There has been a growing narrative in the media that it is necessary for the U.S. to act with a full-scale military intervention in Syria to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad, with the usual myopic and willfully dishonest arguments.
Thomas L. Friedman, for example, in the New York Times opines that to simply directly arm the rebels to topple the Assad regime would be a mistake, because doing that would result in yet another chaotic war in Syria between Sunnis, Alawites, and Kurds. His suggestion is that “we not only need to arm the rebels but we need to organize an international peacekeeping force to enter Syria as soon as the regime falls to help manage the transition.”
Friedman naturally does not mention the fact that the U.S. has already been intervening to prolong and escalate the violence, such as by coordinating the flow of arms to the rebels, or that most of these arms have ended up in the hands of Islamic extremists, such as the al-Nusra Front, which is essentially an extension of al-Qaeda in Iraq. The willful omission of these facts is a key element of the current propaganda campaign to manufacture consent for yet another war in the Middle East.
In an even grosser example of warmongering, Ray Takeyh makes the argument in a Times op-ed that the U.S. needs a full-scale military intervention in Syria in order to maintain its credibility and send a message to Iran that it is serious.
He speaks of the “Iran’s recalcitrant mullahs” and the need to “scale back their nuclear zeal and conform to international nonproliferation agreements”, which is the usual euphemistic way of saying that Iran, which is abiding by its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), must surrender what the treaty describes as an “inalienable right” to research and develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, including uranium enrichment.
What he wants readers to believe is that Iran is working on building nuclear weapons, even though there is no credible evidence for this and the U.S.’s own intelligence community assesses that Iran has no active nuclear weapons program.
Takeyh warns against making a “tentative and halting” intervention in Syria because nothing short of “an overwhelming show of military force” that includes “putting boots on the ground” could “end Syria’s civil war or intimidate Iran’s rulers.” Again, apart from the usual Orwellian logic that to bring peace it is necessary that we make war, the fanciful notion that the U.S. government has a benevolent intent to stop the bloodshed is belied by the fact that it has already intervened to help escalate the civil war.
“America must accept the need for a robust intervention”, Takeyh opines in the Times, which is certainly no stranger to acting as a propaganda outlet by publishing warmongering articles calling on the U.S. government to violate its own Constitution as well as international law in order to manufacture consent for its criminal foreign policies (one may recall, to cite perhaps the most obvious example, how the Times uncritically parroted government officials’ lies about Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction, repeating them as fact to its readers).
Making the case that the U.S. needs to reestablish its credibility, Takeyh argues that America must “convince Iran’s leaders” that it has “an appetite for fighting a major war in the region”.
He throws in the usual appeals to the humanitarian sensibilities of the American public, suggesting that the “vicious Mr. Assad” is someone “who has no qualms about carrying out ethnic cleansing in a struggle to the death.” He thus falls short of actually claiming the Syrian government is presently engaging in ethnic cleansing while nevertheless making the implicit hypothetical argument that a U.S. war on Syria would be a humanitarian intervention to prevent such from occurring. Never mind that, as Thomas L. Friedman warned, overthrowing Assad would likely result in an even more chaotic and violent situation than the one that already exists, with the predictable dire humanitarian consequences.
He also asserts that the “the Assad regime appears to have violated all norms of warfare by using chemical weapons against civilians”, an assertion he has simply parroted from U.S. government officials, whose claims have been called into question by observes, including by a U.N. investigation that found no evidence that the Syrian government had used chemical weapons, but that the U.S.-backed rebels, on the other hand, may have.
And for good measure, he throws in more about “Iran’s mischief and subversion” in the region. Americans are supposed to fear Iran and consider it a threat to the U.S. Thus Takeyh repeats such government propaganda as the old line, constantly asserted without evidence, that “Iranian proxies in Iraq systematically assaulted American troops with I.E.D.’s and helped derail their mission”.
Implicit in such warmongering arguments is the belief that Americans are incapable of learning from the lessons of the past and may yet again be duped into supporting (or at least remaining apathetically indifferent) yet another war. Whether this assumption will hold true this time around or not remains to be seen.
Excellent points.
Takeyh is a petty ‘foot boy’ as Persians call him. He is a servant of Zionist lobby who sit on the “council on foreign relations”, a criminal group. If he dares to go close to Iranian border he will be cut in pieces by the Iranians who hate a warmonger in the service of dumb politicians in Washington trying to kill thousands of Iranians to topple the government. People are telling dumb politicians, black and white, that Iranian people will destroy their enemies at once. They will defend Iranian government against all its enemies including dumb Takeyh, and baby killers. Iranians have no respect for Obama, an assassin, Takeyh, or people like him.
But don’t make a mistake assuming he is pushing his dumb “humanitarian intervention” all by himself. The war criminals in Washington want him to say this garbage so they can sell their savage foreign policy which requires more killing in Syria and elsewhere where makes Americans complicit in crimes against humanity.
Americans must pour into the streets now demanding Obama to be impeached. The United States and Israel are responsible for the “civil war” as they call it, including a member of the COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS, Richard Falk,in order to topple the government in Syria which is AGAINST THE INTERNATIONAL LAW.
This is a PROXY WAR, for regime change so they can partition Syria and change the map of the region for “greater Israel”. WE NEVER ALLOW THAT. The first black president, a war criminal, takes this wish into his grave.
The obvious beneficiary of Syrian disunity is Israel. It`s very much in Israeli interest that the leadership of Arab countries remain fragile and divided (unless they are under the thumb of the US).
Zionist organisations are heavy financial donators to a majority of UK Members Of Parliament, William Hague, the UK Foreign Secretary receives £50,000 p.a. form Zionist sources.
On the 27th May 2013 (A English bank holiday), Hague announced that the UK would look to supply weapons to “Moderate Syrian opposition”.
It received little, or no comment in the UK, certainly no one queried why a “Moderate” Syrian opposition would want or have a need for weapons!
It is much more conceivable that Zionist supporters such as Hague are uncomfortable with the existence of Moderate Syrian opposition and comfortable when accepting payment to redress that situation.
Well, stop banging those drums. Let’s not waste anymore of our resources fighting these expensive mideast teapot wars.
We have a real war brewing on our hands, maybe able to be kept as a regional war but likely another global war, World War III, with China, Pakistan, Russia and North Korea, as well as some minor fish.
So stop giving a care about this bit of noise in Syria. It’ll resolve itself, and there is no solution that actually benefits us, with whoever is the victor like to boot our ass out of the region like Iraq did.
It’s China. Bang your drums slowly.
{So stop giving a care about this bit of noise in Syria.}
These kinds of people who are presenting Syria as a “small fish” are either ignorant or reactionary. I would like to ask the following question: how did WW1 start?
The people who point to China, as “a big fish” need head examined as soon as possible. China and to some extend Russia, are using Syria as a bargaining chip to obtain more CONCESSIONS, like they did in the case of Libya and Iran. They are cooperating all the time with US/Israel against Muslims. In the beginning of the negotiation, Russia and China usually say ‘no’ to set the bar higher so they can get better CONCESSIONS at the expense of Muslim communities.
Both countries are in bed with Israel, an apartheid state, and US against Muslim communities and Islam. If you don’t believe me, go to occupied land, is called Israel to meet millions of Russians and thousands of Chinese working with the apartheid state.
Obama is a war criminal where should be arrested and be punished. He has killed thousands of innocent people so far. He is worse than Bush. The gullible Americans are complicit in US government’s crimes against humanity, especially the pseudo left and ‘progressives’ who are cooperating with the savage foreign policy of the first black ‘president’, a Zionist puppet.
Once again I tip the Hat to the peaceful thinkers
like the editor of this site
Friedman the fraud is at it again with the CFR
and CSIS gangsters
It is clear to all that Mr.hammond is(contrary to his own declarations) a supporter of the assad dictatorial regime.
Mr.hammond also shows a remarkable ignorance in all matters concerning Middle East.Doesn’t he know that nobody can rule in Arab world without dictatorial methods?
And-doesn’t he know that there is no such thing as “palestinians”,and never was?
All the Arabs in the Land of Israel are actually landrobbers-they conquered the Holy Land some 1300 years ago….Arab occupation of the land of israel was desastrous and it is high time to end it NOW.
There will be no peace in theMiddle east as long as Arabs do not leave and return to their country of origin-Arabian peninsula.
Ah, yes, this old familiar argument that opposing U.S. intervention to overthrow a foreign government equates to support for that government. Thus, when I was opposing the planned U.S. war on Iraq and trying to inform people that the government was lying to start a war, that fact by itself made me a supporter of Saddam Hussein.
I’m wondering if we couldn’t instead have a discussion that is actually intelligent.