The civilized west strikes again!
Reply #5 - September 30, 2014, 10:29 PM
I’m about to give my opinion on why the western world didn’t act against Assad last year. There is a good chance that my eyes are a lot more naïve than yours Salim, and they have certainly seen less pain, suffering and injustice than yours undoubtedly have. But for what it’s worth, I’ll write down what I can remember:
IMO, there were a number of contributing factors towards why Assad’s heinous crimes last year went unpunished. He had crossed the line. He needed to be stopped. In fact, most people understood that he should have been stopped years ago, but the Western world could never find the resolve, nor the will or the backing from their public, to do anything about it. But last year, after the attacks that Assad so blatantly sanctioned, all of that changed. Assad had crossed the line. The world could no longer turn its back on the evil that existed in Syria. The world had to do something, otherwise they would be allowing Assad to set a precedent, they would be allowing him to break every convention that existed, and they would thus also be implicit in the suffering and death that was so horribly evident in Syria… So why didn’t they intervene in the end? Well IMO, a few things happened to allow the momentum and resolve to slip:
- Russia, plus China and Iran to a lesser extent, proved vocal in putting their collective weight behind trying to keep the West out of Syria. Between them, they blocked every UN resolution going, issued countless warnings to the west to stay away, tried to cast doubt in the world regarding who was actually behind the attacks, and even brokered a feeble and ridiculously inadequate deal that would mean Assad would hand in all of his chemical stockpile in exchange for the West staying away. In their twisted thinking, it was a reasonable compromise for a crime to go unpunished, because the weapon that had been responsible for it was being confiscated afterwards.
- As you quite rightly say, the resolve of the Western public (not the governments) was incredibly weak. They were war weary. There had been huge messes created in Afganistan and in Iraq. The legitimacy for even going in, particularly in Iraq, had proven to be incredibly dubious. In addition, the exit strategies had been shambolic, and it was evident that an even bigger mess had been created than the one that the West had gone in to try to ‘clean up’, There was no denying any of this, and this meant that the public had become hugely sceptical when faced with another middle-eastern war, regardless of any apparent justification for this
Despite all this, there were three nations in particular who were willing to ignore the alliance that stood against them, and that were willing to convince and carry their public to war, regardless of their weariness. These three nations were the US, France and Britain. Plans were drawn up, their resolve was made clear to the world, their media was being prepped, and other nations were being encouraged and even coerced into either joining, or at least showing approval for the war that was about to happen,. All was in place…
But then, as suddenly as it had formed, this resolve started to break down. IMO, this started with Britain, and with Ed Milliband in particular, the leader of the opposition party. It hurts me to say this about him, but he was not born to lead, and his party will suffer for longer because of this fact. Mr Milliband was struggling a year ago (as he is now) to convince even his own party, let alone the general public, that he has what it takes to lead his country. His personal ratings, as well as his party’s ratings, were spectacularly unspectacular for a mid-term opposition leader whose country was still in the depths of the greatest depression since the war. Because of this, IMO, Mr Milliband played politics with the motion put forward by the government that we should go to war against Assad. Despite first agreeing with the motion, he eventually decided to oppose it by suggesting that we should not enter war ‘without compelling evidence’ that it was actually Assad’s people that carried out the chemical attacks. Personally, I’m not sure how much more fucking evidence Mr Milliband wanted. Did he want to see more images of the victims? Did he want to study for fingerprints on the chemical weapons that were about to be handed in by the perpetrators? Did he want to send more observers into the areas that Assad controlled, from where the attacks indisputably originated, just to make sure that there were only Assad’s people there, in charge of the red buttons in this area? For his sake anyways, I hope the temporary bounce in popularity that he gained from preventing war, was worth him going against even his own judgement and conscience.
Anyways I’ve rambled enough, so I will round up (quickly?). Labour, with the help of a few Tory rebels defeated the motion. Britain was thus forced to leave the alliance. This instilled further doubts in the other two key members of the alliance, and in particular, in their public. This coincided with Russia’s brokering of a deal with Assad to hand in his chemical weapons by a specified deadline. Within a week, the fight was gone from the stomach of the leaderships in both France and the US, and Assad was able to breath easy again. For what it’s worth, there were many in the West that felt devastated that after consensus had finally been built up against Assad, it had inexplicably dissipated at the blink of an eye. It goes without saying that the consequences for not going in last year have been monumental for the Syrian people, and also for the liberal opposition in Syria. Plus, not going in last year has also contributed towards the rise of the IS, for which the western world now feels compelled to act upon.
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Topic: The civilized west strikes again!