What\u2019s needed in Syria is not military intervention, but a global peace offensive. <\/i><\/p>\n
\u00a0(Note: Rob Prince teaches at the Korbel School of International Studies. Although tangentially, he has been associated with the University of Denver\u2019s Center for Middle East Studies and has participated in a number of its public forums, including on the Syrian crisis. Compelled to respond to the February 11, 2014 op-ed in the <\/i>New York Times by colleagues, Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel, he critiques their arguments and makes alternative suggestions for ending the Syrian impasse.)<\/i><\/p>\n
At a moment when the only viable path open to resolving the Syrian conflict lies in a negotiated settlement between the Assad government and the legitimate opposition, two colleagues at the University of Denver\u2019s Korbel School of International Studies, Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel of the Center for Middle East Studies, have put forth an emotional and poorly conceived call for military intervention to resolve the escalating humanitarian crisis there.<\/p>\n
Using logic tinted with Cold War reasoning (blaming the Russians is bit out of fashion) and poor examples (Somalia \u2014 1993?) to bolster their arguments, they put forth their ideas on the subject in an op-ed, in the New York Times <\/i>on February 11<\/a> <\/i>titled \u201cUse Force To Save Starving Syrians.\u201d In a one-sided appeal, they place the blame for the Syrian human debacle almost entirely at the feet of the Assad government for virtually all of the violence.<\/p>\n At the same time, the role of Salafist Islamic militants (trained and funded by the Saudis, Qatar, Turkey, and ultimately supported and manipulated by Washington) is minimized if not denied. Yet it is these elements who have, to a great degree, essentially hijacked a legitimate Syrian opposition movement, internationalized the struggle and continue to wreak havoc and death in their goal to establish Shari\u2019a law in Syria and beyond.<\/p>\n Russia is criticized for failing to restrain the Syrian government\u2019s military actions but no similar demands \u2014 none at all \u2013<\/i> are made of the United States and the Saudis to rein in \u201callies\u201d fighting in the field. Nor is any weight given to the extensive human, infrastructural and cultural damage these Islamic fundamentalist elements have done or to their utter viciousness, cruelty and politically retrograde nature.<\/p>\n Calling for military intervention as a way to end or at least reduce the bloodshed in Syria does pull at certain ethical heartstrings. But it is, at best, a desperate appeal, <\/i>and at worst, quite frankly, a cynical move meant to give cover to a not especially humane long-term geopolitical considerations. \u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n Indeed, perhaps the sorriest assumption of their argument is that the United States can save the day and end the humanitarian tragedy in Syria by riding in on its white heavenly horse laden with cruise missiles and drones. Are they forgetting Washington\u2019s long record of supporting totalitarian regimes in exchange for oil in the Middle East and elsewhere, and whose involvement in the Syrian tragedy is, incidentally, far from innocent?<\/p>\n One must make a distinction between \u201chumanitarian intervention\u201d in times of war, and military intervention using humanitarian pretexts<\/i>. The latter actually has a very long and sordid history going back several hundred years and has been used by virtually every colonial and neocolonial military intervention and massacre. It is nothing new, although lately, through the thinking of certain American intellectuals (Samantha Powers and others) it has been given a new intellectual gloss.<\/p>\n Pulling out the \u201chumanitarian\u201d pretext has become more in fashion in this post-Cold War era when the United States can no longer argue that countering the \u201cSoviet threat\u201d is a pretext for political and military intervention. Even during the Cold War, the United States would frequently invoke a humanitarian pretext (intermingled with anti-communism) for its Third World interventions, C.I.A. coups, whatever. The bodies of hundreds of thousands of Chileans, Argentinians, Brazilians, Guatamaltecos, Nicaraguans, Salvadoreans, litter the fields and oceans as evidence of the results of that policy.<\/p>\n Of late the swan song of \u201csaving the natives from humanitarian disaster\u201d has been cultivated into a fine art by the French in Africa in their attempt to re-position themselves to insure their share of that continent\u2019s strategic assets, most recently in Mali and now in the Central African Republic. Washington is learning from Paris how to refine the argument. What is usually omitted or denied is the degree to which (in the case of the French in Mali or the U.S. in Syria) French or American behind-the-scene machinations contributed to the crises exploding in the first place. <\/i>This is certainly the case for U.S. political activities in Syria \u2014 publicly calling for a negotiated solution \u2014 less openly training, arming, and financing some of the most dastardly elements in the Middle East to bring down the Assad Regime (or getting regional allies to do so).<\/p>\n Naomi Klein\u2019s Shock Doctrine<\/i> aptly applies to what the United States did in Libya (it was Washington pulling the strings even if the French took the lead in the bombing campaign) and what it has tried to do less successfully in Syria: use the pretext of humanitarian intervention to garner public support for a military-initiated regime change. Follow that up with U.N. Security Council support for limited military actions to give the cover of international law to the operation. Immediately violate the U.N. mandate by unilaterally extending the scope of the approved mission. Get as many \u201callies\u201d on board to do the fighting to extend the weight of the \u201ccoalition of the willing.\u201d<\/p>\n Once the regime change has been accomplished, the societies are restructured along neoliberal lines making for easier economic penetration and exploitation, their formerly more centralized governments fractured in one way or another. Once the fighting is over, offer World Bank and\/or IMF structural adjustment aid to restructure the battered economies and infrastructure along neoliberal lines.<\/p>\n In calling for military intervention in Syria \u2014 something not even the U.S. military itself is particularly enthusiastic about \u2014 Hashemi and Postel cozy up, as they have before on Iran in 2009 and Libya in 2011, with the likes of AIPAC, along with this country\u2019s band of intrepid and misdirected neoconservatives. These are the same elements that pushed this country into invading Iraq and continue to push the Obama Administration to intervene militarily in Syria.<\/p>\n What would be worse at the moment than a U.S.-led military intervention in Syria which has the possibility of aggravating an already destabilized region that much more and probably drawing in other players including Iraq, Iran and possibly Russia. The military situation on the ground over the past year has shifted dramatically in favor of the Assad government and its allies reducing Washington\u2019s goal of regime change in Syria considerably.<\/p>\n The inner workings of the Obama Administration\u2019s decision not to attack Syria<\/i> last September remain hazy. Perhaps someday the deeper logic of the decision to pull away from the abyss will come to light. They seem to include both regional considerations as well as Washington\u2019s desire, not to be exaggerated, to shift American strategic attention to Asia. The concern that military operations in Syria could result in Iraq or Afghanistan-like debacles for US policy probably figured into the decision. U.S. (or U.S.-led) military intervention is not likely to improve the humanitarian tragedy unfolding in Syria but to worsen the already bleak reality that much more. There are no assurances \u2014 none \u2014 that it would in any way resolve the conflict.<\/p>\n Along with near global opposition to such a plan of action, the futility and probable negative results of an attack is figured large in the Obama administration\u2019s decision not <\/i>to initiate military action last September to the relief of much of the world. Whatever, that decision not to pull the military lever<\/i> against Syria, followed by Washington\u2019s opening for negotiations with both Syria and Iran, are some of the (few) wiser decisions that Obama had made on Middle East policy since coming to office in 2008.<\/p>\n Rather than ratcheting up the dangers of the Syrian explosion, is it not the time to do just the opposite? Should we not, instead, press for a negotiated political solution to a conflict that has proven it will have no military solution? Admittedly, the Geneva negotiations over Syria to date have been little more than a charade, but then are we \u2014 the world \u2014 not in a better place wrangling over how to settle the Syrian crisis politically rather than fighting over which targets U.S. drones and Cruise missiles might be targeting?<\/p>\n The failure of this round (Geneva II as it is called) cannot be blamed, as the authors do, on Russian machinations. To the contrary, Russia and most particularly its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, are looking more like the peacemakers in the Syria crisis than is Washington. Global public opinion recognizes very clearly that the Russians have played a positive, if not decisive<\/i>, role in moving the Syrian crisis from big power military confrontation to negotiations while the Obama Administration\u2019s approach is more confused and contradictory.<\/p>\n In a sharp U-turn away from military confrontation, having agreed to multi-party negotiations on Syria, the Obama Administration has gotten cold feet about pursuing the Geneva process seriously. The fact of the matter is that there is no way, none, that Washington can \u201cresolve\u201d the Syrian crisis independently on its own or to its liking. The Obama Administration plan for \u201cregime change\u201d in Syria \u2014 what it has been working for now for several years \u2014 is dead in the water.<\/p>\n What is the alternative vision to ending the humanitarian crisis in Syria\u2026What can be done to stop the bleeding? The following are some steps I would recommend that might just make considerably more impact than bombing Damascus or sending U.S. troops to die in yet another senseless Middle East war. It is a global peace offensive<\/i> that is needed, not military intervention.<\/p>\n ______________________________\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n Rob Prince, whose teaching title has changed five times in the past 20 years, although the job is the same, is Teaching Professor at the University of Denver\u2019s Korbel School of International Studies. In recent years, he has written extensively on North Africa<\/i>. He is also the<\/i> publisher of the\u00a0<\/i>Colorado Progressive Jewish News<\/i><\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n\n