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[Dunamisdeos]

The rest of us aren't so cool with declaring war on Russia's allies, you see.

So you're saying that the strike on the Syrian airport was a terrorist attack by the US, if you say it's not an act of war.

I don't think it's a binary thing. Is the prevention of chemical attacks against civilians really a "political goal" sought after by the western world? I feel like its more of a direct moral obligation to stop the horrific murder of children if you have the ability to do so. I also feel like it's important to balance that against outright war between major military powers.

Yeah, see, the actions you seem to want amount to an actual declaration of war. That is what we call it when we gather allies, set terms, and make plans for future military strikes with the intent of destroying another party's ability to make war.

The rest of us aren't so cool with declaring war on Russia's allies, you see.

::EDIT::
Also, I'm glad we revised our stance once they started gassing human infants in the streets. That seems like a thing worth making an exception for.

Mate, you've just made about a half dozen assumptions about what I was saying that I didn't say, and have previously stated things that should make it damn obvious I wouldn't agree with.

Seriously. Gathering allies, identifying desired terms, and planning for future action is also goddamn diplomacy, and what you do when you want to come to a negotiating table. How you show you're a rational actor that's willing and able to communicate through means other than force. You are the one that jumped straight to violent action and discarded the possibility of other means, even in the face of implying "other means" is exactly what you're supporting. And hey, you want to know an easy way to declare war on someone? Launch a surprise attack on a nation you're not in open conflict with, without making clear exactly what you want and what the consequences will be, while completely disregarding whatever procedure your previous agreements had laid out as consequence for violation. 'Cause I'm pretty sure the last agreement on this that was brokered -- through threat, diplomacy, and measured display of willingness to commit to action, not off the goddamn cuff near entirely symbolic bombing -- didn't have a clause in whatever the wording was that said, "Should this agreement be violated, the related party will be bombed without attempt at negotiation or any goddamn thing else."

You'll also note well I've said before that I wouldn't be entirely adverse to intervention, and I said fucking nowhere that gassing civilians isn't an act worth censure, military or otherwise. What concerns I have about that sort of thing are secondary to what my concerns about this particular bloody clusterfuck are.

1) You made a direct complaint about the President going back on his word about military intervention in Syria.  You are either on board with the concept of intervention in the face of chemical attacks or you are not.

2) It was not a surprise attack. Advance notice was given. The point is to give enough notice to move human personnel out while also not giving them enough time to move everything valuable out of the spot you want to blow up.

3) We gathered allies, we identified the terms of stopping their chemical attacks, and took action that proved we were willing to act. This is diplomacy. Explicitly stating that we are going to destroy your ability to make war is actually war. I can't think of a more damaging military action than the one that was taken that does not amount to this.

4) Chemical weapons are internationally illegal. Immediate retribution of some kind is implied after their use, regardless of other existing treaties.

You seem to have a problem with the person who carried out the strike, rather than the strike itself.

Also, I'm glad we revised our stance once they started gassing human infants in the streets.

So, what evidence is there of this claim? I also agree ISIS gassing children to garner good PR for overthrowing a secular elected leader is a thing worth revising your stance over.

Have you guys not watched the videos taken by the humanitarian workers at the site of the attack?

I feel like you can't really have an fully informed opinion on what's going on until you watch them frantically strip limp infants of their clothes to rinse them, while also knowing from the death toll reports that they don't succeed in saving their lives.

Sorry about the above there, I don't mean  to imply that your opinions are worthless. But there is ample footage of this.

[PTTG??]

If you're going to make an argument that a humanitarian crisis demands immediate American response, then you need to prioritize. We need to face the largest humanitarian crisis first by invading North Korea. Sound good?

[Dunamisdeos]

If you're going to make an argument that a humanitarian crisis demands immediate American response, then you need to prioritize. We need to face the largest humanitarian crisis first by invading North Korea. Sound good?

No, I think that if North Korea decides to chemical bomb its citizens in the streets, a more measured response than war would be required. I feel like I've said a few times now that outright war is a thing to avoid while also taking some kind of action.

Also, North Korea is not Syria. I expect a different response would be thought of. Also, we aren't talking about every humanitarian crisis, we are talking about actually gassing babies in the streets, which is a thing that just happened. I don't see how people can keep redirecting away from the actual dead babies that were the catalyst to action here.

[Frumple]

1) You made a direct complaint about the President going back on his word about military intervention in Syria.  You are either on board with the concept of intervention in the face of chemical attacks or you are not.

Dun, my complaint regarding the president is because doing that undermined his word to the entire goddamn world, after he spent something approaching a half a decade saying to everyone and anyone that intervention of this nature was the wrong thing to do -- he explicitly said this in regards to the last time chemical weapons were used in syria. You'll note again. My point with him is that he was stridently against the concept of intervention, even in the face of chemical attacks, for years, and this about-face turn is going to screw what credibility he might have had with the world on the subject of military intervention into the ground. Frankly, while I do agree chemical attacks are something worthy of intervention, I don't agree the cost involved with a response like this was worth its effects. In one unhesitating violation of his stated principles, Trump has done something that is almost certainly going to make it more difficult in the future to prevent things like that gas attack, because he's shown that any word he makes on the negotiating table in regards to what he will or will not do with the american military is worth less than shit.

I am not against the concept of intervention in the face of chemical attacks. I am against the concept of fucking stupidity and expending political capital and trust when it's not even remotely necessary and the desired results can be achieved without it, particularly when there's functionally no material guarantee results are going to be achieved with it.

2) It was not a surprise attack. Advance notice was given. The point is to give enough notice to move human personnel out while also not giving them enough time to move everything valuable out of the spot you want to blow up.

Advance notice was given. Maybe a day before the attack, with no allowance for recourse, communication, explanation, nothing. You can quibble over the exact terminology if you really want, but regardless this was an attack that was done in a way to intentionally limit the ability to respond (militarily or otherwise). If it's not strictly speaking a surprise attack it's close enough to barely bloody matters, and it was done in the face of not actually being in a state of open goddamn conflict with the nation in question. That. Is a good way to start a war.

And that's not getting into, again, that some of the definitions involved in this as to what counts as advanced warning was basically nothing.

3) We gathered allies, we identified the terms of stopping their chemical attacks, and took action that proved we were willing to act. This is diplomacy. Explicitly stating that we are going to destroy your ability to make war is actually war. I can't think of a more damaging military action than the one that was taken that does not amount to this.

The damage was barely existent by accounts both american and otherwise. We gathered no allies (our attempts at communicating apparently boiled down the political equivalent of, "Yolo motherfuckers, we're going in."), we stated no terms save stop and offered no means of demonstrating the intent to, and our action shat upon the reliability of the american word. As for better targets, hey. Maybe actually identify and hit a production facility, stop capability of use rather than maybe blowing up some planes and doing some damage to a single air base. Hell, that would have been even less of an attack on their ability to make war than what we did, which was actually attack their ability to make war, and it would have actually impacted their ability to produce and deploy the weapons in question.

4) Chemical weapons are internationally illegal. Immediate retribution of some kind is implied after their use, regardless of other existing treaties.

Odd, that isn't what happened last time. Or, near as I can recall, just about any other time it's been used, including when the US was overtly supporting it. That last time bought us, what, three, four years from a regime in near constant conflict of refraining from use, and making overt (if apparently insufficient) material motions to display a reduction in capability? Seriously, the existing agreement being spoken of was literally one about refraining from using chemical weapons and working to disarm the stocks. There would have been stipulations as to what to do in the face of a violation, that would have allowed for retribution without most of the negative issues political and otherwise this particular attempt did.

You seem to have a problem with the person who carried out the strike, rather than the strike itself.

I've got a serious goddamn problem with how the strike was done, since to all appearances it basically cocked up on every level except managing to land some bombs on an air base -- basically every other thing about it could have been done better, and generally significantly so. So far as this attack goes, my problems with trump are only to the extent he's the sort of shit that would go forward with a clusterfuck of this nature.

Point I've been making, isn't that a strike was a bad idea (it may have been, it may not have been, but that's not my immediate and largest issue with it), it was that a strike done in this manner was a bloody terrible idea. This was not a victory on the net. It was not an objective achieved, unless you for some reason consider wrecking a few runways and some planes as an objective worth mentioning. It was a symbolic expenditure of munitions that probably set us back on about a dozen fronts, for a gain that is quite possibly going to functionally be nothing. If it's not obvious at this point what my problem with this mess is, I'm not sure how to better communicate it.

[PTTG??]

If you're going to make an argument that a humanitarian crisis demands immediate American response, then you need to prioritize. We need to face the largest humanitarian crisis first by invading North Korea. Sound good?

No, I think that if North Korea decides to chemical bomb its citizens in the streets, a more measured response than war would be required. I feel like I've said a few times now that outright war is a thing to avoid while also taking some kind of action.

Also, North Korea is not Syria. I expect a different response would be thought of. Also, we aren't talking about every humanitarian crisis, we are talking about actually gassing babies in the streets, which is a thing that just happened. I don't see how people can keep redirecting away from the actual dead babies that were the catalyst to action here.

Because "Dead babies" was the excuse used in 2001 and 2002 to go to war in the middle east, and it was stupid then and it's stupid now. And let's be real here, if we were trying to prevent a chemical attack, we would have bombed the fucking chemical depots, not a random airstrip. If we wanted to help Syrians, we wouldn't fucking block immigration from there.

The real reason for this is obvious. Trump wants to drum up support through being a "wartime" president. If he can't declare war, he'll still get credit for fighting.

[Dunamisdeos]

I don't think we know where the chemical depots are? Do we know that? And no, "possible and unconfirmed WMD's" were used back then, not "actively occurring chemical attacks on civilian targets". Also depending on where they are, explosively releasing massive tanks of chemicals might have a negative repercussion or two. The idea is that they have them, and we don't want to go in with boots on the ground to dismantle them. That IS what we did back in the early 2000's.

Also, I don't think that France, the UK, and NATO are on board with advancing Trumps' personal image. They certainly haven't been in the past. Whatever Trump hopes to gain is irrelevant in the face of what has happened.

How can we possibly be more concerned with preventing Trump from gaining an iota of positive public image than what just happened over there. Is that really our priority?

[Frumple]

... when that "positive public image" is for something that could plunge us into war and fuck ever political relation we have present and future sideways, yes, some things are higher priority than going along with the shit trying to spin a fuckup as something we should be appreciative of. The ability to manage negotiation in the future is more important than immediate retaliation for the deaths of at most a few hundred among a country and conflict that's put well over a hundred thousand in the grave, however heinous those deaths were.

The use of chemical weapons might have been worth expending capital political and otherwise on, but immediately gratifying some kind of desire for fucking vengeance or whatever the hell damn sure wasn't. Blood can be taken for those deaths next week or next month just as well as yesterday, if that's really what it takes, but having the tools and reputation necessary to stop the stuff from happening without more people dying is a hell of a lot more important.

In any case, if we didn't know where chemical depots are, maybe we find them before bombing something. Bloody hell, is the concept of hitting something just because you can't be arsed to wait for a better target being a bad idea really that hard to grasp?

[Dunamisdeos]

I think it matters to the people who are likely to get chemical bombed while we take our time thinking, yes.

A lack of immediate action means implied freedom to continue chemical attacks. Remember we are not trying to remove their physical capacity to take any kind of action. This kind of action is a statement, not a committed military campaign. They are specifically avoiding anything that might look like a military campaign, hence the fully intended lack of real impact to their military machine.

Diplomacy has already failed to some degree when someone begins defying international law to commit crimes against humanity in full view of the international community. Assad knew quite well that there were humanitarian workers on-site, and did not care. Further action was necessary to make the intended point.

[PTTG??]

We are not the fucking world police! Go join antifa if you want to fight the good fight.

[Frumple]

... literally no other time in my life, as near as I can recall, did the use of chemical weapons warrant or receive an immediate response, especially a single incident of it, and particularly of the nature of this response. You're trying to paint a picture that's not been used previously dun, to excuse action that may very well cause more damage than what would happen to those hypothetical bombed people. I think at this point, it should be obvious why I'm pretty damn unhappy about what happened, and hopefully why you're having me disagree pretty damn hard with what you're saying.

And, y'know, again. Maybe instead of an action that, by US accounts, destroyed around 4% of their air force (and possibly a vital 4% of an air force stretched thin), we had hit something that was not involved in the military machine more or less period. And was actually involved in the capacity to deploy chemical weapons and little to nothing else. Y'know, a target that would have been worth a damn and actually supported the position you're agreeing is important, instead of actually doing what you're saying should be avoided and making little to no direct impact on their capability to field chemical weapons to boot.

[Baffler]

Go join antifa if you want to fight the good fight.

I hope you don't actually believe this.

Edit: To clarify, they have 'nascent domestic terrorist organization' written all over them, and even now the """""fascists""""" they target for violence and intimidation are often pretty badly selected. I don't think a bunch of jumped up rich kids who want to "make a difference" but are too stupid and full of ideology to do anything but beat up trash cans and start fights with anyone to the right of Karl Marx himself are even able to do good, even by accident.

[Dunamisdeos]

This.... isn't hypothetical? People were actually victims of a chemical attack. I might misunderstand you there. I don't think we can sign something like the Geneva Protocol if we are unprepared to be part of it's enforcement. It does actually call the signing members to action in case of a breach, you may note. Did we sign it to make ourselves feel safe, or to actually keep people safe?

Also, a target not involved in the military machine? What would we have hit if not a legitimate military target? I know you aren't actually implying that we hit something civilian, but in a strike like this it's going to be either-or. I think especially with all of the allegations floating around of our drones causing collateral damage it would be important to select a 100% unequivocal non-civilian target.

The prevailing theory does seem to believe that they were dispersed via plane, thought this isn't confirmed. I think that in this frame an airbase neatly fits the "involved in chemical weapons" without actually being tanks of chemicals.

And the point is to not actually impede their military capacity. They were flying planes out of that base the same day. The point is to let them know that we are not willing to stand by and allow them to continue chemical attacks. Anything but an immediate response sends exactly that wrong message.

There's a large number of Kurds who might disagree as to whether or not an immediate response to the use of chemical weapons is warranted, if we could ask them.

TLDR MY SIDE OF THIS
I can definitely understand how someone could have an opposing view of what should have been done in response. I think that an immediate response of SOME kind was necessary. I think that the idea that the entirety of the western world manufactured this strike to improve Trump's political image is nutty.

[sluissa]

The problem with attacking chemical weapons sources is that they're hard to identify as chemical weapons until they're in weapon form. Assad has been using chlorine primarily when he resorts to chemical weapons. Chlorine is one of those things that's just so easy to make that... well... I could go out in my garage and make a chlorine weapon out of what I have lying around. Sarin is more complicated... and more deadly, but when you break it down into what you need to make it... a lot of it is just commercially available products and a little bit of knowledge and equipment to mix them together. It's the Breaking Bad lesson. Everything is chemistry when you get down to it and if you have the right elements to mix together and the knowledge to do so, you can make just about anything. Assad could literally just have a Walter White out in an RV somewhere mixing up sarin on demand. Given how little he uses it and how often he resorts to simpler methods, that might even be the case.

You can't take away the ability of the person to commit a crime. If the desire is there they'll find a way. But what you do is when you find they've done so, you make sure there is a punishment waiting. You make it so it's no longer worth committing the crimes for fear of the punishment waiting.

[PTTG??]

Go join antifa if you want to fight the good fight.

I hope you don't actually believe this.

Edit: To clarify, they have 'nascent domestic terrorist organization' written all over them, and even now the """""fascists""""" they target for violence and intimidation are often pretty badly selected. I don't think a bunch of jumped up rich kids who want to "make a difference" but are too stupid and full of ideology to do anything but beat up trash cans and start fights with anyone to the right of Karl Marx himself are even able to do good, even by accident.

Hey, thanks for finding my point.

[Frumple]

This.... isn't hypothetical? People were actually victims of a chemical attack. I might misunderstand you there. I don't think we can sign something like the Geneva Protocol if we are unprepared to be part of it's enforcement. It does actually call the signing members to action in case of a breach, you may note. Did we sign it to make ourselves feel safe, or to actually keep people safe?

You're the one that brought up the possibility of folks being bombed while better options were sought, dun. That's the hypothetical you put on the table, that waiting is going to matter for people conceptually gassed in the interim, and apparently more than most consequences rapid action may entail.

... you also seem to think it's to make ourselves feel safe, since you're supporting actions that can very easily cause greater problems than the chemical attack itself. I'm definitely on the keep safe side, which is why this kind of reactionary lash out is exactly what I'm against, particularly when it involved the particulars it did.

Also, a target not involved in the military machine? What would we have hit if not a legitimate military target?

I've... already said it. Repeatedly. Hit production. Find out whatever it is you can hit that's actually strictly related and integral to the chemical weapons. Stuff like that. If that takes more time and more care in how you act, fine. If economic repercussions are more effective, fine. You don't actually have to punch someone in the face the second they do wrong to communicate there will be repercussions or follow through with them.

Also probably worth noting that analysis of flight patterns et al coming out of the base compared to previously is suggesting the hit had pretty significant effect. Some planes being able to lift doesn't necessitate the damage had little impact. Hard to tell for sure at the moment since disinformation on that front is flying from every side, but eh.

TLDR MY SIDE OF THIS
I can definitely understand how someone could have an opposing view of what should have been done in response. I think that an immediate response of SOME kind was necessary. I think that the idea that the entirety of the western world manufactured this strike to improve Trump's political image is nutty.

Hey, say it again. I'm not actually against response. I'm not even against immediate response, strictly speaking, so long as it's measured and utilised properly. I'm just saying that this response in particular gives few to no signs of being any of that. Also not sure where you're even getting that idea from. Most I've noticed is the likelihood that people are rolling with trump being trump, not that they manufactured it, so far as western nations go.