Syria

[StrangeSox]

You do realize that if it was today Germany would call the Jews "terrorists", "enemies", etc. Im not sure why it matters what the pre-text for killing civilians is.

 

German Jews weren't in open rebellion against the (oppressive, s***ty) Syrian government. What are the comparisons here? Who or what are we bombing? How is that going to reduce civilian casualties? Are we going to come out in full favor of the rebels and try to wipe Assad out as quickly as possible?

 

If Germans said they were killing Jews for trying to overthrow the govt, then its okay? No intervention because thats just a civil war?

 

If there was a legit civil war within Germany, I don't know that the US should intervene. If one side is committing genocide, that's a different story, but that's not what's happening in Syria.

 

And so if Germany just used chemical weapons on the Jews in ghettos, that wouldnt be a problem either, because thats not a concentration camp?

 

This is going beyond absurd.

 

Yes, I agree, your arguments are getting beyond absurd. Recognizing that foreign military intervention isn't such the noble and clean action you are pretending it is is nothing at all like saying all interventions always are bad and that I'd be a-okay with Germans gassing jews or Assad engaging in ethnic cleansing.

 

Either you protect people from regimes that kill them, or you dont. There is no "Well if the conditions are perfect then maybe well get involved."

 

Rebels are also killing civilians. Should we bomb them? Don't forget, we'll be killing civilians when we bomb the people killing civilians. Again, on what evidence do you base your conclusion that foreign intervention=less civilian casualties?

 

That line of thinking is what led to more than half the jews in the world being eradicated.

 

ITS NOT OUR PROBLEM!!!

 

Good thing that's not my line of thinking at all. I've clearly and explicitly rejected that line of thinking. I've clearly and explicitly stated my concerns over foreign intervention in that I believe it is more likely than not to kill more civilians than it saves. If you're going to keep pretending that means I'm an isolationist or that my argument in any way is an argument against intervention in the case of genocide, then we're done here.

 

[Balta1701]

You do realize that if it was today Germany would call the Jews "terrorists", "enemies", etc. Im not sure why it matters what the pre-text for killing civilians is.

 

If Germans said they were killing Jews for trying to overthrow the govt, then its okay? No intervention because thats just a civil war?

 

And so if Germany just used chemical weapons on the Jews in ghettos, that wouldnt be a problem either, because thats not a concentration camp?

 

This is going beyond absurd.

 

Either you protect people from regimes that kill them, or you dont. There is no "Well if the conditions are perfect then maybe well get involved."

 

That line of thinking is what led to more than half the jews in the world being eradicated.

 

ITS NOT OUR PROBLEM!!!

To play your game, if the Jews also had an army and were regularly massacring German civilians, would you support their elimination as well?

[Balta1701]

I think in your last paragraph you make the best argument of all for that research being pretty worthless. In there you are comparing conflicts that probably aren't really comparable, but yet the line can be drawn at one place, but not at another place historically? I don't buy it. You can conduct the same conflict with two different reactions to really see what the difference would have been.

But it ought to tell you one thing..."humanitarian intervention" is absolutely not guaranteed to reduce casualties and to say otherwise is to ignore evidence. It could in some circumstances do so...but that means you need to absolutely sit down and detail the circumstances.

 

Even in the supposed case of preventing an imminent massacre in Libya, all we've left is a multi-year simmering sectarian conflict with no leadership and a failed state.

[StrangeSox]

I think in your last paragraph you make the best argument of all for that research being pretty worthless. In there you are comparing conflicts that probably aren't really comparable,

Why aren't they comparable? Have you looked at the methodology?

 

but yet the line can be drawn at one place, but not at another place historically?

 

I'm not sure what line you're talking about. The data set they picked? Well, you've got to pick a data set somewhere and ultimately most lines are arbitrary to some extent. WWII would be completely irrelevant, anyway, as that wasn't about foreign intervention. It was full-scale nation-state war with a bunch of genocide by several actors thrown in to the mix. That's the situation that's not really comparable to the current civil war in Syria.

 

I don't buy it. You can conduct the same conflict with two different reactions to really see what the difference would have been.

 

Well, I'm not quite so willing to reject a pretty huge and broad category of research that extends far beyond foreign policy.

[Balta1701]

British parliament has voted against endorsing military action in Libya.

[southsider2k5]

Why aren't they comparable? Have you looked at the methodology?

 

 

 

I'm not sure what line you're talking about. The data set they picked? Well, you've got to pick a data set somewhere and ultimately most lines are arbitrary to some extent. WWII would be completely irrelevant, anyway, as that wasn't about foreign intervention. It was full-scale nation-state war with a bunch of genocide by several actors thrown in to the mix. That's the situation that's not really comparable to the current civil war in Syria.

 

 

 

Well, I'm not quite so willing to reject a pretty huge and broad category of research that extends far beyond foreign policy.

 

You were the one saying conflicts in the research were comparable, but then in the next breath were saying that others weren't comparable because it didn't fit the narrative.

[Soxbadger]

You can conduct the same conflict with two different reactions to really see what the difference would have been.

 

This is 100% true. Anything else is merely speculation.

 

Hell I can write an article (supported by fact) that but for the allies involvement in World War II, maybe less Jews die. It wasnt until 1941-2 that Germany did the "final solution". So maybe if Germany wins the war, they only enslave the Jews.

 

So basically you can argue ally intervention in world war ii killed more jews than if they sat out. As historically Hitler said that he was killing the Jews for starting another World War (December 12, 1941) which was 5 days after Pearl Harbor.

 

So if the US had not declared war on Germany, maybe he never orders the final solution.

 

What terrible logic.

[southsider2k5]

But it ought to tell you one thing..."humanitarian intervention" is absolutely not guaranteed to reduce casualties and to say otherwise is to ignore evidence. It could in some circumstances do so...but that means you need to absolutely sit down and detail the circumstances.

 

Even in the supposed case of preventing an imminent massacre in Libya, all we've left is a multi-year simmering sectarian conflict with no leadership and a failed state.

 

And you can't say that standing on the sideline watching absolutely works either.

[StrangeSox]

Exactly, this is why I wont let this happen on my watch. Because to many people like you just raise their hands to the sky and say "There is nothing I can do"

 

No there is something you can do, when you see evil, when you see tyranny, you stop it. Sometimes bad things happen because of that, but you dont just let the even worse things continue because youre afraid something bad may one day happen.

 

Now that is not to say the US should absolutely intervene in Syria. But if its shown that the govt is targeting and killing civilians with chemical weapons, Im not sure how much worse our bombing can make it, because chemical weapons on civilians is pretty outrageous.

 

And what if it is shown that the rebels are also using chemical weapons, which is pretty likely as far as I've read?

 

What if Assad used chemical weapons against the rebels and wasn't directly targeting civilians? I've seen nothing to indicate that that's what is alleged here a la Saddam and the Kurds in the 80's.

 

It's not throwing your hands up and saying "there is nothing I can do." It's recognizing that doing something has its own effects. Those effects may very well be worse than non-intervention. If you believe the balance of intervention is fewer civilian deaths, fine, let's discuss why. That you keep ignoring this and pretending that Balta and I are making a completely different argument is pretty insulting.

[Balta1701]

And you can't say that standing on the sideline watching absolutely works either.

But there is one thing you can say definitively. Spending money on humanitarian aid in these cases absolutely works to save lives. It's the only thing that actually works.

[Soxbadger]

To play your game, if the Jews also had an army and were regularly massacring German civilians, would you support their elimination as well?

 

Are the Jews using chemical weapons? Because if both sides are using chemical weapons you need to stop them both. Chemical weapons really just are not okay since WWI.

 

But it ought to tell you one thing..."humanitarian intervention" is absolutely not guaranteed to reduce casualties and to say otherwise is to ignore evidence. It could in some circumstances do so...but that means you need to absolutely sit down and detail the circumstances.

 

No one is saying that it guarantees less casualties. Im pretty sure Ive consistently said "There is no way to predict the outcome", but that doesnt mean Ill sit on my hands while people are being murdered.

 

You take risks in life, you make decisions based on the facts available. Sometimes they work, sometimes they dont.

[southsider2k5]

But there is one thing you can say definitively. Spending money on humanitarian aid in these cases absolutely works to save lives. It's the only thing that actually works.

 

How can you say that even? How is that working in North Korea? There is nothing to stop a scenario where the government just steals it all and keeps it for the loyalists anyway, just like in NK, while they keep slaughtering anyone who isn't "loyal".

[StrangeSox]

You were the one saying conflicts in the research were comparable, but then in the next breath were saying that others weren't comparable because it didn't fit the narrative.

It sounds like you're really confused here.

 

Do we have a reason to believe that the conflicts in the research weren't comparable? One of the comments on the link posted contains a link to their data. Can you tell me why they "probably" aren't comparable?

 

On the other hand, we can unquestionably say that World War II is not at all comparable to the ongoing Syrian civil war and the potential for foreign intervention. The US wasn't "intervening" in the European theater in order to support an internal rebellion or suppress an uprising. The US was attacked and Germany declared war on them. When they had the opportunity, the US did approximately nothing to directly intervene in the genocide. How or why is this comparable?

[StrangeSox]

How can you say that even? How is that working in North Korea? There is nothing to stop a scenario where the government just steals it all and keeps it for the loyalists anyway, just like in NK, while they keep slaughtering anyone who isn't "loyal".

You wouldn't be sending money to the Assad regime. Refugees are pouring across the borders into other countries.

[Balta1701]

Are the Jews using chemical weapons? Because if both sides are using chemical weapons you need to stop them both. Chemical weapons really just are not okay since WWI.

 

 

 

No one is saying that it guarantees less casualties. Im pretty sure Ive consistently said "There is no way to predict the outcome", but that doesnt mean Ill sit on my hands while people are being murdered.

 

You take risks in life, you make decisions based on the facts available. Sometimes they work, sometimes they dont.

yes, there seems to have been evidence that both sides have used chemical weapons in this conflict already. The largest attack was the one last week, conducted by Syrian forces but possibly/probably not with orders from Assad to do so.

 

So people are being murdered left and right by both sides.

 

You say you won't sit on your hands while people are being murdered, I say that you're advocating murdering a lot of people using Tomahawks.

[StrangeSox]

Are the Jews using chemical weapons? Because if both sides are using chemical weapons you need to stop them both. Chemical weapons really just are not okay since WWI.

 

Why is it ok for Assad and the rebels to blow each other and lots of civilians up with conventional weapons but not chemical weapons?

 

What happens when we start bombing both sides to stop their use of chemical weapons?

 

No one is saying that it guarantees less casualties. Im pretty sure Ive consistently said "There is no way to predict the outcome", but that doesnt mean Ill sit on my hands while people are being murdered.

 

You take risks in life, you make decisions based on the facts available. Sometimes they work, sometimes they dont.

 

The only available information I've seen, which you dismiss out of hand, is that there is greater risk to civilian life by intervening.

[Balta1701]

How can you say that even? How is that working in North Korea? There is nothing to stop a scenario where the government just steals it all and keeps it for the loyalists anyway, just like in NK, while they keep slaughtering anyone who isn't "loyal".

If you're sending in food aid and the government "steals it all", then the civil war has pretty much ended because the government won, and at least people start getting fed. Otherwise, food and medicine will wind up being used by people who need food and medicine because neither side controls the country. Saying that somehow the government will steal it all really shows a complete lack of understanding of the situation.

 

You might not be able to get food aid into downtown Homs, but there are millions of refugees within and outside of the country who desperately need aid and the price of a single missile could save hundreds.

[Soxbadger]

But there is one thing you can say definitively. Spending money on humanitarian aid in these cases absolutely works to save lives. It's the only thing that actually works.

 

Really?

 

Might want to check into the International Red Cross and World War II. They did a bang up job of helping all those Jews. T

 

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsourc...t/redcross.html

 

The ICRC maintained that there was no inequality of treatment of Jewish prisoners,

 

Yeah, Im really going to trust them.

 

[Balta1701]

Really?

 

Might want to check into the International Red Cross and World War II. They did a bang up job of helping all those Jews. T

 

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsourc...t/redcross.html

 

The ICRC maintained that there was no inequality of treatment of Jewish prisoners,

 

Yeah, Im really going to trust them.

So why do you trust war when it also did nothing to help the Jews?

[Soxbadger]

Why is it ok for Assad and the rebels to blow each other and lots of civilians up with conventional weapons but not chemical weapons.

 

 

 

The only available information I've seen, which you dismiss out of hand, is that there is greater risk to civilian life by intervening.

 

1) Because the price of freedom is blood. We have all had to pay it. Its just historical fact. In a perfect world people would allow peaceful change, but that wont ever happen.

 

2) The information you presented is terrible and I believe I proved why. You have yet to show me how that article can come to that conclusion beyond mere speculation. There is literally no way you can compare the same conflict and say "In X scenario there was no intervention in Y scenario there was intervention". If you could, then maybe the information would be worth while. But otherwise its merely an opinion piece, which is fun, but not something I need to consider cannon.

[Soxbadger]

So why do you trust war when it also did nothing to help the Jews?

 

I dont trust anything but myself.

 

Im not advocating for intervention in Syria, Im arguing against the idea that you shouldn't intervene because people may die due to intervention. Its just historically absurd.

[Balta1701]

I dont trust anything but myself.

 

Im not advocating for intervention in Syria, Im arguing against the idea that you shouldn't intervene because people may die due to intervention. Its just historically absurd.

No one has said that.

 

What we've said is that we shouldn't intervene if intervening kills a lot more people than not intervening.

 

If you can give me an outline of a succesful way to pull this off, I'm listening. Bombing Assad's capabilities in a small attack doesn't do anything. A large attack a-la libya doesn't seem to have any expectation of success since so much of the fighting is house to house and there aren't concentrated forces that can be knocked off, and even if we tried there's no reason to think it would produce anything but a debacle like Libya is today. An attack on the chemical weapons themselves is no better than just spraying the gas ourselves since the bombs would disperse the chemicals. A long term occupation didn't save lives in Iraq or even slow down the civil war, it killed hundreds of thousands and intensified the civil war.

 

How do you do this? What do you hit with these grand freedom bombs to save lives?

[southsider2k5]

The same way any other counter-factual-to-real-world is examined. Obviously you cannot know for sure, but you can study and compare different situations throughout history in which there were interventions and which there weren't. Balta posted this link a few pages back:

 

http://themonkeycage.org/2013/08/27/do-mil...+Monkey+Cage%29

 

This is a challenge with any counter-factual research, but that doesn't mean it's impossible to do.

 

From the conclusion:

 

 

If you have third-party troops on the ground that you believe both sides will refrain from attacking, intervention can protect civilian populations. Lobbing a bunch of missiles, which is the only thing anyone is talking about or considering, won't do that.*

 

*According to this paper. I'm open to any studies that suggest otherwise.

 

So going into the data of this study, a couple of things jump out at me very quickly.

 

#1- Nothing with North Korea is included in the study, yet how many millions have died there?

 

#2- They excluded Rwanda because it was an "extreme outlier". Um, that is kind of the point here. If no action is taken, the worst case scenario is an "extreme outlier" which is what is trying to be avoided by intervention. Again, how are you supposed to know without the gift of hindsight that something isn't going to result in an extreme until it happens.

 

They basically ignored anything that would skew the data against them.

 

[southsider2k5]

If you're sending in food aid and the government "steals it all", then the civil war has pretty much ended because the government won, and at least people start getting fed. Otherwise, food and medicine will wind up being used by people who need food and medicine because neither side controls the country. Saying that somehow the government will steal it all really shows a complete lack of understanding of the situation.

 

You might not be able to get food aid into downtown Homs, but there are millions of refugees within and outside of the country who desperately need aid and the price of a single missile could save hundreds.

 

lol. You can't be serious. If aid shows up, the rebels stop rebelling even if they don't get fed?

[Jake]

I see no good endings in any scenario.

 

No intervention = ??? deaths, ??? in power

 

We intervene = ??? deaths, extremist muslims in power

 

From my understanding of this situation, we're not going to want either group in power, but Assad's regime may be better.

 

Not to mention the long term effect is more money, more risk of getting sucked into another conflict, and more of a permanent hit on foreign relations in that region.

Edited August 30, 2013 by Jake