I ask again: If you intervene in Syria, what are you EXACTLY proposing?

[Are_grits_groceries]

I keep reading more general hooha about taking it to Assad and Syria.
Stop the the platitudes and list the steps.
Who gets attacked?
How and when?
What groups are you helping and what are the consequences of aiding them?
I want your ideas on plans, the endgame, and dealing with the aftermath.
What are the plans for the refugees?

I am horrified by the gassing and the atrocities.
I just do not see a plan that will not make the situation worse.
We have no real idea about all of the different groups and who is dealing with who.
Who has what weapons?
And DON'T tell me the CIA knows. They have been up to no good forever. The CIA is interested in perpetuating the CIA.

Previous post that some Wistful Warriors haven't addressed.

What are the immediate steps you would take?
Where and with what components?
What groups are you helping? What happens when you leave?

I have no idea what to do in Syria? It is a mixed up hot mess.

Believe me.I want to stop the gas attacks and help. How?
It's brass tacks time. No general 'boots on the ground' shite or 'we must act to defend freedom'.
There has to be a specific plan with an endgame in mind or we are into one more bog of war.

The curve we should have been ahead of is waaaay behind us. Even at that point, getting ahead of that curve was problematic.

It's an effing tangle of a hot mess that makes the Gordian Knot look like granny tied it.

[LearningCurve]

1. Anything to knock the NSA scandal off the news

Targets don't need to be any more specific than that.

[alcibiades_mystery]

2. Good questions

[elleng]

3. Wesley Clark discusses.

&feature=youtu.be

[eridani]

4. The rebels say "Christians to Beirut and Alawites to the grave"

Are we supposed to be in the side of ethnically cleansing one group of Syrians and executing another? This is better than Assad how, exactly.

[liberal_at_heart]

5. That right there is one of the biggest problems. Iraq, Afghanistan, now Syria. No one knows

what the objective or strategy for obtaining that objective are. We keep hoping if we just throw enough bullets and bombs at people it will magically make things better.

[ladyVet]

42. That's not true.

No one knows what the objective or strategy for obtaining that objective are.

Of course we do: the objective is to make more money from war, and the strategy is to keep making war.

We keep hoping if we just throw enough bullets and bombs at people it will magically make things better.

No, "we" keep hoping we don't get pushed into these stupid wars, while our government ignores us and keeps throwing bombs and bullets at people. It's magical how that increases profits for the war-monger corporations, and the government officials that they control.

[Luminous Animal]

6. WE WILL BRING THE ASSAD REGIME TO ITS KNEES. THE PEOPLE WILL SHOWER US WITH FLOWERS

AFTER SODOMIZING ASSAD WITH A BAYONET A VICTORY FOR DEMOCRACY WILL BE DECLARED.

And then the new govt. will show its appreciation with oil, gas, and mineral contracts.

[dkf]

7. Lol!

[delrem]

10. not funny. very disturbingly *real*.

[gordianot]

8. Just a few generations ago our ancestors thought the Balkans was a mess.

Assassinations, atrocities, brush wars, World Wars, genocide, riots, radical movements, unresolvable conflict, and common chaos. We have not seen anything yet. Oh for the good old days.

Thanks for the reference "Gordianot"

[Recursion]

23. Niall Ferguson, of all people, said it best about the Balkans

"The Balkans were often described as a powderkeg, but this is mistaken. Western Europe was the powderkeg; the Balkans were the fuse."

[defacto7]

9. Win or Lose... we loose.

We must neither win nor loose. The only logical purely mathematical action would be to play a stalemate and let it grind down on it's own. If the government is winning, support the rebels. If the rebels are moving ahead, stop support for them. Create a stalemate.

It is not what I wish nor advocate, but there is a time when you are totally screwed no matter what you do that you have to look at the numbers. If Assad wins, we are screwed. If the rebels win, Al Qaeda will wipe out the better of the rebels and we will be screwed. We have no win or loose choices which is our own doing.

The other choice is to stay out. In that case, we are screwed but at least on the side of peace.

[Warpy]

11. We don't know for certain who did the attacks

or what agent was used. I have a lot of questions about videos I've seen posted that showed people on their backs being flushed with water and coming around. I don't know of any agent that would do that. If you lose consciousness, you're gone. People who are shot, drugged or gassed into unconsciousness generally fall forward as they crumple down to the ground, not backward.

In other words, I'm skeptical of the videos, although a gas attack could very likely have occurred.

We just have no clear idea who would do it at this point. That's what kind of mess that country is. It's more a donnybrook with everybody fighting everybody else than an organized revolution.

Putin is right about this one. No matter how this stuff tugs at heart strings, we need to stay out. It's the hardest thing in the world but without a clear purpose and a very limited presence, we'd just be getting into a war we have no hope of paying for or winning in a country whose people don't want us there.

[Granny M]

14. Wondered about that too.

I heard a Doctors Without Borders person in Ireland talking on the radio yesterday. Said that several of the medical people treating the injured had fallen ill, and one doctor has died. If it's that toxic, how can you just wash somebody off? I really don't know enough about this to be sure what is happening.

[Warpy]

31. I concluded the video was rubbish

but that doesn't mean there wasn't an attack.

You do flush the area with water before you proceed into it. You want to dilute any residue down as far as possible. That part was accurate. However, people don't start moving when you do. If they're down, they're likely dead.

[joshcryer]

12. Let Russia decide.

All Obama has to do is make it clear, abundantly clear, that he won't act without the UN.

Then he can wipe his hands of the situation and wait to see what happens.

And Russia gets culpability forward, rather than everyone looking to the US to do something.

[redgreenandblue]

16. I agree. nt

[LuvNewcastle]

17. That's what I'd prefer, but I don't think that things are

going to go down like that. I just watched the all night news and they said that Britain, France, and Turkey have signed on to back the U.S., so it looks to me like it's going to be a NATO mission. I don't like it.

[Comrade Grumpy]

32. The UN? We don't need no stinking UN.

That appears to be the administration's position. Although going through the UN would be the way to go.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

13. My plan? Let the weapons inspectors do their job. If chemical weapons were used without orders,...

....and if they were Assad's own weapons and Assad claims he didn't order them used then he has to admit he isn't in control of them and he needs to regain control or lose them.

They will be disposed of the way they were eliminated in Iraq in the early 90s. By the UN Inspectors who are experts in doing it safely.

Well,...that's MY plan anyway.

You asked.

[Granny M]

15. Now stop talking sense.

You'll just mess up the propaganda.

[Alkene]

18. "Let the weapons inspectors do their job."

That sounds strangely familiar.

And far too rational to be compatible with the U.S. foreign policy.

[DeSwiss]

19. They are proposing to blow some shit up.

Blowing shit up is what is done in war.

People get killed.

Children die.

Buildings are destroyed.

And lives are torn-apart.

And then Congress passes some legislation making the American taxpayer's replace everything they blew-up and for some more ammo and new killing machines, so that they can reload for the next one. They hire ''contractors'' who bring in cheap foreign labor to skirt American laws, and they build the victims some new roads, some schools and some hospitals as an ''I'm sorry, my bad'' and then we move on to the next one.

That's what they're proposing because that's what we do now.

- It's pretty much the only thing we do......

K&R

“The primary aim of modern warfare is to use up the products of the machine without raising the general standard of living.”

~George Orwell, 1984

[LuvNewcastle]

21. You're right, it's pretty much the only thing we do.

This whole damn country is built around war, and it's bleeding us to death, too.

[morningfog]

26. There is always plenty of money for more war!

[cali]

20. some people never learn.

It disgusts me to see people advocating for military intervention in Syria. Stop genocide there? Hah. It won't stop it and could make it even worse- as well as the potential to spread the conflagration.

fuck the war advocates.

[Recursion]

22. I oppose intervention, but I can think of three mission templates

1. Partition a la Bosnia. Has the general rubric of "peacekeeping" and "regional stability". Roughly, put troops in the Euphrates valley and around Aleppo to keep the Kurds, Sunnis, and Shi'ites/Allawites away from each other (more or less).

2. Bomb the fuck out of Damascus, Latakia, and Hasakah until the government collapses

3. Just concentrate on Hasakah, drive the government out of there, and incorporate this area into the unofficial Kurdistan we're building in Iraq

The "rebels" and Kurds (who are also "rebels", and also Sunnis for that matter) don't really care much about each other (yet) so we wouldn't need to do much about those two prongs of this war.

None of these are good ideas, but it's better to actually have a plan than not, even for an ill-advised war.

[pampango]

24. One tactic I saw would be to crater all the Syrian air forces runways.

The Syrian Air Force (SAF) currently conducts three missions on an ongoing basis that result in regime forces having a significant strategic advantage over rebel forces. Those missions are:

• Receiving aerial resupply of weapons, ammunition, and other supplies from Iran and Russia
• Conducting aerial resupply of Syrian Arab Army (SAA) units deployed against rebel forces
• Conducting area bombing of rebel held territory

Syrian Air Force and Air Defense
Total airfields in syria: There are approximately 27 airbases in Syria capable of supporting at least one of the SAF’s primary missions.

Current status: The 27 airbases are identified by the following categories:

• Primary airbases under regime control, currently supporting SAF operations (6) May 2013
• Secondary airbases under regime control not currently supporting operations (12)*
• Airbases in contested territory / under siege, not available to the regime for operations (5)
• Airbases in rebel controlled territory (4)

Purpose and Assumptions
Purpose: Identify US weapon types and sortie counts required substantially to degrade the ability Syrian Air Force and Air Defense
of the Syrian Air Force (SAF) to conduct three primary missions.

Assumptions:
• Complete destruction of SAF or supporting infrastructure (runways, control towers, fuel depots) is not required as long as SAF ability to conduct its missions is degraded
• No intent to establish a full No Fly Zone (NFZ)
• No requirement to completely eliminate the Syrian Integrated Air Defense System (IADS)
• No requirement to degrade Syrian rotary wing (helicopter) forces

http://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/RequiredSorties-to-DegradeSyrianAirPower.pdf

The goal of this would be to ground Syria's jets by destroying the runways they use. It would not destroy the jets themselves, would not affect the use of helicopters by the government and would not target the air defense system. It does not contemplate a No Fly Zone but would require future attacks to keep the runways disabled.

Who knows what the real plan is. I saw this posted at the Guardian's website.

[PowerToThePeople]

25. This thread is mysteriously missing the pro-war chickenhawks. n/t

[LuvNewcastle]

28. I think they're waiting for it to start. Then the cheerleading will commence.

[Are_grits_groceries]

29. That's why I asked one more time.

If they can beat the drums of war, they can lay out the plans for it.

[morningfog]

27. These are the questions that must be asked. They won't be answered by the

people who make the call and pull the trigger, but they must be asked and asked louder and louder to rise above sound of the approaching war drums.

We are heading down the inevitable path to another unnecessary, ill defined war.

[Scuba]

30. I recommend we send food and medicine, hand delivered by all the chickenhawks in Congress.

[Puzzledtraveller]

34. and DU war-drum beaters?

Say yes, say yes!!

[Scuba]

36. Especially.

[Puzzledtraveller]

33. Regimen change

Not to be confused with regime change.

[Capt. Obvious]

35. Spoken like a typical Peace Purist

[maxsolomon]

37. I ask instead: what would YOU do? Nothing?

This is the first documented (lets give Obama/Kerry the benefit of the doubt at this point) use of chemical weapons on a civilian population since Saddam Hussein's use on the Kurds.

Aside from concentration camps, chemical weapons weren't used by the Nazis in combat or on civilians in WW2. This is a BFD.

Assad's regime has painted Obama/NATO/the UN into a corner. If they don't respond, the CWC means nothing.

[IronLionZion]

38. Find out who did it and where they are storing it

then targeted missile strikes.

The actions in Libya could serve as a good approach.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

39. As in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, good "tough on...(name the bogeyman) PR is the goal.

[KamaAina]

40. I hadn't even thought about the refugees

what jaw-dropping irony it would be if they fled to Iraq.

[Are_grits_groceries]

41. They have already been fleeing there. nt