by Eze Eluchie
No doubt,
when Barack Obama drew an imaginary line of ‘use of chemical weapons’ as the
point where Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria would venture beyond to attract
greater United States involvement in the Syrian Civil War, the US President
committed a political gaffe.
On the one
hand, there was the possibility that any of a plethora of actors in the Syrian
conflict could deliberately use chemical weapons so that the al-Assad regime
will be blamed for it and thus attract US intervention; and on the other hand, the
regime itself could use chemical weapons and blame same on the rebels, as a
ploy by rebels to elicit US intervention – either way, a US reaction would be
tele-guided, not by US interests, but by the manipulations of some smart alec
in Syria or any of the several puppeteers using Syrian interests to propagate
their own agenda.
It is simply
inappropriate to threaten what you either cannot execute or what you will look
bad executing!
As the
Syrian civil war drags on, the complexities of the conflict become more
glaring. The infiltration of the rebel ranks by extremist al-Qeida linked
organizations, the imposition of Sharia laws in the areas where the rebels seem
to control and the possibility of a genocidal war against the Alawite minority
tribe which has held political power over Syria for decades in the event of the
routing of al-Assads regime by the Sunni dominated rebel groups, makes the talk
of a rush into intervening in Syria on behalf of any one side, appear
infantile.
We are once
more witnessing efforts by some countries in Europe to push the United States
into a war in a territory the US least understands nor has yet to develop any ‘post-intervention’
plans. The recent announcements by France and Great Britain that they had ‘irrefutable
evidence’ of the use by the al-Assad regime of chemical weapons sounds so akin
to the noise made earlier of the possessions and preparations of the Saddam
Hussein regime of ‘weapons of mass destruction’ – noise which later proved to
be trash-talk.
The toppling
of Saddam sacked the most liberal regime in the Middle East, a regime which amongst
other things had a Christian as Deputy President (Tariq Aziz), was very futuristic
in the rights allowed women and quite egalitarian. Post Saddam, what do we
have: a nightmare where religious freedom seems light years away and women
rights consigned to history. The same rush to judgment was made in killing
Muammar Qhadaffi in Libya, a travesty which has unleashed untold Islamist extremism
across much of West Africa, threatening the stability of the entire region.
Those who
are now calling for US intervention in Syria on account of the ‘crossing of the
imaginary line’ know full well that when the chips are down, they will not be
the ones to bear the brunt. They will merely contribute insignificant number of troops and equipment and funds leaving the US and its peoples with the major bills.
Unfortunately,
however, the death toll in the Syrian Civil War continues to climb.
Caution,
caution and more caution is advised.
The US
should not allow the tail to wag the dog once more!
Picture: President Bashar al-Assad of Syria
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