English philosopher Edmund Burke is reputed to have said that the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. And so it is in the case of Syria. The world first ignored the horrible humanitarian disaster in Syria for several years, procrastinating while some one hundred thousand innocent people were killed there -- after having indeed tolerated the abuses of the Assad regime,father Hafez and now son Bashir, for decades. Finally and belatedly, it took a clear poison gas attack on civilians to generate outraged calls for action -- without agreement as to what that action should be. Meanwhile, numerous petitions and op ed pieces are circulating, advising against taking any real action at all. However, doing nothing in the face of such escalating violence would be shameful
Of course, the last thing which the United States needs is another war. We certainly do not need the present War in Afghanistan, nor do what passes for the Afghan government or most of the Afghan people want that war either. But what is being advocated to deal with the major humanitarian disaster that has been present and prevalent in Syria for the past three years is not another war -- rather, proposals include the maintenance of a no-fly zone over troubled areas (much as worked very well during the earlier crisis in Libya) and similar limited engagements.
My own approach would include taking the case against the regime of Bashir Assad to the proper World Court, having him declared a war criminal. and then removing him from Syria by one means or another. Obviously, the United Nations should be taking the lead on Syria -- but equally obviously, Russia and China have been blocking that lead for reasons of their own. However, that is no excuse for inaction.
There may have been a period when the go-slow approach was appropriate to dealing with the Syrian violence. But that period is long gone, and in truth it only encouraged the excesses of the Assad regime. This is not to say that the rebels opposing that regime are angels, either -- nor is it to say that there may not be representatives of some terror groups involved there.
But to allow those reservations to rule while men, women, and children are being injured, killed, even gassed to death, is not only wrong, it is cowardly and intolerable. And if that do-little-or-nothing approach continues, indeed, evil will triumph in Syria -- and we will have encouraged comparable evils elsewhere in the world. That outcome would surely be intolerable, indefensible, and truly shameful.
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