Syria: don’t go there, Mr Obama
The civil war in Syria is a tragedy but that does not mean the answer lies with the Pentagon. Nadim Shehadi (‘One day the world will thank Bush for shaking up the Arab region’) apparently thinks that the major downside of the invasion of Iraq is that the United States is reluctant to intervene with military force in Syria. Surely this is to ignore the key lesson of the invasion of Iraq, namely that force breeds more force. Overt US military intervention in Syria would have consequences no less catastrophic than what happened in Iraq over the past 10 years. US soldiers would instantly become the target of all the Sunni Muslim jihadis in Syria who want to turn it into part of a revived Caliphate.
