Directing an attack upon Syrian military installations is not the best way to achieve the stated U.S. objectives. However, if military action is inevitable, then an approach targeting Syria's leadership would be a more effective deterrent and would greatly reduce casualties.
This diary probably won't be popular for a couple of reasons. First, it assumes that calls for using a non-violent approach instead of military action will go unheard. They usually do. (I wish it weren't so. The wisest course would be to keep the military out of Syria, but that is not the subject of this diary.)
Second, it recommends directing the inevitable military action in a way that goes somewhat against the conventions of war. It recommends not killing Syrian soldiers. One of the conventions of war is that members of the military are legitimate targets, regardless of whether they are voluntarily in the military and voluntarily engaging in violence. That's a notion I don't accept, and new technologies make a different approach possible.
What are the objectives of intervening in Syria? I’m going to take the Obama administration at its word:
"Our military objectives in Syria would be to hold the Assad regime accountable, degrade its ability to carry out these kinds of attacks and deter it from further use of chemical weapons.”
-- Secretary of Defense Hagel in a statement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, September 3, 2013
In this, I give them the benefit of the doubt -- that the concern about Syria is not at its root a concern about securing oil pipelines or diminishing Russian influence in the region. They are not the Bush administration. Most here would agree that the objectives listed by Secretary Hagel are laudable, even if we disagree about how to achieve them, or whether it makes sense to try.
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Of the military approaches that have been proposed, the ones most widely discussed have been:
1) “surgical strikes” against certain weapons installations and/or weapons manufacturing facilities;
2) a ground attack, which some believe would be necessary to capture and dismantle chemical weapons;
3) further arming the rebels and waging a battle by proxy.
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If you were advocating an attack on Syria, exactly what and whom would you would propose to attack? In other words, whom would you like our military to shoot, and where would you like it to drop its bombs, to achieve the objectives?
It's disconcerting that many who advocate an attack on Syria are unable to answer this question, or they see it as beside the point. To see it as anything but central to the point suggests the person is operating with a model of nations and governments that lacks more than a few connecting pins. Syria did not gas it's own people. A group of people operating under the direction of President Assad did. Assad is not Syria, and Syria is not Assad.
Most of the Syrian military is composed of young men who have been conscripted; that is, young men who were given no choice about joining the military. Those men also have almost no ability to dissent from carrying out attacks against whomever their superiors tell them to. Many of them would choose to walk away if they could. Thousands have already done so, becoming deserters, but not everybody can desert. In many cases, the penalty for trying to desert is to be shot.
If you were to direct the U.S. navy to fire upon a Syrian military installation that was staffed partly by conscripts, that would be little different from ordering our navy to fire upon civilians caught on a battlefield. In both cases, the people in our sights don’t want to be where they are. They are not in control of their circumstances and are not responsible for carrying out the attacks that it is our objective to stop.
A better approach would be to aim our sights at the individuals who are responsible for the attacks; better not just ethically, but also strategically.
The United States has demonstrated that it is capable of locating and capturing (or killing) nearly any high-profile individual, even when that individual has gone into hiding. Sometimes the process is quick, and sometimes it takes years. Regardless of how long it takes, odds are high that the person will be found.
Consider what would be the effect if our country were to announce that it was targeting the small group of government and military leaders who ordered the use of prohibited weapons and the commission of other monstrous acts. Consider what would happen if we stated we were targeting President Assad personally.
It would mean the end of Assad’s rule. Even if he were to go into hiding, he would not be able to maintain control of the government. He would either be officially displaced, or someone else would step in to govern by proxy. If Assad were to try to hold onto power while hidden, the simple volume of communication sent to him and sent by him as a function of governing would reveal his position.
In other words, painting an indelible target on the ruler’s back would inexorably take away the most important thing he is trying to protect – his hold on power.
If the promise to kill Assad were carried out as a consequence of his authorizing the use of chemical weapons, it would be a powerful deterrent to future decision-makers too. They would know that directing the use of such weapons would initiate a chain of events that would almost certainly lead to their own downfall.
This approach would make it much less crucial for the U.S. to find and dismantle all the chemical weapons, production facilities, etc., which in turn eliminates the need to send ground troops to do the job. Instead, chemical weapons would be rendered nearly unusable simply as a result of deterrence. Their presence would become less important.
It is also unlikely that killing Assad would be any more destabilizing to Syria and the region than simply letting his regime fall on its own. In fact, it might be less destabilizing.
A common objection to this approach is that targeting a nation's leaders sets a precedent that other governments might use indiscriminately, causing disorder and working against our national interest. Another objection is that it breaches the wall between the military and the diplomatic worlds. I'll leave it to others here to make a case for why either of those two things would be worse than the prospect of shooting at people who don't deserve to be shot at.
For those who maintain such objections, please consider that the approach of targeting leaders is by its nature self-limiting and constrained. A key aspect of the approach is that it is conducted in broad view on the world stage. There is a clear linkage between cause and consequence, and it is apparent which country or coalition is taking the action. It's not a secret assassination. A government that initiates this type of action without cause would almost certainly be the object of sanctions, if not worse. Thus, it's difficult for this particular genie to get very far out of the bottle.
Perhaps most importantly, this approach is no more illegal than invading or bombing a country without having been attacked first, yet it is far less destructive.
It actually represents backing away from the precedent of unprovoked invasion that was established by the Bush administration. If you're someone who's worried about precedent, that one should keep you awake at night. In fact, it should have you demanding that members of the previous administration be put on trial.