Should the USA Intervene in Syria - Essay Example

8th May OP-ED Article Should USA Intervene in Syria? The mess in Syria is becoming murkier day by day. It is now evident that neither President Assad nor the rebels have the military power to secure a convincing victory. With this in mind, the calls for a direct intervention by USA are becoming more pronounced. UK and France have directly asked for a NATO intervention. Various reasons are being given to facilitate this intervention such as duty of USA to protect human rights of Syrians, benefits to USA from a decrease in the influence of Iran in the region,the threat of chemical weapons use by President Assad , to stop the conflict from engulfing the entire region and the most important one being flashed is to stop Al Qaeda from gaining foothold in Syria(Doran and Max). The USA president Obama has said that he will look to build consensus in the international community before intervening in Syria (Nicholas and Adam). This necessary means that all major western powers such as Russia , France and UK need to agree on the need for intervention. However whenever USA is asked to send its military to a foreign land in order to ‘liberate’ the people of the country, the voices of those who matter the most are never heard. In this article I will try to bring the spotlight on these voices – the average citizen of USA who pays for the military intervention, the soldier who has to lay down his life and the people of the country who are being ‘liberated’. A study by Brown University has claimed that the Iraq and Afghanistan war has cost USA $2.27 trillion by conservative estimates and up to $4trillion by liberal estimates (Crawford and Lutz.).In order to bring a perspective to this figure, the total debt USA owes to China and Japan as of 2012 was $2.112 trillion dollars (Moore).Thus instead of fighting wars in Afghanistan and Iraq , we could have paid back our foreign debt and prevent the deep cuts in public spending which the congress has initiated in 2013. This money was not provided by President Bush or Obama but is provided by USA citizens in the form of taxes paid to the government. We have authorized the government to protect us from foreign aggression but we have not authorized the government to conduct foreign aggression on our behalf. So much amount of public money going down the drain is downright criminal when Congress is telling us that it does not have any money to spend on health, education and social security. How do the citizens of USA benefit by sponsoring these wars in distant foreign lands? What do we gain? No one has ever asked this question. It is time to do so. I think it should be made mandatory for a referendum to be held for intervening in wars which do not belong to us. The decision to bring democracy to distant lands should be a democratic one. If the people vote a yes in the referendum, then the President should be free to intervene in Syria. The people may make a wrong decision but at least it will be their decision, not the decision of NATO or a war hungry president. If we are paying for these wars, it is the USA soldiers who are dying in these wars.2220 USA soldiers have laid down their lives in Afghanistan (Icasualties.org.) and 4488 young soldiers have been killed in the Iraqi war (Antiwar.com.).As so many of them lay down their lives, it is just that they also have say in which wars to fight and which ones to avoid. Some people may say that as soldiers they have no right to have a say, it is the prerogative of the elected legislature. I agree that it is the prerogative of the legislature and the President of USA to declare wars; and I also agree that soldiers when they join the army agree to serve our nation without any question. But we have made an army to defend our country and fight our wars; not to liberate Syria or Libya. An army man will be more than happy to lay down his life for his motherland but why should he kill himself for people he has never met and who mean nothing to him. The death of our soldiers when there is no threat to our sovereignty is akin to murder of these brave men. I propose a complete freedom to soldiers in deciding whether they want to participate in a war if there is no direct threat to the sovereignty of our country. They should be given the freedom to say ‘no’ without any repercussions to their career or their pay structure. If our President can find enough volunteers to die in Syria, he can go ahead and attack but if he does not; he needs to back off and stay away from other people’s war. The final question that I will pose here is who has given USA the right of being an international policeman? This right vest with the Security Council of the United Nations. USA or NATO has no right to unilaterally intervene in other countries unless they request us to. We have declared many wars in the name of protecting human rights but let me ask the readers a simple question. How would we have reacted if England or some other country had intervened in our civil war just like we are planning to intervene in Syria’s civil war ?What if England had bombed our cities to ‘liberate’ the oppressed African-American citizens just like we bomb others to ‘liberate’ their population? Every country is sovereign. The USA has no right to meddle in the affairs of a sovereign country. A sovereign people have the right to even destroy themselves if they want to. Let them decide themselves what future they want for themselves and their children. Works cited Antiwar.com. "Casualties in Iraq - Antiwar.com." 2013. Web. 9 May 2013. . Crawford, Neta C. and Catherine Lutz. Economic and Budgetary costs of War in Afghanistan , Iraq and Pakistan to the United States : A Summary. St. Providence: Brown University, 2011. 1 - 9. Print. Doran, Michael and Max Boot. "5 Reasons to Intervene in Syria Now." The New York Times. 26th September. 2012. Web. 8th May 2013. [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/27/opinion/5-reasons-to-intervene-in-syria-now.html?_r=0]. Icasualties.org. "iCasualties | Operation Enduring Freedom | Afghanistan." 2013. Web. 9 May 2013. . Moore, Galen. "US national debt surpasses $16 trillion - Boston Business Journal." 2012. Web. 9 May 2013. . Nicholas, Peter and Adam Entous. "U.S. Sets Hurdles to Intervention in Syria." The Wall Street Journal. 30th April. 2013. Web. 8th May 2013. [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323982704578454940008959514.html]. Read More