The Least Bad Option

Thanks to my man @dwaghalter for helping transform ramblings into an essay

Here's the big picture about Syria:  neither the Obama Administration nor Congressional leaders have defined a geopolitical outcome that promotes US national security interests. 

So I'll just do it.

First to recap:  all we hear about is what we don't want:

1.  We don't want more atrocities from Assad against the Syrian people

2.  We don't want other rogue states to get the message that they can use WMD

3.   We don't want Syria to become an al-Qaida base

4.  We don't want Syria to become (remain) an instrument for Iranian hostility 

5.  We don't want to get mixed up in a Sunni-Shia ethnic conflict

6.  We don't want a costly new Middle Eastern war as measured both in economic terms and in the sacrifices of American military families

All of these are legitimate things to want to avoid.  However just like I tell my daughters, you can't always have everything you want.  Sometimes you can only have some of what you want.  And the corollary:  sometimes we have to change our plan.

With all due respect to President Obama's longstanding policies, the fragile status of the American economy and our love and concern for our military families, the right answer in Syria is military intervention, because it is the only way to shape a political outcome that promotes US national security interests.  And as Colin Powell said when referencing Vietnam in preparing for Desert Storm:  from now on when we go, we go all the way, to the end, with full political and material commitment to the armed forces that's needed to accomplish the mission.  I'll outline the military concept in a subsequent post, but rest assured it puts much of the heavy lifting on Arab and other regional allies.

Let's get this out of the way - don't fight the last war again:  The neocons were wrong about going to war in Iraq. They were wrong to cite unreliable evidence of WMD as justification, and they were wrong to connect Saddam to 9/11.  Those mistakes/misrepresentations are over and done with.  

This is a new chapter with new circumstances, and Obama is wrong to let the Iraq experience dictate or limit our actions in Syria.  They say that generals often make the mistake of trying to fight the current war just like the previous war.  Today we see Obama and many in Congress mistakenly approaching Syria policy through the lens of the previous war. 

Some have criticized Obama for delaying an attack until consulting with Congressional leaders and receiving their approval.  I disagree - I think consultations and endorsement are a very important and necessary step.   
My problem is why are we having this discussion in September 2013?  The Obama Administration should have checked this off the list 12-18 months ago.  The inexcusable delay has hurt the United States, helped Iran and gotten a whole lot more Syrian civilians killed than could have been the case, in addition to further destabilizing Lebanon and Jordan.  
  In the list above, the most important elements are 3 and 4.  We cannot let Syria or parts of it become a base for al-Qaida, global jihad or other elements that threaten US national security interests.  And we cannot let Iran fill the vacuum after Assad. 

The next most important priority is preventing the current regime and its successor from carrying out widespread murder and persecution of Syrian citizens.

Hearing about the 100,000+ human toll in the Syrian civil war, much of which are civilian deaths inflicted by the regime (even before the chemical warfare):  I'm reminded of two photos of the Auschwitz death camp.  One (among a very large series) was taken in 1944, showing that the Allies knew of its existence and could reach it repeatedly with warplanes.  The second was taken in 2003, when Israeli Air Force F-15s overflew the site, carrying on board the names of every known Auschwitz victim.  The message, of course, is "never again."  And we all assumed that the combination of the information age and the F-15s could ensure never again. 

The situations are hardly analogous in scope, intent or numbers.  But the question remains - was the lesson of "never again" a universal one, or limited to certain groups?  Is there a minimum number of deaths in a campaign of ethnic cleansing etc., below which the lesson (and our obligations) does not apply?  

How do we know when we're facing a "never again" decision? 

On a possibly related note, here's one more photo, an Iranian Revolutionary Guard missile base outside of Khorammabad, Iran that's believed to house hundreds of ballistic missiles and launchers (courtesy Digital Globe and Google Earth).  It's about 5.2 miles from end to end, about the distance from Manhattan's Battery Park to E 70th Street.  One of several such facilities.