My low opinion of Syria

Syria is yet another backwards Middle Eastern country ruled by an evil dictatorship.  That appears to be the norm in that part of the world, but what do you expect when you allow religion to run your government?  But Assad, the evil power hungry tyrant that he is, may or may not have used chemical weapons on his own people and America, the world's savior, cannot tolerate that.

Here's the thing for me though.  Assad and his goons have been killing his detractors since they first began fighting for their freedom.  The rest of the world just gave the rebels some more guns and sat back and watched.  Suddenly chemical weapons come in the picture and we're like "Hey! That's not right!" and say we need to bomb them.  Why now?  Why not 2 years ago?  Does it matter how a massacre is carried out or that a massacre happens?

Let's be honest.  The US has never gone to war over something that didn't serve US interests and preventing chemical weapons from getting into the hands of their enemies is a very big interest.  It only took the possibility of Hussein having weapons to convince the world to attack Iraq.  We have incontrovertible proof that Syria has chemical weapons, but the rest of the world is fine not doing anything about that. So that is why America is beating the war drums now. Any lives they may save from Assad's tyrade is just a lucky happenstance.  The real goal is to protect the US from jihadists using chemical weapons on Americans.

But as much as I would like to see dangerous chemical weapons kept away from the crazy jihadists, I know that any US led military action in Syria is doomed to fail.  It will not stop the bad guys from getting the weapons.  It's a fact that a lot of the rebel fighters are affiliated with crazy jihadists.  It won't stop the war in Syria. There is no plan to remove Assad from power.  It WILL piss off the jihadists and increase anti west sentiment across the Middle East.   It WILL piss off Russia (and her tyrant in charge) into taking action against the US.  It WILL drag the US into another war it can't afford either financially or physically to fight.  It WILL cause tension and grief and wind up being as pointless as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So as noble as it may seem to want to stop the bloodshed and destroy the weapons, I can't support going to war in Syria.  It won't prevent innocents from dying and it won't serve the US well.

This shouldn't be America's fight.  The entire world should be dragging Assad out of office but they won't and why not? Because dictator Putin says no. Because it's in Russia's interest to keep Assad around.  Because Russia makes money off of Syria and making money is more important than stopping genocide.  The US can't fight this war alone and that is why they shouldn't. Russia needs to do the right thing, put the all mighty dollar aside and stop Assad from killing civilians. 

Sorry to the Syrians who are suffering.  Blame Russia.