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Isn't current Syrian government also guilty of perpetrating acts of genocide against its own populace? This person is quick to denounce the other side, but Assa

by Grue3 11y ago

Isn't current Syrian government also guilty of perpetrating acts of genocide against its own populace? This person is quick to denounce the other side, but Assad's forces have killed thousands of civilians as well. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_Syria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_Syria

jacquesm 11y ago
Assad falls smack in the middle of the 'lesser of two evils' category. As did several other now deposed leaders. Regime change is relatively easy, dealing with the fall-out is not.
cturner 11y ago
He isn't in a position to criticise Assad for exactly that reason. Nobody wants a knock on the door in the night.
beshrkayali 11y ago
The issue now is not whether Assad has committed crimes or not, that is for Syrians to decide on imho. The problem is that any criticism of foreign regime change operations (mainly led by US gov, hypocritically in the name of democracy, spending way too much money (look up US military budget) are countered with the accusation of being pro Assad. I, for one, am anti foreign regime change and have way too many things to say about Assad. There isn't that much defense that could be said for proposing that IS is nothing but an intelligence operation that got out of hand, read Operation Cyclone.
pluma 11y ago
Better the devil you know. The reason we (i.e. "The West") left Saddam in place until the US needed an easy target after 9/11 is that despite being a dictator and mass-murderer, his reign kept Iraq relatively stable. As soon as he was taken out of the equation other forces began to fight for dominance and now we have a huge mess on our hands that's arguably worse than where we started. The same is true for most of the dictatorships toppled during the "Arab Spring". This is partially why Russia was against intervening in Syria from day one and why nobody seems to think Saudi Arabia or Qatar or any of the other bloody dictatorships in that region are worth disrupting. In many cases the actual borders of these countries are pretty arbitrary and split up various ethno-religious groups (that often historically hate each others' guts) in weird ways. As soon as you tell them to self-govern and dispose of the dictators you end up with all these directly opposing interest groups suddenly being able to get at each others' throats. It's not that Assad is a nice person or that it's more ethical to leave an evil person in place than to dispose of him, it's just that mindlessly handing out guns and expecting an oppressed people to be rational is pretty much the worst thing you can do. Look at WW2 Germany. Sure, we got rid of Hitler, but in order to prevent Germany from blowing up again (exactly what had happened after WW1) the Allies actually had to work out long-term plans for the occupation of Germany to make sure the citizens were educated enough to understand how messed up their world view used to be and that the country was re-integrated into world economy and politics. We need a Marshall Plan for Syria with buy-in from several major influencers. THEN we can talk about disposing of Assad.
- seren 11y ago
  The problem with supporting dictators is that this is a powerful recruiting argument for Isis. "Look at the West, they claim to be democracies and defend human rights, but they are supporting mass-murders here" ...which makes the West looks like a bunch of hypocrites. And this is an argument that is factually hard to counter. Frankly, I don't know what we should be doing. I don't see a solution without a long political roadmap with likely a partition of Syria & Irak, to have an Alawite state, next to a Sunni state, next to a Shia Iraq.
  - pluma 11y ago
    Except we're already hypocrites. We support all kinds of dictators and terrorist groups. Though a lot of it has to do with preventing wars with Israel.
- Grue3 11y ago
  The Kurdish part of Iraq did pretty well once Saddam was deposed. The central government is weak, and wasn't able to fend off ISIS but at least their human rights record is much better than Saddam's. And like, if Saddam still ruled Iraq currently, would he be able to hold back ISIS? I'd say no. In fact, ISIS would get even more sympathisers because by this time everybody would be sick of Saddam's shit. Look at Libya. Khaddafi's "strong man" reputation didn't mean nothing when people started fighting back against his regime. Look at Syria. Assad is supposedly "strong" but this days, and historically he had very weak control of his country. The idea that these people should be propped up because they are "lesser evil" has no experimental basis. Reminds me of WW2 "appeasement" honestly. It only makes the problem worse in the long run.
- gotchange 11y ago
  It seems a recurrent theme for all the "Arab Spring" skeptics to focus only on the failures of the movement like in Libya or Syria and ignore the success stories like Tunisia. I must admit that the US and allies abandoned Libya after toppling Ghaddafi and not helping Libyans with nation rebuilding after that. Add to that, the intervention by regional players in Libya complicated the situation and made things worse for the ordinary people.
supergirl 11y ago
Actually on that page there are few massacres before the current civil war. The biggest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Hama_massacre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Hama_massacre happened during a fight between government forces and islamists which had taken over a city and started an uprising, so I wouldn't really call them civilians; civilians with guns maybe. I don't know much about the history of Syria, just saying the link you posted doesn't really show the picture you want.

by Grue3 11y ago

jacquesm 11y ago

Assad falls smack in the middle of the 'lesser of two evils' category. As did several other now deposed leaders. Regime change is relatively easy, dealing with the fall-out is not.

cturner 11y ago

He isn't in a position to criticise Assad for exactly that reason. Nobody wants a knock on the door in the night.

beshrkayali 11y ago

The issue now is not whether Assad has committed crimes or not, that is for Syrians to decide on imho. The problem is that any criticism of foreign regime change operations (mainly led by US gov, hypocritically in the name of democracy, spending way too much money (look up US military budget) are countered with the accusation of being pro Assad. I, for one, am anti foreign regime change and have way too many things to say about Assad. There isn't that much defense that could be said for proposing that IS is nothing but an intelligence operation that got out of hand, read Operation Cyclone.

pluma 11y ago

Better the devil you know. The reason we (i.e. "The West") left Saddam in place until the US needed an easy target after 9/11 is that despite being a dictator and mass-murderer, his reign kept Iraq relatively stable. As soon as he was taken out of the equation other forces began to fight for dominance and now we have a huge mess on our hands that's arguably worse than where we started. The same is true for most of the dictatorships toppled during the "Arab Spring". This is partially why Russia was against intervening in Syria from day one and why nobody seems to think Saudi Arabia or Qatar or any of the other bloody dictatorships in that region are worth disrupting. In many cases the actual borders of these countries are pretty arbitrary and split up various ethno-religious groups (that often historically hate each others' guts) in weird ways. As soon as you tell them to self-govern and dispose of the dictators you end up with all these directly opposing interest groups suddenly being able to get at each others' throats. It's not that Assad is a nice person or that it's more ethical to leave an evil person in place than to dispose of him, it's just that mindlessly handing out guns and expecting an oppressed people to be rational is pretty much the worst thing you can do. Look at WW2 Germany. Sure, we got rid of Hitler, but in order to prevent Germany from blowing up again (exactly what had happened after WW1) the Allies actually had to work out long-term plans for the occupation of Germany to make sure the citizens were educated enough to understand how messed up their world view used to be and that the country was re-integrated into world economy and politics. We need a Marshall Plan for Syria with buy-in from several major influencers. THEN we can talk about disposing of Assad.

seren 11y ago
The problem with supporting dictators is that this is a powerful recruiting argument for Isis. "Look at the West, they claim to be democracies and defend human rights, but they are supporting mass-murders here" ...which makes the West looks like a bunch of hypocrites. And this is an argument that is factually hard to counter. Frankly, I don't know what we should be doing. I don't see a solution without a long political roadmap with likely a partition of Syria & Irak, to have an Alawite state, next to a Sunni state, next to a Shia Iraq.
- pluma 11y ago
  Except we're already hypocrites. We support all kinds of dictators and terrorist groups. Though a lot of it has to do with preventing wars with Israel.
Grue3 11y ago
The Kurdish part of Iraq did pretty well once Saddam was deposed. The central government is weak, and wasn't able to fend off ISIS but at least their human rights record is much better than Saddam's. And like, if Saddam still ruled Iraq currently, would he be able to hold back ISIS? I'd say no. In fact, ISIS would get even more sympathisers because by this time everybody would be sick of Saddam's shit. Look at Libya. Khaddafi's "strong man" reputation didn't mean nothing when people started fighting back against his regime. Look at Syria. Assad is supposedly "strong" but this days, and historically he had very weak control of his country. The idea that these people should be propped up because they are "lesser evil" has no experimental basis. Reminds me of WW2 "appeasement" honestly. It only makes the problem worse in the long run.
gotchange 11y ago
It seems a recurrent theme for all the "Arab Spring" skeptics to focus only on the failures of the movement like in Libya or Syria and ignore the success stories like Tunisia. I must admit that the US and allies abandoned Libya after toppling Ghaddafi and not helping Libyans with nation rebuilding after that. Add to that, the intervention by regional players in Libya complicated the situation and made things worse for the ordinary people.

supergirl 11y ago

Actually on that page there are few massacres before the current civil war. The biggest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Hama_massacre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Hama_massacre happened during a fight between government forces and islamists which had taken over a city and started an uprising, so I wouldn't really call them civilians; civilians with guns maybe. I don't know much about the history of Syria, just saying the link you posted doesn't really show the picture you want.