Syria and the UN "responsibility to protect"

[cali]

In 1982- the last time there was a popular uprising in Syria, 17,000+ people were killed by government forces. We don't know how many people have been killed in the current protests but bodies are turning up riddled with bullets at hospital morgues. Yesterday Syrian troops opened fire on peaceful protesters outside a Mosque. A prominent doctor who came to help those who were wounded was shot and killed.

No, I'm not advocating that the U.S. intervene. I'm simply pointing out that the Syrian gov't is as repressive and determined to quell opposition as the gov't of Khadafi. Yet, the administration response to the killing in Syria has been muted. No one speaks of stopping the killing of protesters there.

So again, why Libya? What makes it a special case?

[kenny blankenship]

1. Go ahead attack Syria. No civil war there, no threats of mass reprisal killings on whole cities

no split in the Syrian military, not even mass demonstrations in the capital yet, but go ahead with your contrived comparison and launch your attack on Syria...see what then happens to Israel, to Lebanon - and then to the people Syria at the hands of the Israelis.

You're a real humanitarian.

[cali]

2. I suggest you try reading for comprehension.

it's clear you haven't mastered that ever so modest skill. how very sad, my dear friend.

Let me lay it out in the simplest of terms (although it was quite clear in the OP) I am against any military action against Syria. Let me repeat that for your benefit: I am against any military intervention against Syria. I was against it in Libya. I'm pointing out the problems with the U.N. doctrine.

[kenny blankenship]

3. No civil war in Syria yet. No threats by the regime to lay waste to whole cities.

No split in the Syrian military leading to the presumption of imminent civil war and the threat of mass slaughter. All those conditions exist in Lybia but do not yet exist in Syria. There aren't even mass demonstrations in the capital of Syria as yet. The UN resolution concerning Lybia was not prompted by a bloody riot in one town, but the stated intention of a heavily armed regime, in the context of civil war, to take revenge on the civilian population and to punish them collectively for the insurrection.