Month: September 2013

President Obama has said explicitly that his attack on Syria would be limited. It would not be aimed at regime change, wouldn’t include boots on the ground, and wouldn’t even aim to prevent the Assad regime from being able to continue to use violence to fight the rebellion.

Despite the administration’s reluctance over the course of two years to get involved in Syria, there is very little reason to believe that this war, should he launch it, would in fact be limited.

As Micah Zenko, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, has recently written, “it is highly unlikely that such an intervention can be so narrow that it will not force a deeper U.S. military engagement in Syria’s civil war.”

We have at least one experience to draw from on Obama’s understanding of “limited” airstrikes. Libya was supposed to be simply a no-fly zone to prevent the Gadhafi from using air power to kill Libyans. That was thrown out the window as soon as the bombing started, eventually turning into regime change that Libyans are still paying for and that had negative consequences throughout the region that the world is still dealing with.

Rhetoric about limited wars abound in presidential administrations. During the Bush administration’s sales campaign for invading Iraq, we were promised the war would last “weeks, not months.” Eight years, trillions of dollars, and hundreds of thousands of lives later, those promises would be laughed at as naive at best and deceitful at worst.

When Lyndon Johnson went to Congress for the Tonkin Gulf Resolution that would start America’s most costly quagmire in Vietnam, he promised a “limited and fitting” response to North Vietnamese naval attacks (which didn’t happen the way he said it did). He repeatedly assured Americans that “we seek no wider war” in Vietnam.

Many observers didn’t see vital interests at stake in Vietnam, just as many (even in Congress) doubt today that America has an interest in Syria. And Johnson was pulling for greater and greater escalation in Vietnam for reasons similar to what Obama is claiming in Syria. This is about Obama’s “credibility.” That is, he made a promise to bomb Syria if chemical weapons were used and if he doesn’t follow up on that promise he’ll signal to others that he’s cowardly.

As Johnson explained to Doris Kearns Goodwin in 1970, “if I left that war…then I would be seen as a coward and my nation would be seen as an appeaser and we would both find it impossible to accomplish anything for anybody anywhere on the entire globe.” Then, as now, it was all about “credibility.”

About ten years, billions of dollars, 58,220 American deaths, and millions of dead Vietnamese later, the “limited” war for the sake of America’s credibility was lost and went down in history as the U.S.’s greatest folly.

Whether Obama is sincere or not, a U.S. bombing campaign is unlikely to be limited. Any U.S. war in Syria, especially if you judge by the administration’s incredibly broad draft legislation for force authorization, will expand beyond what even the most hawkish can imagine. Mission creep is a very powerful force, and Syria is ripe for such a snowball effect.

A most unusual thing happened yesterday [Aug. 31] at the protest in front of
the White House against President Obama’s planned bombing of Syria.

A group of mostly young, white, male Republicans gathered on the edge of the demonstration holding hand-written signs. But there was something peculiar about this band of right-wingers: they weren’t behaving like the counter-protesters who regularly showed up at the antiwar demonstrations against the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

These Republicans weren’t holding signs that read, “Hitler = Stalin = Assad,” or “Commies Love Dictators.” They weren’t yelling “get a job” or “love it or leave it” at the other demonstrators. Instead, their signs read, “Obama the Warmonger” and “Anti-War Republican” and “Conservatives against War with Syria.”

Was this a parody? Was it a politically calculated action to undermine Obama simply because he’s a Democrat?

I put on my reporter’s hat and inquired about their motives. I wanted to find out why Republicans would be opposing war. Why had they gone off script, which clearly calls for them to spew venom at antiwar demonstrators?

Matthew Hurtt, the gentleman holding the “Anti-War Republican” sign, agreed to speak with me. “I’m generally opposed to military action that doesn’t directly protect our borders,” he said. “Obama ran as the antiwar, peace prize president and he’s been totally the opposite – with a secret drone war in Yemen and droning innocent people in Pakistan. I’m opposed to that.”

Obama’s planned bombing of Syria, Hurtt said, “continues the tradition of both Democrats and Republicans acting with recklessness on foreign policy issues.”

Hurtt, a direct mail copy writer for conservative causes and contributor to Reason magazine and The Daily Caller, explained that he and his fellow conservatives may not have the same mission as other groups gathered at the demonstration, but that there are certain issues, such as stopping wars, on which they can come together.

Lacy MacAuley, a veteran antiwar and global justice activist in Washington, D.C., also noticed the diverse groups at the demonstration.

“This is representative of just how unpopular U.S. military intervention is,”
she told me. “Different groups have come together from all directions today
to protest U.S. military intervention because it’s wildly unpopular.”

Continue reading “Participants Ditch Stereotypes at White House Protest”

Here’s what former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had to say about using force against another country — one considered far more offensive than Syria — when she was a U.S. Senator:

“If the administration believes that any, any, use of force against Iran is necessary, the president must come to congress to seek that authority.” –Sen. Hillary Clinton, Feb 14, 2007

Again referring to Iran, Vice President Joe Biden, agrees. And then some – – –

The president has no Constitutional authority to take this nation to war against a country of 70 million people unless we are attacked or unless there is proof that we’re about to be attacked. And if he does, if he does, I would move to impeach him.” –Senator Joe Biden, Chris Matthews’ Hardball

Who do you suppose said this – – –

“The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.” —Q&A with Charlie Savage, The Boston Globe, December 20, 2007

If you guessed candidate and Constitutional scholar Barack Obama, you nailed it. Mr. Obama himself stated, unequivocally, the President can’t Constitutionally do what he nearly just did. Again.

That time U.S. Representative Dennis Kucinich suggested it was likely an impeachable offense.

Grassroots pressure has forced President Obama to seek approval from Congress for an attack on Syria. But Obama is hell-bent on ordering a missile assault on that country, and he has two very important aces in the hole.

The administration is about to launch a ferocious propaganda blitz that will engulf a wide range of U.S. media. And as a fallback, the president is reserving the option of attacking Syria no matter what Congress does.

Until Obama’s surprise announcement Saturday that he will formally ask Congress for authorization of military action against Syria, the impassioned pitches from top U.S. officials in late August seemed to be closing arguments before cruise missiles would hit Syrian targets. But the pre-bombing hyper spin has just gotten started.

The official appeals for making war on yet another country will be ferocious. Virtually all the stops will be pulled out; all kinds of media will be targeted; every kind of convoluted argument will be employed.

Hell hath no fury like war-makers scorned. Simmering rage will be palpable from political elites who do not want to see Congress set an unprecedented precedent: thwarting the will of a president who wants Pentagon firepower unleashed on another country.

Continue reading “Obama Will Launch a Huge Propaganda Blitz – and May Attack Syria Even If He Loses the Vote in Congress”