The tragedy of the Iraq War, an ill conceived and unnecessary war, which weakened the United States and emboldened Iran, is now haunting the Obama Administration, as it considers military intervention in Syria, as a result of the use of chemical weapons, believed to have been promoted by the government of Bashar Al Assad.
Chemical warfare is an illegal crime under international law, and a crime against humanity, and IF it is proved that Assad authorized this, rather than a renegade group, it is essential that the international community punish him for his war crime!
If nothing is done, then it will be seen as an endorsement of a war crime, a crime only done by a very small handful of government leaders in world history, including, of course, Adolf Hitler!
It will show that the world is again sitting by as they did when Hitler came to power in 1933 in what became known as Nazi Germany!
But the failures of the Iraq War, including the human cost and financial burden, is now burdening the Obama Administration as they plan strategy.
But to compare the Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld led tragedy to what might be done under Obama, Biden, Kerry, Hagel is to distort reality, as the credibility of the first group is extremely different than that of the second group!
We are talking about three leaders who regularly lied to us, against four leaders with solid credentials and principles, who are reluctantly planning an intervention in a measured way!
The hypocrisy of Republicans who rushed to back the Bush Administration, while now opposing action by the Obama Administration, is nothing new, part of the continued attempt to undermine anything that Barack Obama and his colleagues want and believe in, whether domestic or foreign.
Obama wants a limited engagement, similar to Bill Clinton’s intervention in Kosovo in 1999, a 78 day bombing campaign against Serbia, with only a loss of one plane, and no human casualties.
While there is no way to know the reaction of Iran, Russia, China and others if there was an internationally led effort to punish Syria’s outlaw government, it is hard to conceive that intervention in Syria would lead to a wider war.
In any case, a chemical warfare Syria represents a threat to Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and really, the civilized world, so to do nothing is simply unacceptable!
Let us pray for the good judgment of Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John Kerry, and Chuck Hagel, as they face what could be the signature foreign policy challenge of the Obama Presidency, and hope that other nations, including Great Britain, whose Parliament just rejected any action, will come to support a necessary minimal intervention against an international outlaw government, which threatens the long range sanity of the world, if chemical warfare goes unpunished!