Posted on 09/02/2013 1:57:25 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
There are no good guys to support. You will harm the USA regardless of who you bomb. The only winning move is not to play.
This is very obvious from the many attempts of various forces (not just Syrian ones) to drag the USA into that war. It will result in wear of equipment, loss of expensive ordnance and fuel. As it happens in large scale operations, some US soldiers will be harmed or killed, just because a container falls here, or bad food is eaten there. It will also further demonize the USA in the eyes of Muslims - who, instead of killing each other, will now have a common enemy that, after Iraq and Afghanistan, they started to forget about. Well, they will get a fresh reminder who the Great Satan is.
What will you get in return for all that trouble? Here is the complete list: [ ]
Yes, you get nothing in return for the US treasure that you expended to kill random people on the other side of the planet. It's like walking into a ghetto and starting to hit people left and right while shouting your name and address; then returning home, to your family.
The only US person who gains an advantage from the attack would be Obama. I didn't know that he is so much adored here that people are willing to pay for his war, and to kill Syrians for his political causes.
It would be quite humiliating to be willingly exploited by your enemies. A simple rule of thumb says this: if your enemy sets you up to do something, do the opposite.
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No. Best strategy is to make a plan that will give us the ability to outflank our enemy.
It will also further demonize the USA in the eyes of Muslims
This is the old "why do they hate us" argument. Sure let's not do anything to piss off the muslims. Heaven forbid.
if your enemy sets you up to do something, do the opposite.
The USA's most dangerous and deadly enemies in the world are Russia, China, and Iran.
What’s his FR nick? Paleokhan?
Thanks Tailgunner Joe.
They have their reasons, however right or wrong those reasons are. But why to give them even more reasons? They will use them for recruiting. I'd at least understand if that would buy us something in return. But this proposed strike is pointless, however you look at it. What would be the purpose of it, other than to be a checkmark on Obama's resume? What is to be achieved? Can it be achieved? At what cost? Those are important questions; one shall not dive, head first, into another Gulf of Tonkin. US citizens have no dog in that fight.
You can also think about it this way. Enemy soldiers fight you because they want you dead. Why to increase hostility toward yourself? There is a real life example to review. When the Nazis crossed the border of USSR in 1941 and started their march through Ukraine and Belarus, many locals were accepting Germans without much fight, as they had no love toward Red Kommissars. Nazis, if they were smart, could have used it to their advantage. But no, Nazi soldiers were so much brainwashed by racist propaganda, they just had to burn and kill and rape and pillage - and thus Partizanen were born. Not out of love for Communism, but out of need to survive. Later on Germans would have given half of their Reich to get rid of guerillas; all that pain was self-inflicted, just because some soldiers two years ago felt the need to abuse the Untermenshen. Sometimes just one more straw can exceed the threshold and break the back of a proverbial camel. A wise leader will not exacerbate the situation; not without a very good reason.
The USA's most dangerous and deadly enemies in the world are Russia, China, and Iran.
Do you really expect Russian or Chinese nukes to explode over US cities any time soon? Why would anyone do that? There is no reason for them to attack, much less destroy, the USA. (Not that such an attack would be successful.) The Cold War is over, we left it in the last century. Those countries, just like all other, have interests that may differ from US's interests - but so what, US's interests differ from theirs too!
Assorted terrorists, on the other hand, represent higher danger because they cannot be adequately monitored. You cannot threaten a terrorist group, you cannot destroy it, and you cannot negotiate with it. Quite a few books about the near future depict widespread acts of terrorism - because terrorism is simple, and because it works against a weak, liberal society that is afraid that someone, somewhere, will be hurt.
But foreign terrorists are mere babies, on the danger scale, when compared to internal problems that are growing within the USA. This is where the worst future problems come from. This country will not be destroyed by outside forces. However internal tensions are likely, and they happened before. Ten Syrias would be still less important than one Detroit, or one Chicago, or any other "troubled" city of your choice.
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