{"id":109286,"date":"2018-04-16T12:02:20","date_gmt":"2018-04-16T11:02:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=109286"},"modified":"2018-04-14T19:58:31","modified_gmt":"2018-04-14T18:58:31","slug":"major-war-journalism-papers-urge-trump-to-kill-syrians-risk-world-war-iii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2018\/04\/major-war-journalism-papers-urge-trump-to-kill-syrians-risk-world-war-iii\/","title":{"rendered":"Major War Journalism Papers Urge Trump to Kill Syrians, Risk World War III"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

The New York Times (4\/9\/18) calls Syria \u201ca crucial test for Mr. Trump, who has shirked America\u2019s traditional leadership role.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

12 Apr 2018 – <\/em>Western governments accuse the Syrian government of carrying out a chemical weapon attack in Douma, a suburb of Damascus. The World Health Organization says that, of 70 deceased persons they examined in the area, 43 had signs of being exposed to \u201chighly toxic chemicals,\u201d though whether the government carried out the attack has not been confirmed, and even the US\u2014despite its public stance\u2014was reportedly \u201cstill assessing the evidence of the attack\u201d and \u201cdid not know which chemical was used, or whether it was launched by the Syrian government or forces supporting the government\u201d (New York Times<\/strong>, 4\/11\/18<\/a>).<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump is threatening to escalate the Syrian war, as are France and the United Kingdom, while Israel apparently bombed Syria<\/a> three days ago. In this context, major \u201cliberal\u201d media outlets are writing that Trump should attack Syria further.<\/p>\n

Clamoring for Catastrophe<\/strong><\/p>\n

A New York Times<\/strong> editorial \u00a0(4\/9\/18<\/a>) used rather weaselly language to call for more war on Syria. \u201cThe president should know by now that tough talk without a coherent strategy or follow-through is dangerous,\u201d the paper wrote. Saying that Trump should \u201cfollow through\u201d on his \u201ctough talk\u201d is a way of saying that he should carry out his threats against Syria and its allies. In the bizarro world where the paper evidently operates, it\u2019s not<\/em> dropping bombs that is \u201cdangerous,\u201d even though the bombs are presumably unsafe for the Syrians beneath them. Another air attack on Syria could provoke a wider war in the Middle East, as well as risk direct confrontation with Russia and possibly even China (National Interest<\/strong>, 4\/4\/18<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The editorial opened by saying that the world had \u201cgrown numb to the slaughter of civilians in Syria\u201d until it saw pictures from Douma. The cognitive dissonance is astounding: The paper notes the emotional potency of pictures of dead and wounded Syrians while saying that the US should ratchet up the war in Syria, a move that is guaranteed\u2014as we know from the results of US attacks on Iraq<\/a>, Libya<\/a> and Syria<\/a> itself\u2014to produce victims who are just as dead and injured as the ones in the photos described.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

\u201cOne feel-good bomb-fest does not a strategy make,\u201d writes the Guardian\u2018s Simon Tisdall (4\/9\/18)\u2013a strategy is making your enemies \u201cfeel the pain.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

A Guardian<\/strong> article by Simon Tisdall (4\/9\/18<\/a>) article suffers from the same affliction. He demands Western military action and explains that this recommendation<\/p>\n

means destroying Assad\u2019s combat planes, bombers, helicopters and ground facilities from the air. It means challenging Assad\u2019s and Russia\u2019s control of Syrian airspace. It means taking out Iranian military bases and batteries in Syria if they are used to prosecute the war. And it means keeping up the pressure when they push back, which they will, until Putin, his Damascene partner-in-war-crimes, and Iran\u2019s cocky Revolutionary Guard commanders get the message, feel the pain, count the escalating cost, and stop trying to kill civilians.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Even if one accepts that the US has the right to do such things, which it doesn\u2019t, such actions cannot be undertaken without killing the very civilians that Tisdall claims he wants to save. The \u201cdestroying\u201d and \u201ctaking out\u201d he mentions happen through bombing. In Afghanistan, to take one of many possible comparisons, American bombing killed 1,000\u20131,300 civilians<\/a> in the first three months alone, and that war will turn 17 in October.<\/p>\n

The answer to Tisdall\u2019s question, \u201cCan we no longer distinguish between right and wrong?\u201d is apparently that it is \u201cright\u201d to kill thousands of Syrians and provoke the governments of Syria, Russia and Iran. He laments the \u201cmerciless attacks\u201d he attributes to the governments of Syria and Russia, leaving readers to conclude that when America inevitably kills further civilians in Syria, those attacks will be merciful.<\/p>\n

The Washington Post<\/strong> (4\/9\/18<\/a>) also encourages the US to risk World War III and \u00a0kill Syrians in what would almost certainly be enormous numbers, because \u201cPresident Trump will deal another blow to US global leadership if he does not follow through\u201d on his declaration \u201cthat Syria will pay a \u2018big price\u2019\u201d for its alleged use of chemical weapons.<\/p>\n

Crime Is Law<\/strong><\/p>\n

The New York Times<\/strong> contends that \u201cif a Russian veto prevents Security Council action, then Mr. Trump needs to work with our allies, through NATO or otherwise.\u201d Wars are illegal under international if they lack UN authorization<\/a>, but the Times<\/strong> argues that the US should nonetheless ramp up its war on Syria without UN approval. (The reference to NATO incorrectly implies that NATO, a military alliance, has some kind of legal authority.) Yet in the next paragraph, the paper notes that \u201cthe use of poison gas,\u201d which it accuses the Syrian government of doing, is \u201ca war crime under international law.\u201d Thus the editorial invokes international law to legitimize an attack on Syria immediately after urging the US to violate international law.<\/p>\n

Tisdall also argues that the US needs to break international law so as to uphold international law, writing that \u201callied military intervention, better late than never,\u201d would uphold \u201cinternational law.\u201d In other words, international law is vitally important, but it only applies to Washington\u2019s enemies.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

The Washington Post (4\/9\/18) warns that if Trump doesn\u2019t do what he tweeted, it will \u201cdeal another blow to US global leadership.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

These articles rest on the assumption that the United States has a right to control Syria, and should kill Syrians and drive them from their homes to assert that right. The Post<\/strong> editorial says, \u201cWhat\u2019s really needed is a concerted strategy for protecting the vital American interests wrapped up in the multi-sided Syrian war.\u201d The paper then wrote that<\/p>\n

the reality Mr. Trump has not yet faced is that as long as the dictator he called \u201cAnimal Assad\u201d remains in place, Syria\u2019s wars will continue, breeding Islamist terrorists and propelling refugees toward Europe. Mr. Trump does have an advantage that Mr. Obama lacked: Thanks to the capture by US and allied forces of a large part of eastern Syria, the United States has the capacity to stabilize at least part of the country and has leverage in demanding an acceptable outcome to the war.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The first sentence of this paragraph indicates that the Post<\/strong> thinks the only \u201cacceptable outcome to the war\u201d is the overthrow of the Syrian government. The passage suffers not only from its unfounded assumption that the US has a right to decide who governs Syria and to enforce that with arms, but also from its failure to consider what will happen should Washington attempt to do so. An escalation of America\u2019s war on Syria will almost certainly mean that \u201cSyria\u2019s wars will continue,\u201d since the Syrian government and its partners from Iran, Russia, Iraq and Hezbollah can be expected to fight back against US efforts to dominate the country. In that scenario, refugees will indeed be \u201cpropel[led] toward Europe,\u201d as they will if the US ousts the Syrian government and ushers in total social collapse, as it did in Libya (FAIR.org<\/strong>, 11\/28\/17<\/a>). Thus what the paper purports to be worried about is virtually guaranteed to result from the course it recommends.<\/p>\n

The Times<\/strong>, meanwhile, says that<\/p>\n

to have any chance of success, any international retaliatory action must be part of a coherent diplomatic strategy for stabilizing Syria and putting a political settlement in place\u2026. The conflict has allowed Russia, Iran, Turkey and the Islamic State, now degraded by an American-led coalition, to gain a foothold in Syria.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Notably absent from this list of actors are the United States and its proxy Israel, both of whom have \u201cfootholds\u201d in Syria: The US controls \u201cabout one-third [of Syria], including most of its oil wealth\u201d (New York Times<\/strong>, 3\/8\/18<\/a>). Israel, meanwhile, has illegally annexed Syria\u2019s Golan Heights, and has sought to expand its control of Syrian territory throughout the country\u2019s war (FAIR.org<\/strong>, 2\/21\/18<\/a>). These \u201cfootholds,\u201d however, are supposedly legitimate, as would be any further \u201cfoothold\u201d America and its partners would gain from escalating their war on Syria.<\/p>\n

This style of coverage\u2014enthusiastic about the moral need for violence but oblivious to its obvious consequences\u2014inhibits the public\u2019s capacity to make sense of the extremely dangerous moment in which we are living.<\/p>\n

_________________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Gregory Shupak teaches media studies at the University of Guelph-Humber in Toronto. His book<\/em>, The Wrong Story: Palestine, Israel and the Media, is published by OR Books.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 fair.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

12 Apr 2018 – Clamoring for Catastrophe: President Donald Trump is threatening to escalate the Syrian war, as are France and the United Kingdom, while Israel bombed Syria three days ago. In this context, major \u201cliberal\u201d media outlets are writing that Trump should attack Syria further.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-109286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109286\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}