Broadsword:
International law is by no means clear that the use of military force must always be authorised by the UN Security Council. There is a developing legal framework for military intervention on humanitarian grounds. Known as the Responsibility to Protect, or R2P, it was born out of the humanitarian disasters of the 1990s in Kosovo and Rwanda.
"We'll make it up as we go along." Got it. I suppose that's how most laws and rules come to be ...
Why is no one pushing for a ceasefire, a separation of combatants, and a UN Green Line?
Pontius: Check out a map of where the fighting is, who controls what, and where the factions are. It isn't that simple. Even the Dayton Agreement took a lot of work and three reasonably well recognized spokesmen for their "sides" to get ironed out, and then about ten years of international support to achieve.
They are tired of wannabe soldiers who remain enamored of the lure of bloodless machine warfare.
I wrote a paper on this inanity at staff college, nearly 20 years ago, that got me into a little bit of hot water with my adviser. I had to redirect my efforts toward a different element of the topic.
Robert J Samuelson: (an economist)
Americans must be {war} weary. {He disagrees}
The truth is that for most Americans, the constant combat has imposed no
burdens, required no sacrifices and involved no disruptions. True, the money spent has been substantial. From 2001 to 2012, reckons the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan along with related operations cost $1.4 trillion. Although that’s a lot even by Washington standards, it pales next to all federal spending and the economy’s total production. From 2001 to 2012, federal spending totaled $33.3 trillion; the wars were 4 percent of that. Over the same period, the American economy produced $163 trillion of goods and services. War spending equaled nine-tenths of 1 percent of that.
As important, no special tax was ever imposed to pay war costs. They
were simply added to budget deficits, so that few, if any, Americans suffered a loss of income. It’s doubtful that much other government spending was crowded out by the wars.
doubleeweeight
said event occurs as a CIA false flag exercise.
By your own words you condemn yourself.
has Qatar really been trying to overthrow Assad to push a natural gas pipeline through Syria to Europe to knock off the russian gas supply monopoly?
Good question. Do you have an answer, or are you "Just Asking Questions"
Nutloose:
One feels Obama's chance has past him by,
Passed him by.
glojo:
If I were the Syrian President and I was accused of this act then why oh why would I not insist on having the resident weapon inspectors come in IMMEDIATELY and carry out whatever tests they deem necessary? I say resident inspectors simply because they were but a short distance away from the attacked area (they were in the same city). Instead of inviting in these inspectors the Syrian Government refused entry and for days carried on bombarding that area in the FULL KNOWLEDGE that their actions were destroying any evidence that might be of use in the detection of what was used? Bottom line however is the FACT that the inspectors will NOT investigate who is responsible for the attack, but instead they are only tasked with trying to discover if a chemical was used and to me that is a farce!
You have put your finger on that which is "the international community" and "the media" and a lot else. Farce.
Britain's MOD confirms Syrian planes crossed into international space
It's legal to do that.
Use of Sarin might well have been an unathorised release by a local field commander, rather than directed by the government per se.
Of course al-Assad woudn't suggest this, as it would imply that he no longer had full control over his military forces.
If he court martials the nitwit who did that, it's might be a nail in Obama's "I'll bomb you" coffin. So why doesn't he? Se glojo's point up above.
Beags:
it seems that the hawks in the US are more concerned about Russian and 'Eye-raynian' influence in the area than they are in the facts specific to this incident.
That makes sense. Looking after America's interests is what the government is supposed to do. If Russian and Iranian interests and ours are in conflict, particularly in a given area, for damned sure our government needs to consider that ... so the "hawks" are at least thinking at the appropriate level. Whether I agree with them or not is another matter.
Some people are against this due to being displeased with Obama. I am against this as I don't see the point of acting unilaterally. It is to me a politcally bad move to do so. First get multinational support, then move on with a course of action.
FFS, get things in the right order.