By Robert Spallone
The once hopeful optimism of native uprisings that spread throughout the Middle East over two years ago might be coming to an end. The movements that were lead by supporters risking their lives, and that eventually lead to the name “The Arab Spring,” could be falling faster than the time it took for social media to get Arab’s voices heard. This fall couldn’t be any more evident than in Syria, where a lack of early U.S. involvement may have lead to an even worse off fate than what Syrians could have ever imagined.
At least the Countries of Egypt and Libya were able to remove their governments, and can now focus on the hardest part of overthrowing a government, setting up a new one. The future isn’t clear for the progression of Egypt and Libya, but the fate of Syria is even more deadlocked, where a bloody civil war hasn’t even allowed Syrians to complete their first task of the Removal of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. The Syrians might fall before they even have a chance to get up and fight.
U.S. involvement wasn’t as easy in Syria as it was for other countries like Libya, where opposition groups had the approval of the U.S., and actually had a chance of defeating government forces. Till this day the Obama administration is still weary of which Syrian opposition groups should be given aid. This problem of fearing opposition groups due to the possibility of them having terrorist affiliations could have been avoided if the United States would have organized a U.S. led coalition, like the one achieved in Libya. An early led U.S. coalition could have stopped Syrian opposition groups from looking for any aid they could get, including aid offered by terrorist groups like the Al Qaeda inspired Al Nusra Front.
Now even if Syrian opposition groups are successful in the removal of the Assad regime, the U.S. will have to fear which group will be in charge of Assad’s stash of Chemical weapons. The same chemical weapons that Bashar Al -Assad threatened to use against rebel forces, and the same chemical weapons that President Obama considered to be a “red line” for U.S. involvement, may end up in the hands of terrorist factions. If 70,000 dead Syrians aren’t a “red Line” for The Obama Administration to become more involved in the Syria conflict, then hopefully the idea of terrorist controlled chemical weapons will be.
The Syrian uprising is not a simple situation that can be solved only by the President ordering U.S. soldiers on the ground. A fear of more U.S. involvement in the Middle East is expected after Americans can see what occurred in Iraq now ten years later after a war that lasted for eight of those years. Many options are being implemented by the United States, like economic sanctions and missile batteries placed on Syrian boarders, but they don’t measure up to the increasing Syrian death toll. Sitting around any longer and waiting to see how things play out in Syria is not the best option anymore. With close to a hundred thousand silenced Syrians, and over a million newly displaced Syrian refugees, The U.S. doesn’t exactly have much time to make a decision in Syria’s fate. The United States is going to have to decide whether taking a risk on a Syria is the best option, compared to waiting a few years until U.S. intervention might become the only answer.
Opinion: An Arab Fall
