War America Style

The US has long had a doctrine that it is all right to inflict large civilian casualties with the aim of limited troop casualties. The United States used nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, after which there were thousands and thousands of dead children. Some were carbonized so quickly that nothing was left of them but shadows on the wall. Little children. The US security elite has never apologized for this war crime and continues to menace other nations with this kind of indiscriminate and unspeakable violence every time it announces that “all options are on the table.”

As for chemical weapons, the US has studiedly avoided signing unreservedly the 1925 Geneva Protocol banning chemical weapons use. (It says it will use chem if others do, which means it could use chem in Syria now).

The Reagan administration shamefully ran interference for six years as Saddam Hussein of Iraq systematically deployed chemical weapons against Iranian troops at the front. Everyone knew this was going on. [...] And, indeed, when Iran appealed to the United Nations Security Council to condemn what Iraq was doing, the Reagan administration maneuvered at the UN to make sure that Iran’s case was not taken up.

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As for those decrying Obama inaction they need to, like, read the news sometime. For the past several years the US has intervened in Syria in two ways. President Obama used the Saudis to deliver money and weaponry to some 40 “vetted” groups supported by the Central Intelligence Agency, which is certified as having no ties to al-Qaeda or international extremism. Except that several of these groups have in fact formed battlefield alliances with al-Qaeda in Syria (was Jabhat al-Nusra, now Jabhat Fateh Sham or the Syrian Conquest Front).

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The other US intervention has been thousands of bombing raids against Daesh (ISIS, ISIL) in Raqqa and Deir al-Zor in Syria’s far east.

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But that somehow the Syria situation can be made better if only Donald J. Trump would stick his fingers into it is a wildly implausible premise.

  Juan Cole

Until a couple of days ago, even that asshat didn't think it was a good idea.  At least, according to what he's said.

For all the times Trump said believe me and trust me in his salesman patter, he communicated constantly and in every medium that there was only thing you could believe and trust: If you voted for Donald Trump, you’d get Donald Trump, in all his Trumpery and Trumpiness.

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In August 2013, Trump insisted that President Obama needed congressional approval before striking Syria. Obama came to agree. He sought approval and was refused. No strike followed.

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Promises of no war in Syria were central to Donald Trump’s anti-Hillary Clinton messaging. Take, for example, to his interview with Reuters on October 26, 2016.

“What we should do is focus on ISIS. We should not be focusing on Syria," said Trump, as he dined on fried eggs and sausage at his Trump National Doral golf resort. "You’re going to end up in World War Three over Syria if we listen to Hillary Clinton. You’re not fighting Syria any more, you’re fighting Syria, Russia and Iran, all right?”

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Not even 100 days into his presidency, Trump has done exactly what he attacked Hillary Clinton for contemplating.

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Voters and citizens can expect literally zero advance warning of what Donald Trump will do or won’t do.

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On October 26, 2016, he surely meant what he said. It’s just that what he meant and said that day was no guide to what he would mean or say on October 27, 2016—much less April 6, 2017.

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On the night of his Syria strike, he spoke directly to emotions. "Using a deadly nerve agent, Assad choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children. It was a slow and brutal death for so many. Even beautiful babies were cruelly murdered in this very barbaric attack. No child of God should ever suffer such horror.” He then asserted: "It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons."

  David Frum

Loss of limbs and family members by bombing is not cruel to beautiful babies, apparently. That's a horror they can suffer.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.