Syria: the case for action

[TheCurmudgeon]

You asked in your title what point I was trying to make. I was trying to suggest that the record of recent military "punishment" operations shows that they have not had any of the 5 desired effects of punishment. I think it is probably the case that short of winning a general war and then trying the leadership of the losing side, that will always be the case. And, IMO, the only aim of punishment that this latter course will meet is that of retribution/revenge..

I will agree with that.


Although my thoughts on this are the same as they are on our actions in Iraq and Afghanistan trying to create democracies where they are not feasible - are we taking this action based on an understanding of how Assad will interpret events or are we taking it based on how WE interpret events? A corollary would be, are we taking this action based on how a reasonable (or unreasonable) third party dictator would interpret these events?

[TheCurmudgeon]

Just to be clear, I think we are making the right move to take action in this case. The question in my mind is, "what action will yield the desired result?"

That is a complex and nuanced question. But unlike others on this council I will not walk away from it just because it is complex. I have seen too many people here try to pass off the observation that a problem is complex as some form of intellectualism - with their next statement being that if it is too complex we should not get involved. Sorry, but that is poor logic and even poorer scholarship. There is nothing profound about standing on the sidelines.

If we want 1) to deter Assad from using these weapons again, and 2) deter other like-minded leaders from using the same tact - what is the response that will yield that result. What can we take away that Assad cares that much about. What can we threaten that other leaders will think twice about before they chose to use chemical weapons.

My response is - we need to know what Assad cares about first - then we act.

An appropriate response against Assad will yield the desired deterrence against others.

[ganulv]

If we want 1) to deter Assad from using these weapons again, and 2) deter other like-minded leaders from using the same tact - what is the response that will yield that result.

What about rewording “we want to deter Assad” to “we want Assad deterred.” The ultimate deterrence might be the threat of direct intervention by the militaries of neighboring countries and/or loss of support from Iran. Non-clandestine U.S. involvement threatens to introduce a whole ‘nother political dimension to whether that might happen, doesn’t it?

[TheCurmudgeon]

What about rewording “we want to deter Assad” to “we want Assad deterred.” The ultimate deterrence might be the threat of direct intervention by the militaries of neighboring countries and/or loss of support from Iran. Non-clandestine U.S. involvement threatens to introduce a whole ‘nother political dimension to whether that might happen, doesn’t it?

I agree that the action, whatever it is, need not be from the U.S. alone or from the U.S. at all. It is not like we have never worked through surrogates before. Even better if the action is taken as part of a coalition.

But it does need to be tailored to achieve the desired result - deterrence.

There were four other objectives of punishment. Revenge should not apply since his actions were not against us directly. I could argue that democracies see all citizens as the rightful powers in any political system. That said any attack on a innocent civilian is an attack on the "Democratic Us" (kind of like the royal "we"), and therefore an attack on all like-minded humans. This is the foundation of R2P. I will not make that argument nor do I believe it is accurate. Incapacitation is laudable, but unachievable. In this case incapacitation means eliminating the ability of Assad to use chemical weapons - a bridge too far in my estimation. Rehabilitation, I think not. Reparation, I don't see how. Perhaps we could seize all of Assad's foreign assets and offer to give them to the relatives of the victims, but I see jurisdictional issues until the relatives file an action in a US Court. Even then it is a wildly unlikely option. So our only reasonable security interest is deterrence. Deterrence against Assad or any other government that would use weapons of mass destruction against their (or any other) population.

If there were a non-military way to achieve this I would be for it. I don't see one.

[TheCurmudgeon]

What about rewording “we want to deter Assad” to “we want Assad deterred.” The ultimate deterrence might be the threat of direct intervention by the militaries of neighboring countries and/or loss of support from Iran. Non-clandestine U.S. involvement threatens to introduce a whole ‘nother political dimension to whether that might happen, doesn’t it?

I am not sure it does. It is not like the players on the world stage (both state and non-state) believe that we are doing nothing behind the scenes. Overt action at least does not allow for wild speculation.

Consultation with key players (particularly Russia) can limit "damage". We have to keep their interests in mind.

[Dayuhan]

An appropriate response against Assad will yield the desired deterrence against others.

The problem with punishment and deterrence is that both are invariably based on assumptions about how other parties will respond. It's easy to say that "If we do x, they will do y", or if we had done x, they would have done y". These assumptions are impossible to verify and as likely to be wrong as right. Any course of action based on assumptions about the responses of other parties has to be balanced by consideration of the lively possibility that we will do x and they will do z, or something from a completely different alphabet.

[TheCurmudgeon]

The problem with punishment and deterrence is that both are invariably based on assumptions about how other parties will respond. It's easy to say that "If we do x, they will do y", or if we had done x, they would have done y". These assumptions are impossible to verify and as likely to be wrong as right. Any course of action based on assumptions about the responses of other parties has to be balanced by consideration of the lively possibility that we will do x and they will do z, or something from a completely different alphabet.

This is the "it's too hard" argument. Let me lay this out.

Blue Team - psychologists, political scientists, and military people brought together to determine Assad's vulnerability (what we want to target) as well as his most likely response.

Red Team - Same makeup whose mission is to determine the most dangerous reaction.

White Team - A more robust element designed to look at third party outsiders (Iran, Russia, Lebanon, Turkey, Israel) to look for issues that could lead to a regional conflict.

Silver team - same makeup as the Blue and Red Teams, but whose mission is to study what total inaction will result in.

Each team should have at least two native Syrian's if possible. They review all relevant data and provide a series of courses of action that have been war gamed (action, reaction, counteraction). Leadership then recommends options to the President's team.

You are never going to be 100% right , and perhaps the Silver team wins and inaction is the best course of action. But I am not willing to concede that because a problem is difficult it is therefore intractable.

[Dayuhan]

This is the "it's too hard" argument.

Actually it's the "it's too uncertain" argument. Given the number of actors and the range of motives involved, our ability to predict outcomes is very limited, and any effort to predict outcomes is likely to be speculative.

What strikes me as odd about the proposals for action is that the adverse outcome of inaction is invariably claimed to be the possibility of escalation and regional spillover. To avert this, we propose an escalation that is very likely to produce regional spillover. I have to question a proposed response that seems very likely to produce precisely the outcome that we're trying to avoid.

From a cynic's perspective, if a stalemate continues, the rebels and the government will continue to butcher each other and anyone caught in between. If Assad wins, he will butcher the rebels and anyone associated with them. If Assad falls, the rebels will butcher each other and anyone associated with Assad. That's horrible any way it comes out, but is it really an equation that we need to be in? If AQ and Iran/Hezbollah are going to square off and duke it out, why should we be trying to pry them apart? No doubt the whole thing is going to be very bad for Syrians, but are a few thousand tons of explosives delivered by cruise missile going to make it any better?

[jmm99]

Senate committee approves Syria attack resolution - Committee voted 10-7, with both Democrats and Republicans voting for and against resolution. (USA Today, by Gregory Korte, 4 Sep 2013):

WASHINGTON — The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted to authorize President Obama to use limited force against Syria Wednesday, after adopting amendments from Sen. John McCain designed to urge Obama to "change the military equation on the battlefield."

The Senate resolution would limit hostilities to 60 or 90 days, narrow military action to Syria's borders and prohibit U.S. troops on Syrian soil. McCain's proposal didn't change that scope but urged that the end goal should be "a negotiated settlement that ends the conflict and leads to a democratic government in Syria."

The vote was 10-7. Five Republicans and two Democrats voted against it. Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., voted "present."

Here's the amended AUMF.

Regards

Mike

[Dayuhan]

McCain's proposal didn't change that scope but urged that the end goal should be "a negotiated settlement that ends the conflict and leads to a democratic government in Syria."

How do you do that "bashing head on wall" emoticon?

I'd love to know how Mr. McCain proposes to achieve that goal within 90 days, without putting boots on ground.

The document looks like a prescription for disaster to me, and I hope it gets voted down. We'll see.

Realistically, force has to be proportional to goals, and "limited force" needs to be paired with limited goals. The goals here seem out of proportion to the approved means and thoroughly unrealistic. That's not even starting on the potential for unintended consequences...

[TheCurmudgeon]

Actually it's the "it's too uncertain" argument. Given the number of actors and the range of motives involved, our ability to predict outcomes is very limited, and any effort to predict outcomes is likely to be speculative.

Inaction is no less uncertain.

What strikes me as odd about the proposals for action is that the adverse outcome of inaction is invariably claimed to be the possibility of escalation and regional spillover. To avert this, we propose an escalation that is very likely to produce regional spillover. I have to question a proposed response that seems very likely to produce precisely the outcome that we're trying to avoid.

The motivation for action here is not to prevent regional spillover.

From a cynic's perspective, if a stalemate continues, the rebels and the government will continue to butcher each other and anyone caught in between. If Assad wins, he will butcher the rebels and anyone associated with them. If Assad falls, the rebels will butcher each other and anyone associated with Assad. That's horrible any way it comes out, but is it really an equation that we need to be in? If AQ and Iran/Hezbollah are going to square off and duke it out, why should we be trying to pry them apart? No doubt the whole thing is going to be very bad for Syrians, but are a few thousand tons of explosives delivered by cruise missile going to make it any better?

Here I agree. There may have been a time when we (as in the World, and in particular, the Arab World) could have gotten involved to limit the destruction. That time has passed.

Again, don't confuse the reasons for taking action with anything to do with taking sides or even bringing an end to the conflict. In this particular situation no one is arguing that Assad can't defend his regime using conventional weapons. No one is arguing that the rebels cannot kill Government forces using conventional weapons. They can kill each other using conventional weapons to the last person as long as they are killing each other over political power and not as a form of genocide. And following the logic of your argument, could a few tons of explosives delivered by cruise missile make it any worse?

This has to do with the use of chemical weapons. The ramifications of inaction are not limited to the boarders of Syria.

[wm]

I think we are presented with the analog of the following scene found in the 1983 movie Trading Places (Eddie Murphy as Billy Ray Valentine; Dan Akroyd as Louis Wintorpe III)

Billy Ray Valentine: [watches Louis clean his shotgun] You know, you can't just go around and shoot people in the kneecaps with a double-barreled shotgun 'cause you pissed at 'em.

Louis Winthorpe III: Why not?

Billy Ray Valentine: 'Cause it's called assault with a deadly weapon, you get 20 years for that ####.

Louis Winthorpe III: Listen, do you have any better ideas?

Billy Ray Valentine: Yeah. You know, it occurs to me that the best way you hurt rich people is by turning them into poor people.

The administration seems to want to take the Winthorpe approach when the Coleman approach might be more likely to have some real impact.

[Dayuhan]

For what it's worth:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/165224353/...d-Intelligence

English translation of French report on alleged use of chemical weapons by Syria.

National executive summary of declassified intelligence

Assessment of Syria’s chemical warfare programme

Cases of previous use of chemical agents by the Syrian regime,

Chemical attack launched by the regime on Aug 21

[Dayuhan]

Inaction is no less uncertain.

It certainly keeps us out of the picture, and that's something. The demon you know, and all that... while things are ugly now, we're proposing a substantial escalation that has little chance of making anything better and a very substantial chance of making them worse.

The motivation for action here is not to prevent regional spillover.

I don't see how the goals of this operation can be separated from overall policy goals re Syria.

There's a point at which general principles regarding chemical weapons are in conflict with the real-world calculus of costs and benefits presented by Syrian intervention. Overall, the prospect of intervening in Syria is no more attractive than it was before the use of chemical weapons. There's still no credible ally on the ground. There's still no clear, practical, achievable goal. There's still a huge raft of probable unintended consequences. So do we go out and stick our collective schlong in the meat grinder purely to deter future use of chemical weapons?

There may have been a time when we (as in the World, and in particular, the Arab World) could have gotten involved to limit the destruction. That time has passed.

There may or may not have been such a time. Of course there will be no shortage of claims that at any given juncture we could have done x and "they" would have done y. That's pure speculation. We do not know where the road not taken would have led, and we do know that there were good reasons for not taking that road.

This has to do with the use of chemical weapons. The ramifications of inaction are not limited to the boarders of Syria.

So what happens if you fire off your punitive strike and they turn around and use chemical weapons again, maybe on a larger scale? What's the next step up on the punitive escalator? Have we got a next step up that we can actually use without head-butting the tar baby?

We're not in a position to get on the high horse and claim that the use of chemical weapons must be punished in any circumstances, because we and everyone else know that we've let the use of chemical weapons pass before, when it suited us to do so. At some point our interests have to come into the calculation.