what it does best. Kill people and break things. But we could leave Assad in power, just in a dramatically weakened state.

The miltary could literally leave after they bust up the nation like a bull in a china shop. Much like we did in Iraq under G.H.W.Bush. Assad would be left to deal with the mess, we'd be all around it with trade sanctions making their lives miserable.

Now we would not make any new friends doing that, and it would be a pretty good way of creating more recruits to try to attack us. But, and this is the but, if we lay out plenty of evidence, actual and substantial evidence, and if we build a coalition like G.H.W.Bush did, then it would be a doable thing. Militarily we could do it next week. We have more than enough capacity to take out Syria even with one foot in Afghanistan and another in Iraq and our diplomatic hands full with the UN mess, Korea, etc. The major dipolmatic work will take over 1 year to lay out all the evidence, go through the UN quagmire, and then build the coalition. But building a coalition against Syria would be much easier than we faced when the small coalition was barely scraped together by G.W. Bush for the Iraq 2 invasion.

 

[dzalphakilo]

Bob, I agree 100% with your last sentence (sp?).

By the way, I need to learn how to use these dang funtions such as copying from one post to another.

But, we are already in Iraq and honestly it does not seem like we are accomplishing anything at this point. I said at this point. We did accomplish somthing when we started "this thing", but as of now I don't know.

We can "stay the course" there, but we've become a police force with civilians in the way, and the longer this goes on, the worse it will be for our military. Thats why they call it guerrilla war.

Just think that perhaps we need to change our "gameplan" in Iraq. This does not mean leave.

Seems to me that Korea has the WMD

Lets not get on the U.N.

 

[Cityboy]

I am sick and tired of screwing around with these raghead muslim extremist nations that hate us. Why waste another American life on this scum? We have nuclear weapons, lets use them. You sponsor terrorism, we strike your ass with a nuke. You want to survive, knock off the bullshit. End of story. Innocent civilian deaths? Though shit. You think they care about our civilian casualties? The only thing these morons understand is brute force. I say we nuke 'em and be done with it. A billion muslims are not worth the life of one American soldier.

 

[dzalphakilo]

I don't think you want to use nuclear (sp?) weapons unless you're prepared to face the ramifications. Honestly, Iraq is not worth that decision (sp?).

We put ourselves in our current position in Iraq (for better or worse) and "nuking" them is (I hope) not an option.

The military is not a police force, and that's what we've become.

 

[Cityboy]

We nuke these morons and they're going to.....do what about it? Not a damn thing other than what they are already trying to do. It's our pussified response to terrorism that allows these muslim idiots to operate in the first place.

Let me put it to you this way:

If someone kicks down the door to your home in the middle of the night with the intent to harm you or your family, do you negotiate with them? Shoot to wound? Or do you ensure they exit your property bound for the morgue? Anyone breaking into my home while I'm there will experience the business end of my Mossberg's 3" magnum "00" buckshot to their face, neck and chest region. They will get no second chance.

Same thing with muslim terrorists.

What would China do? Talk a lot of smack, but ultimately not a damn thing.

Russia? Same thing.

North Korea? Their assholes will pucker to the max and they will change their attitude because they know they will be smoked next if they don't.

Let's nuke 'em and be done with it.

 

[Viking]

I agree with Cityboy. Nuclear weapons should be an option and should be used. Japan surrendered after nuclear weapons where used on them. I suggest part of Syria is nuked to set an example. If terrorism does not stop nuke another city in Syria or Iraq or Iran for that matter. Keep using tactical nuclear weapons until the governments or populace of these rogue, terrorist supporting states kills the terrorists themselves or hands them over to US troops. For every car bombing, beheading, blown up building, any terror attack anywhere there is a swift and devastating nuclear response. And if France or Russia or China or anyone else doesn't like it, that's too bad.

The terrorism will stop.

 

[OkeeDon]

Whew, for a moment there, I thought you guys were serious. Wait. You were just venting, weren't you? I mean, you can't be serious? You were? Oh, God, I don't know where I can duck.

Cityboy, let's look at your example of the crooks breaking in your house. Your solution is to blow them away (providing they don't blow you away first, if they see you with a gun). But, if I understand your example, you then want to go to the crooks house and shoot his wife, his kids, his parents, his brothers and sisters, their families, their friends, and anybody else who happens to be in the neighborhood. If there are any good guys there, sorry, tough, you're going to blow them away, too. Then, tilt up your barrel, blow off the smoke, hitch up your pants and swagger away -- and not expect to get shot in the back.

Are you nuts?

 

[Cityboy]

Don,

We are talking about muslim fanatics that want to kill you, your children and grandchildren. We are talking about a religion who has yet to condemn one terrorist beheading or other act of murder. These people cannot be negotiated with or reasoned with. If we just be nice to them, they will kill us anyway. I think you understand that. You are simply taking issue with the manner in which they should be dealt with. Nukes are devastating and hard for many to swallow. Well, another 9/11 is even harder for me to swallow, as was the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut where I lost hundreds of Brothers-in-arms and a couple of good friends. I take this personally and would suffer not one soul of a religion who preaches that my family should be murdered in the name of allah (lower case intentional) to live. If they stay to themselves and practice their "peaceful" religion, fine. But come here and call us infidels and murder us in the name of your god, then its time to unleash any means necessary to crush this insanity, including the nukes.

 

[Melensdad]

Well, another 9/11 is even harder for me to swallow, as was the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut where I lost hundreds of Brothers-in-arms and a couple of good friends.

Let's not forget the attacks on the Cole, or Somalia, or Mogadishu, or for that matter the FIRST ATTEMPTED attack on the World Trade Center that failed, or the countless others we don't know about. Then again the same quasi-religious group can be blamed for the Bali attack, the London Subway, and many others.

While I am not a fan of the nuclear weapons option, I do support the concept of massive destruction.

While I think Don did a good job of laying out the level of retribution that a nuclear attack will cause, I think he also missed a very large point. That is that in many cases the nieces, nephews, cousins, neighbors, etc allow for terrorists to exist in their communities via both tacit consent and laisse faire actions, in addition to offering them shelter and support. And in many ways that makes them guilty. When a government, or even a community allows for these terrortists to openly work in their nations to set up terrorist camps, to recruit, to preach murder & hatred, then those nations and communities are at very least culpable in the actions of the groups that they allow to continue within their communities. Further, these groups are often supported by the governements and the governments are often interwoven into the fabric of these groups. Therefore, to claim that the aunts and uncles and neighbors and nieces & nephews are innocent is a dramatic overstatement of reality. Afghanistan, the Taliban, and al Quadia (sp?) is an excellent example of how the nation, the government and the terrorists were all essentially one-and-the-same. Syria is a very similar situation.

But one point Don makes that I agree with is that some of the neighbors, sisters, parents, children are true innocents. And I'd suggest that because of that reality, a nuclear option is not the preferred answer. An overwhelming military invasion is the answer, just as we did in Afghanistan. I still don't buy the logic for Iraq, but that was a classic case of a proper military response. I'd suggest that we use that same type of force in Syria should the need arise. I'd also suggest that while I am still a very strong supporter of our men & women in Iraq, that I don't understand why we went in and why we are there.

 

[LarryRB]

A very good friend of mine, retired Colonel last year at this time, was the head of the DIA... Like all before him, a three year study and report, (same as a doctoral dissertation) was required by him prior to retirement... His dissertation centered on Saudi Arabia. His in depth 55 year historical study, suggests that Saudi Arabia is still the biggest problem of all, especially when considering all of that whole area.. As you know, they claim to be our allies. This is only true if it is to save their own asses.... His report is quite the opposite including the millions upon milliions the Saudi's spent in Arafat only to see Arafat pocket most, hidden in Paris, and the remainder to attack Israel and America, through various means. Syria is a minor problem also, However, like my friends report shows,,, it was Saudi who sent their cronies over 50 years ago to these various surrounding countries and with Saudi's endless cash, has exacerbated and continues to,,, the vast majority of these problems...

 

[Melensdad]

Larry, absolutely no question in my mind that dealing with the Saudis is a questionable thing. There is plenty of evidence to support the claims that they fund (via private donations from members of the most influential families) terrorist groups, fundamentalist training "schools" and other nasty things that are hostile toward the US. But we need their oil and they need our money so we both seem to hold our noses and do business with each other. It is not sustainable for the long term, but no question it can go on for decades longer with a cloak of semi-legitimacy.

 

[Cityboy]

Call it armchair quarterbacking if you wish, but overwhelming ordnance gets the point across and all our buddies would still be alive if we quit giving a shit what the rest of the world thinks about us and take care of business. I have no idea what you experienced, nor you I. But I have to ask: How's it going so far? We keep playing ****-**** on the ground and our guys are the best in the world at it, but goddamnit, there is a better way.

Saudi Arabia and its terrorist funding government need a good taste of radiation too. Don't like my opinion? Tough shit. These assholes would have no money to fund their bullshit fanactical muslim terrorists without us, but they take our oil money and fund our enemies who kill our people on the ground. Yeah, OK, some muslim saved a SEAL. There are exceptions to every rule, but the fact remains that mainstream islam has yet to take a stand against religous murder in the name of their god. Until we do what we must do to end this insanity the silver boxes will keep coming home and it will only be a matter of time before one of those "peaceful" muslims detonates a nuke right here on American soil in a city near you.

 

[nofanobush]

Hey, you guys had better back off Saudi Arabia or you might be getting a visit from Big Brother. The royal families own our white house, lock stock and barrel. Scrub Bush and chubby Cheney can't fart without getting their permission.

 

[Melensdad]

Hey, you guys had better back off Saudi Arabia or you might be getting a visit from Big Brother. The royal families own our white house, lock stock and barrel. Scrub Bush and chubby Cheney can't fart without getting their permission.

First, welcome to the forum.

But honestly I don't know what to make of your post. It would be pretty hard to refute that Saudi Arabia (or more correctly factions within the leading families) doesn't fund a good chunk of questionable (terrorist) activity. There is also little debate about Syria's role. While someone may, or may not be able to fart, might be in question, the real question is will we invade Syria?

 

[nixon]

Nofan.. Could You expand on that a bit ? While I'm no big fan of Bush ,or any politician for that matter ,I just don't seem to be able to make a connection betweem the White House and Saudi Arabia . TIA, John

 

[loki2]

Turn the whole place into Glass and make it the 51st state!

 

[loki2]

OH yeah, send the Sierra Club over there to do an impact study, about one day before we toast it.

 

[OkeeDon]

Here's the sad part about some of the comments I've been reading. If you really were in a position of responsibility instead of just being blowhards, and the ramifications of what you're suggesting were explained to you, there is no way in hell you would do what you suggest. But, because all you're doing is spouting off, you can make the most outrageous suggestions that would probably be the worst thing we could ever do, and get away with it.

What's wrong with that? Well, other people hear you. Some of them are too dumb to realize that you're just venting, and will actually believe that this is a possible action to take. Many of these people actually have the right to vote. So, they vote for some cowboy who gets them into stupid wars where they haven't thought things through and before you know it, 2000 Americans are dead and nothing has changed.

This upsets me more than you could ever conceive.

Talk is cheap, but the results can really cost.



By the way, it won't be long until George has killed more Americans than Bin Laden...

 

[Melensdad]

Just to try to get back on track we have a potentially serious issue being pushed forward with Syria. We do have a lot of bravado being spouted out, but we also have some confusion of the facts intermixed with all of this.

Syria is not like Iraq.

Syria is very much like Afghanistan.

We are making a difference in Afghanistan and that is a country that was nothing short of true evil that is now a nation with its own legs. Yes we provide the braces to keep those legs from wobbling. Yes we are going to be there for a long time to support it. But it has a very good chance of becoming a responsible world citizen-nation.

Let us not confuse the Syria situation and in any way relate it to the Iraqi situation, these are quite different in what their positions are in terms of world wide terror, in terms of world wide evidence, and in terms of nations who support or don't support Syria. Syria has far fewer friends that Iraq, and they have few friends for a very good reason, they are a true outlaw nation that is one of the strongest, if not the strongest, supporter of international terrorism.

 

[OkeeDon]

Everything you say about Syria is true, and makes me wonder why we picked Iraq in the first place (Oil? GB's Daddy? Who knows?). Regarding Afghanistan, our early efforts had my full support. Some of the reports I've been reading (sporadically) currently are mixed. I hope we don't screw up; the reason why the Taliban had control of Afghanistan in the first place is because we abandoned the place after we helped them beat the Soviets.

But, back to Syria. What specifically have they done to us, and what is the specific threat they pose? I understand all about the training and support of terrorists; what I want to know is exactly what can we point to as harm to the United States as a direct result of Syrian involvement? In other words, what precisely will change if we take the Syrians out? What is the direct benefit to us?

I'm not saying there is no benefit; I'm asking if there is one. I don't follow it as closely as you, but I can't point to any specific thing and say, "If we take out Syria, this won't happen."

I cannot support any preemptive action unless the threat can be specifically identified. Saying, "No more 9/11's" is not good enough; exactly what involvement with 9/11 did the Syrians have; how many more have there been since then; what have the Syrians done to us recently; what are the chances they could be directly responsible for something, enough to justify going to war with them?

Saying their support for terrorism is enough doesn't float my boat; there are too many other countries who do the same thing, where do we stop?

Look; let's be realistic about all this. We have been attacked twice by the same folks; we have pretty much identified Osama Bin Laden and Al Queda. I support all efforts to reduce their existence. If you can prove that going to war with Syria will help that reduction, I'll support it. But, as you pointed out, it's likely that adding Syria to our hit list will increase recruitment of terrorist candidates and increase the chances that terrorists will attack us again.

That doesn't sound like a winning strategy to me. I support containment and close observation. That was the main reason I was against preemptive war with Iraq; we had them covered like a glove. There was nothing Saddam could do without us knowing. They had no involvement in 9/11, and they could not do us any harm without giving us warning. We get absolutely nothing for our actions in Iraq and the sacrifice of our brave kids.

We had better be sure we would get more results from a Syrian action before we do it.

 

[bczoom]

Here's the sad part about some of the comments I've been reading....

...instead of just being blowhards...

But, because all you're doing is spouting off, you can make the most outrageous suggestions...

OK Don, you set all this up.

By the way, it won't be long until George has killed more Americans than Bin Laden...

Then you say this????
The word hypocrisy comes to mind BIG TIME! GW killed our Americans? Come on now Don...