Syria, What Would The West Acheve?

[ToraToraTora]

Appalled as I am with the goings on in Syria I can't help feeling that any intervention is futile, even if the current regime were displaced we'd just end up with another Taliban state. Similar to what happened with the Muja Hadeen in Afghanistan. I have, on here on several posts, said I am in favour of doing nothing and leaving them to it. My ire has mainly been aimed at the general political point scoring that the left have been unable to resist. So why don't we just ignore it and stop giving it the oxygen of publicity? The whole sorry mess is not worth a single civilised life.

[Wharton]

oil

[Zacs-Master]

So why don't we just ignore it and stop giving it the oxygen of publicity?

Posting another Q about it would seem somewhat counter productive to this.

[jim360]

"The whole sorry mess is not worth a single civilised life."

What does this say about how you value the lives of the Syrian people?

[emmie]

whilst i mostly agree, sadly it is the civilians that get caught in the middle, Assad v the rebels, neither is good, so what can one do, stay out of it, give humanitarian aid, yes, then what. What i don't get is those who don't realise that is Assad is ousted, killed, war will follow, what else could happen, they are not one large rebel army, but many factions, fighting for their own slice of the pie, and agenda, many as you state are Islamists, and what could happen is what is happening in Afghanistan, we go in, lots of theirs and our people get killed, nothing is actually resolved, we leave and the Talibs move back, great, or not so great.

[ToraToraTora]

Wharton, Oil is irrelevant the west buys what it needs a lot cheaper that military intervention.
zacs, yes but what if it wasn;t running 24/7 on the news channels, we'd not be having this cdicussion
Jim: It's not question of value it's just futile, they are determined to kill each other, mainly over the minutiae of fairy tales I don't want our troops killed in a conflict that has no logic or reason beyond that.

[youngmafbog]

Totally agree Tora. In the past I have been for invasion, for instance I backed Blair with the information (false as it turned out) I had.

This time it is majorly different. 1) Hindsight eg Iraq/Afghanistan 2) I am not convinced who did it 3) I really cannot see what intervention will achieve apart from mass annihilation of civilians when war really breaks out amongst the factions, especially when the rebels get their hands on a load more chemicals.

I am saddened by the Left trying to score political points though. It would be more constructive to come up with viable ideas on how to prevent more suffering of the Syrian population.

[Coldicote]

Without scientific evidence that’s taking a long time coming, it would have been easy to make the wrong decision about action on Syria. Perhaps Mr Cameron took the line he felt he had to take, but is he perhaps relieved that the vote was lost?

[ToraToraTora]

to be fair, though YMB, there is one in their number of late that has impressed me with his erstwhile yearning to do something for the suffering in Syria, even making suggestions on things like a no fly zone, so mikey, well done for looking beyond the standard 'right on' liberal approach and politicking, and saying what you think, we don't often agree but you have respect for that.

[Wharton]

Slightly off the question, but did you know that Scotland has the distinction of being the only country in the world to discover oil and become poorer?

[LazyGun]

Despite the 3T/YMB love in, this is not a left vs.right issue. There are plenty of people and MPs on the right of the political spectrum who have major reservations about intervening in Syria.Witness the vote last night in the HoC. And to accuse Labour of political play-acting when raising important issues - you know, like evidence, international consensus, the actual objective of military action - is demeaning, as was No.10s comments about Milliband giving succour to Assad, or Phillip Hammond attempting to suggest that last nights vote would severely impact upon the cosily named "special relationship", or Gove calling his own colleagues in the Tories "traitors" for voting against the government last night.

To reduce every single issue to some kind of polarised "left vs. right ideology" is juvenile.

[jake-the-peg]

Well I think that the 'Taliban state' assumption is a bit of a leap

We've not seen that in Tunisia, Lybia or Egypt

However the overall point is good

What is the hoped for outcome of military action? - that doesn't seem to be very clear does it?

[youngmafbog]

Very true Tora, I was thinking more along the lines of Red Ed and his cohorts.

[Wharton]

Red Ed? Is this a weans' poetry competition?

[ichkeria]

'Political point scoring that the left has been unable to resist'
And not a hint of irony in that comment?? :-)
What on earth makes you suppose that the Taliban are suddenly going to spring up in an Arab state? Or that the lives of 100,000 Syrians and 2,000,000 refugees are cheaper than British lives?
Apart from that - spot on lol

[heathfield]

Those politicians who would like to see our intervention in Syria say that it is our duty on humanitarian grounds to protect the innocent. So what about the Congo? There's a war going on there with innocents being slaughtered daily. Strangely, not a cheep from those same politicians on that conflict. Apart from the odd sparse news item, it's as though it doesn't even exist.

[Wharton]

^ no oil?

[ichkeria]

Re the Congo are you talking about the DRC? I thought the war there had ended. Tho hardly a picnic there now it seems. There was a lot of coverage of the last elections there

[keyplus90]

Oil, resources, military basis to protect ONE (so that they can build as many new developments as they like) and to scare and show others who controls the world etc. However if nothing would be gained then still lot of weapons would be sold so business will boom. Then in the area of hostility NJO's would run charity missions and that would generate more income for their heads to have huge benefits and finally contracts for re-building what we destroyed. These are few of the benefits that anyone can see but then there are lots of other benefits hidden behind words like "American interests" or Western interests" etc. If you think about it then it is worth killing 100 of thousands and then they would not be civilised anyway so your last sentence would be fulfilled too. So it is win, win situation.

Finally, take my words for it that one way or another we would go on war in any country where Jewish lobby wants Americans to go, because then American would like us to go and we would find a way around all these commons vote etc.