The reported use of chemical weapons by Syria\u2019s embattled Assad regime has not made much difference in that devastated country. Tens of thousands have been killed in brutal fighting already, and the heart-rending violence continues with no end in sight.<\/p>\n
The chemical weapons reports have had a dramatic effect in the United States, if not in Syria. The president had warned that their use would be a \u201cgamechanger,\u201d with \u201cenormous consequences,\u201d a proverbial \u201cred line\u201d that cannot be crossed. Immediately, the neoconservative hawks who helped drive us into Iraq \u2014 William Kristol, Robert Kagan, Dan Senor and more \u2014 started pounding the war drums once more.<\/p>\n
Alarmingly, liberal humanitarian interventionists also have begun talking up military intervention. Anne-Marie Slaughter, former head of policy planning in the State Department under President Obama, led the charge in a bellicose op-edin The Post, comparing the reports of chemical weapons use to genocide in Rwanda. There, she said, America had been shamed by the Clinton administration\u2019s demand for \u201cmore conclusive evidence\u201d of genocide. Now, she argued, Obama was repeating the dodge by seeking proof about what actually took place in Syria.<\/p>\n
\u201cU.S. credibility is on the line,\u201d concluded Slaughter. The president must understand the \u201ctremendous damage he will do to the United States and to his legacy if he fails to act.\u201d<\/p>\n
Slaughter shows neither the slightest awareness of the \u201cdistrust, cynicism and hatred\u201d that will be generated if the dying Syrian civilians are victims of U.S. bombs or of the deep divide within the Muslim world over the civil war there. She seems unconcerned at the lack of any good choices in the Syrian debacle, or at the absence of any legal justification for the United States to intervene.<\/p>\n
Obama has thus far stood up to such howls, and displayed a sensible caution that others would do well to emulate. It is time for everyone \u2014 even the righteous \u2014 to sober up about Syria. Given the terrible costs we have suffered from U.S. intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan, and given the complexities of the sectarian conflict now taking place in Syria, the president is surely right to avoid any rush into another war in the Middle East.<\/p>\n