December 2, 2013
NEWS
President Obama is willing to attack without the mandate of the United Nations, if it comes to that. President Obama wants Assad punished for the poison gas attacks that occurred. If there were to be U.S. soldiers sent into Syria, more American lives would be in danger because, yet again, the United States would be involving itself in another foreign conflict, that not only the country cannot afford, but that the country is not involved in. This would be an immoral act according to international law, since there is no threat that the United States needs to defend itself against, and an act of recklessness. It is time to take a step back and begin to understand that it is not the responsibility of the United States to fix everyone else’s problems. Yes, something needs to be done about this awful situation, but does that mean that the United States needs to be thoroughly invested and involved in it at this point in time? With the national debt approaching $17 trillion, and the military already in Iraq and Afghanistan, is it really necessary to go into Syria as well? It is time to come to the understanding that not everybody wants the help of the United States, and that the United States cannot be responsible for taking over every time there is an alleged tyrant in another country. This situation is comparable to Vietnam, and I find it hard to believe that that is something that the country wants to go through again. The US government must to listen to its people, and the people oppose the Syrian attack.
Syria and Pace: Bridging the Gap By Erkinaz Shuminov “The more I heard about rebellion, the more I saw foreigners.” Unlike most of the attendees of Dr. Bolton’s Syria discussion, Gabriel, who lived in Syria, does not view the Syrian uprising as a political revolt against the government. In fact, he thinks the civil conflict is “more like an invasion than a rebellion.” He disagrees when a student refers to the Syrian government as a dictatorship. To begin the discussion, Dr. Bolton expressed a similar yearning to understand what his audience thought about the Syrian situation. He asked us all what the conflict in Syria meant to us. One student explained that if the United States spends its tax dollars to intervene in
The Honors Herald if the United States spends its tax dollars to intervene in Syria, then one has an obligation to understand the conflict. Another student believed that by invoking responses from foreign powers, the conflict strongly affects international law and should therefore be studied. Dr. Bolton then asked the audience what they thought of when they heard the word Syria. The answers reflected the media coverage surrounding the conflict: oil, civil war, Assad regime, violence, chemical weapons, Russia, the United States, and propaganda. Challenging us, the professor then asked that we examine the associations we make with Syria. “Why did none of you say poetry or art?” he asked, and “why did you think of Russia and the U.S. when you heard Syria?” It became clear that many of us knew little about the country that we kept hearing about in the news. Dr. Bolton explained that most outsiders see Syria as an “abstract entity” and a “vague group of possibly violent people.” He cautioned that our negative and uninformed perceptions of Syria may bias our responses to the Syrian conflict. If “Syria somehow represents for us death,” he continued, “then naturally we wouldn’t expect a peaceful resolution to the conflict.” A significant portion of the opposition participates in nonviolent activism, yet the Syrian revolt somehow provokes violent images. To end the discussion, Dr. Bolton offered six action steps that we can take to better understand the Syrian conflict and our country’s role in it. First, he stressed that we should never stop discussing—there is always information to uncover. Secondly, he encouraged us to understand that a conflict is never neatly divided into two sides, such as the regime and the opposition. Third, “no conflict erupts out of nothing.” Similar to his first point, his fourth point stressed awareness and education. He recommended accessing Al Jazeera and BBC for reliable, unbiased, and thorough information. His fifth step suggested that we identify the problem before we devise a solution. Lastly, the professor reminded us of our relevance to the Syrian situation. Though we are in another country, we are still connected to the conflict. Dr. Bolton’s wants students to realize that “you’re part of the ‘we’” in the question “What should we do?”