Could Conceivably Grow Worse

Daniel Larison writes:

John McCain and Lindsey Graham want the U.S. to fight against both sides of Syria’s civil war:

The reality is that defeating Islamic State also requires defeating Bashar Assad.

As I said before, this is an insane position. If “destroying” ISIS is already an unrealistic goal, and it is, setting out to defeat both ISIS and the Assad regime at the same time is even more fanciful.

Destroying the latter would probably be relatively easier, and we know that the U.S. is capable of overthrowing established foreign governments by force, but in doing so the U.S. would plunge all of Syria into even greater chaos.

If the war against ISIS also requires the U.S. to go to war with the Syrian government now or later, there is no way that the outcome will be worth the costs to the U.S., and those costs continue to grow with each new goal that hawks want to tack on to the ever-expanding war.

Just as ISIS poses no direct threat to the U.S., the Syrian government is no threat to American security, so our government has no compelling reason to fight either of them.

As much of a mistake as the current war is, it would be inexcusable to widen the war by attacking the Syrian government.

Not only would this demand a much larger commitment of U.S. forces, but it would mean that the U.S. would “own” the aftermath of the war for many years to come at an unknown cost in lives, resources, and wealth.

If this is where the war against ISIS is eventually leading, it is vitally important that the war be halted now before the U.S. keeps blundering into new and dangerous commitments.

And:

As he always does, Max Boot takes the argument for intervention in Syria to its inevitably deranged conclusion:

The only way to rescue Syria from its nightmare is to overthrow Assad and install a government capable of keeping order and winning the assent of the country’s various constituent parts.

To understand why this is an insane position, it is necessary to be very clear about what this would involve and what would very likely happen afterwards.

First, it would require a major military campaign involving ground forces to defeat the regime’s army and take control of the parts of the country under regime control.

That would cause the deaths of even more Syrian civilians and contribute to the further devastation of the entire country.

That would be followed by an occupation of Syria that would require at least a hundred thousand soldiers to be done semi-competently.

That occupation would last for a decade or more, and it would also commit the U.S. to propping up some new Syrian government indefinitely because like its Iraqi counterpart it would be incapable of defending itself for a very long time.

Another war for regime change would make all of Syria even more chaotic than it already is, and the presence of Western forces in Syria would predictably become a magnet for jihadist groups and another boost to their recruitment and propaganda.

The nightmare would not end for Syrians, and could conceivably grow worse.

The U.S. would then continue to fight ongoing insurgencies for as long as our forces were there, and Syria would become a de facto U.S. protectorate for as long as Americans tolerated the extraordinary, unnecessary waste of American resources and lives.

Since we already know that our government has neither the wit nor the ability to establish a stable, functioning government in this part of the world following a war for regime change, it is madness to recommend such a policy.

Since we definitely know that the public has absolutely no patience for such absurd state-building exercises and no tolerance for the enormous costs that such a war would impose, it is a political non-starter.

It is worth drawing attention to this horrible idea only to remind everyone that this is where the demands for “action” and “leadership” predictably and almost inevitably lead.