We, as North Americans are blessed to not have this kind of war in our faces each day. It is easy for us to sit in front of our computers talking about what our governments and soldiers should be doing in other countries. Now imagine yourself on the ground, a Syrian, only 4 years of age. While your sibling chokes and dies beside you, your parents are already gone, bombed to death and you lay in the rubble. Now write your opinion based as that child, or their grandparent maybe. Our leaders need to think about the innocent victims. WHY??
You know, up till this point I honestly thought you were making a case
against US government intervention. You see, every horror you have outlined here is very likely to result from exactly the sort of bombing campaign the US now proposes to do. I was kind of surprised to see that you thought you were making a case for government intervention.
Fighting for peace is like you-know-what for virginity. It's a crazy idea. Lots of total innocents will be hurt, and, if we're lucky, we may get a few soldiers on the side of the Syrian government. Assad clearly isn't going to care either way, if he did gas his own people. Note that the US government has not only refused to release what information they have on who perpetrated this, but are actively involved in covering it up by forcing UN investigators to leave the area, just like Iraq. Negotiations may not be of any help at all here, but I guarantee you that if the US invades Syria (and, let's face it, if we bomb them for several days there is no way any Syrian will see it as anything other then an invasion, how would you feel if China started bombing Kentucky for a few days?), it will only result in far more bloodshed and disaster all around.
Oh, and before anyone brings in that lame old "ohhhh...appeasment, Chamberlain, Hitler" trope, let me just say that World War 2 was absolutely a just war and Hitler was a madman who might well have succeeded in taking over the entire world if we had not stepped in. I agree that appeasement was totally wrong...
in that one instance. In every other way in all of history (far as I can tell) appeasement has just been what people called it when they thought they could go to war and make a huge profit off other people's deaths. I'll give you world war 2, but that's it. Whenever people propose some kind of military action on foreign soil they either have no clue what war is really like, or they're not risking their own necks and they don't care what it costs others.
I say we need a new constitutional amendment. No actions on foreign soil ever unless the goals to be achieved, the likelihood of achieving them, and the costs expected (in lives, time, injuries, material, and money) are clearly spelled out to the American people, proof is provided of the necessity, and all of America gets to vote in a referendum where the number of voters must be at least half the average of the last 3 presidential elections. If, after the American people do decide the war is a good idea after all, and it is later discovered that there were lies committed by those who laid out the goals, probability of success, and costs of the war, then those who lied (if proven in a court of law) are to be immediately killed.
War is never fought over just causes, war is fought in order to make rich men richer.