General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSo now history is being rewritten to ignore that regime change was on the table?
Syrias Assad must go, Obama says
President Obama and European leaders called Thursday for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to resign, after months of his violent crackdown on protesters. The rhetorical escalation was backed by new U.S. sanctions designed to undermine Assads ability to finance his military operation.
The future of Syria must be determined by its people, but President Bashar al-Assad is standing in their way, Obama said in a written statement. For the sake of the Syrian people, the time has come for President Assad to step aside.
Obama and Erdogan: Syria's Assad Must Go
winter is coming
(11,785 posts)morningfog
(18,115 posts)pnwmom
(108,978 posts)NOVA_Dem
(620 posts)pnwmom
(108,978 posts)to get involved in a war to depose him.
notadmblnd
(23,720 posts)morningfog
(18,115 posts)That one.
newfie11
(8,159 posts)And will not settle for less. Now Assad must go? Where did that come from.
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)pnwmom
(108,978 posts)when Obama said he wanted Assad to resign.
It has nothing to do with the current crisis.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)pnwmom
(108,978 posts)and he hasn't been threatening that now.
There's no good "regime" to change to, at the moment, since no one really wants the Taliban to take charge.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)pnwmom
(108,978 posts)to depose him.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)Is the USA funding the opposition: aka rebels?
Yes, or No?
pnwmom
(108,978 posts)is connected to al Queda, and the US has no wish for them to take control. What I read a few weeks ago was that the US had been helping more moderate groups but those groups didn't seem ready to step in yet.
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)"It is the policy of the United States to change the momentum on the battlefield in Syria so as to create favourable conditions for a negotiated settlement that ends the conflict and leads to a democratic government in Syria," said the second of two amendments proposed by McCain and Democrat Chris Coons.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/04/syria-senate-committee-vote-military-authorization-obama
NOT EXPLAINED -- Why a guy who apparently has the "momentum of the battlefield" on his side would risk an international intervention over chemical weapons.
pnwmom
(108,978 posts)bornskeptic
(1,330 posts)battlefield. The word "momentum" does not occur. Rather, the resolution emphasizes that the military action authorized would only be for the purpose of deterring use of chemical weapons. It also specifies that the ultimate goal of US policy on Syria is achieving a negotiated settlement. The text is here:
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2013/09/03/full-text-senate-foreign-relations-committee-resolution-on-syria/
Comrade Grumpy
(13,184 posts)Cha
(297,237 posts)Similar shit.. trying to equate Pres Obama to bush as fast as their little keys will let them.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023620531
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)They were so sure that Obama was going to invade Syria and create a 2nd Iraq.
Now that its obvious to them that its never going to happen, they need to flip their outrage machine in a different direction.
Its fun to watch them go back 2 years, find some statement, and then scream "Ah ha!!" ... as if they broke the secret code.
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)But hey, the outrage won't just make itself.
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)sell your soul to John McCain --
"It is the policy of the United States to change the momentum on the battlefield in Syria so as to create favourable conditions for a negotiated settlement that ends the conflict and leads to a democratic government in Syria," said the second of two amendments proposed by McCain and Democrat Chris Coons.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/04/syria-senate-committee-vote-military-authorization-obama
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)McCain is an ass. And that statement is so weak that its meaningless.
Look, I know that some folks are really, really upset that the President isn't going to turn Syria into another Iraq and they predicted, and prove that he's secretly an evil neocon PNAC member in the process.
The President, by staying firm on this, forced Congress to agree to take a vote (something they did not want to do) and that pressure got Russia off the fence.
Oh wait ... you and others think that the Obama administration and the Russians haven't been in talks almost continuously during this entire thing, don't you?
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)I'm well aware plenty of the voices arguing against the war have made this and other absurd accusations. I'll admit some of the CTs conjured to rationalize the President's ill-conceived actions were off the rails.
But the fact of the matter remains, in order to get an AUMF out of the SFRC the President's supporters had to cozy up with that chucklehead.
If you're hearing arguments in other quarters you should confine your rebuttals to that conversation. I'm more than happy defend/explain/whatever any point I have made but only points I have made.
I will grant the premise Obama has been in talks with the Russians. I remain skeptical that this entire debacle was a Good Cop/Bad Cop ploy between the US and Russia with the US volunteering to play Bad Cop. Even assuming that was true Obama has Bad Copped himself into a domestic disaster.
Moreover, all the high-morality warmongering told us we had to PUNISH Assad for the moral offense of gassing people. Not killing people, period, full stop, end-of-sentence; but specifically gassing people. Had the rush to war been framed in the context of getting Assad to surrender his CWs we would have been hearing "surrender his CWs" not the jumping ahead to, "We gonna blow your shit up!"
This entire fiasco stemmed from the infamous red line comment. It would be the height of disingenuous claims to say the original proposition was, "Once Assad crosses the red line we will ask Russia to ask Assad to surrender his CWs."
That being said the OP is on the mark.
bvar22
(39,909 posts)pnwmom
(108,978 posts)R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)Or, in a lame attempt to muddy the waters, are you trying to muddy the water?
pnwmom
(108,978 posts)than it is to start a war to depose him.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)phleshdef
(11,936 posts)pnwmom said "start a war to depose him". Post #18 regards choosing to aide one side of a war that Assad declared on his own citizens. It has nothing to do with what the post you were replying to was saying.
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)phleshdef
(11,936 posts)That doesn't contradict the post in question though. It has very little to do with it.
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)Stop pretending otherwise.
cthulu2016
(10,960 posts)"Our policy on this is very clear. Assad must go"
My recollection is that he did.
LittleBlue
(10,362 posts)It is absurd to think that we're funding rebels bent on regime change, that our Arab and Turkish allies in funding these rebels want regime change, but that we don't want it ourselves. Even when we've stated such in the past.
I seriously wonder what madness is required to believe something like that. Someone else compared it to the Palin cult, which seems accurate.
phleshdef
(11,936 posts)Some of you folks are a few steps away from signing for the Assad fan club at this point, sheesh.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)bobduca
(1,763 posts)I read it here first!
former9thward
(32,006 posts)Because that is who would take over.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)This gets so confusing...
bhikkhu
(10,716 posts)...it was Obama saying Assad should resign. Which I agreed with, but that was quite awhile ago when the civil war was still a small-scale rebellion. At no point in the past couple of years have we been beating the war drum for US-led regime change; even the military has shown no interest.
For anyone interested in a refresher on the Syrian Arab Spring movement, where Assad's actions led to Obama's remarks: http://www.tiki-toki.com/timeline/entry/34854/Syria-Arab-Spring/#vars!date=2011-03-15_11:42:16!.
UTUSN
(70,695 posts)bobduca
(1,763 posts)How better to revise history than to get a jump on it and start revising what happened today?!?
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)some PNAC-like plan to keep us bogged down in the middle east so the fucking petroleum companies can set more all time world history profit records.
Uncle Joe
(58,362 posts)Thanks for the thread, R. Daneel Olivaw.