SecState Hillary Clinton has gone on the record to state that, despite being a tyrannical state sponsor of terrorism whose government is ruthlessly gunning down unarmed protesters in the street, Bashar al Asad’s Syria will be free from the kind of coalition attacks that have marked our foreign policy in Libya:
“No,” Clinton said when asked on the CBS program “Face the Nation” if the U.S. would intervene in Syria’s unrest. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s security forces clashed with protesters in several cities over the weekend after his promises of freedoms and pay increases failed to prevent dissent from spreading across the country.
Clinton said the elements that led to intervention in Libya — international condemnation, an Arab League call for action, a United Nations Security Council resolution — are “not going to happen” with Syria, in part because members of the U.S. Congress from both parties say they believe Assad is “a reformer.”
That, and Syria has no oil.
Yep. I love watching ‘em dig deeper and deeper holes as they try to explain their hopelessly hosed up world view. Can not bring themselves to act in the US national interests, or admit they are doing so if forced to act.
Trying to pin down anyone in the Obama Admin to provide a straight, logical and coherent answer about Libya and our overall ME policy is like watching a greased weasel playing twister.
Dumbest. Administration. Ever. First we have the Surgeon General saying KI pills were a useful precaution against the 15 I131 atoms a Californian would get from Japan, now we have a Secretary of State who couldn’t figure out strategic ambiguity if it was spelled out in a coloring book. As for Biden… You can’t actually say anything about Biden because whenever you open your mouth all the comments try to get out at once and logjam your tounge. I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone higher ranking than the guy emptying the trash cans carried aroung a note card tha said “inhale (turn over)” on one side and “exhale (turn over)” on the other. No wonder Obama is considered brilliant. He can tie his own shoes, a mensa-level achievement for this cavalcade of window-lickers. Now if only we could get Tiger Woods to explain geopolitics we might have a chance of making it out of this alive.
“That, and Syria has no oil”.
Neither does the Sudan. Not much anyway. Military. power was brought to bear in Libya to reduce mass killings. Sudan? Not so much. The civil wr in the Darfur region claimed 400,000 lives and displaced 2,500,000 people. Staggering.
The U.S. is not equipped to be the world’s peacekeeper nor should we, but we ought not claim we’re striking Tripoli for humanitarian reasons while we did very little to prevent genocide in the Sudan.
Nobody has mentioned if we’re going to check up on that MF the Brits released, you know, the guy that pulled off Lockerbie. The one who miraculously recovered from terminal cancer. Just thought we might check up on him while we’re there. For humanitarian reasons.
I’d go for that. Send A SEAL Sniper team with a Corpsman to make sure the humanitarian thing has been done. We don’t want him to suffer terminal cancer for the next 20 years.
Flatlander and QM: Excellent point. This creatures thugs also murdered a colleague of mine 27 yrs ago, by opening fire on demonstrators outside their own `Embassy` in London, with an SMG. My brief comments can be found after the following blogpost, if you have the inclination to read up on the histrionics of the event that allowed the killers to quietly walk away from justice.
http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.com/2011/03/will-we-see-justice-for-yvonne-fletcher.html
Denial is the professional liar’s best defense. And really, every politician is a professional liar. She can’t exactly publicly admit we’re inconsistant, nor can she publicly back an intervention against Syria. There’s not a lot of alternative here. It’s like being caught with your pants down with the nanny when the wife walks in the door. Or something like that. Anyway, I’m sure Hillary has a lot of experience to draw from there…
Wait, wait–Hillary was caught doing the nanny?
Ooh, that nanny got some splainin’ to do!
But she could be vague. Something like “We will evaluate each instance individually in light of our interests and international standards, and in consultation with our allies act accordingly.”. Commits us to nothing and gives Assad something to ponder before he orders in the tanks.
A truly professional liar never denies. She never allows herself to be pinned down to a specific statement. There is always enough ambiguity that the various audiences hear what they want to hear. Look at lawyers and PR flacks.
You can retract the claws now, Liz,
Reeeer. Okay, sorry. It happens.
Let me toss something out there for consideration — it’s no secret that Lebanese Hezbollah (LH) has been on the receiving end of a variety of LRR (Long Range Rockets) and SRBMs from a couple of ME sources. One can be sure that Syrian oversight and control work to tamp down any extraneous enthusiasm of LH to exercise that capbility. *IF* Asad goes down, that condition pretty much goes out the window with one or more of a couple of COAs resulting: (a) LH gets a little happy with the LRRs (solid fuel, much easier to hide and fire than the SRBMs)and Israel responds by invading southern Lebanon to remove the threat – mixing IAF and IGF in with the international NFZ would be — problematic at best; or COA(b) Israel doesn’t wait for LH and goes all out in a preemptive strike with attendant difficulties previously noted.
And for those who think LH wouldn’t let loose with those weapons, I refer you to the 2006 strike on INS Hanit with an ASCM – lots of folks didn’t think (a) a terrorist org would have that capability, much less (b) employ it against the Israelies…
w/r, SJS
Not only that, SJS., but throw Egypt into the mix with the peace-treaty continued observance being HIGHLY problematic, and we could be looking at another region-wide war not too far down the road. To say that once the missiles start flying that “these things tend to get out of hand” is an understatement..
Alternatively, we would have a free hand to take out all those anti-shipping missiles. The ones that actually threatened us, unlike, say, Libyan SA-2s.
Gotta find them first — no easy task as they are mobile and (as was the case with the Hanit) can be fired from non-traditional platforms.
Hmmmmm. And Israel just started deployment of their Iron Dome system.
Coincidence, I’m sure.
…or not…
If a coalition were to deploy against Syria probably Assad’s first action will be to attack Israel and create a regional conflict. Same strategy as Saddam tried during the Gulf War, except it will work. Syria has enough firepower, close enough to provide an existential threat to Israel and Israel will need to respond in kind.
Any foreign attack that treatens the Assad regime will result in a war where Israel bombs and then invades Syria.
“…an Arab League call for action…”
This condition may be difficult to obtain.
no no.
while we’re in the middle of it can we bomb the entire city of Damascus flat? I find that I despise them as much as they do us and that all of them do.
Let’s do the western thing on them….no no silly, no knight crusaders, lets just deport them to hell with airpower.
“And now, for something completely different…”