Sand Painting and Game Changers

"President Barack Obama said on Monday that his administration would rethink its opposition to military intervention in the Syrian civil war if President Bashar Assad deploys weapons of mass destruction, calling such action a ‘red line’ for the U.S. Speaking to reporters at the White House, Obama said the use of chemical or biological weapons would considerably widen a conflict that has already dragged on for a year-and-a-half and killed some 20,000 people, according to activists. Syria possesses extensive stockpiles of such weapons and has threatened to use them if the country comes under foreign attack." — Aug 20 Associated Press

You and I are supposed to read news like this and it is supposed to make a great deal of sense. WMD is the Death Star of warfare … we justifiably abhor their use, fear their potential use, and think that the people who would use such weapons are truly evil, quite possibly insane. Well, after Hiroshima and Nagasaki of course, but that was almost seventy years ago. History. I am like you. WMD are off my list of acceptable methods to kill people. They kill too many people at once and are indiscriminate. Aren’t these the main objections?

In addition, of course, many have nasty residual effects, the second hand smoke of WMD I guess. People are sick and keep dying for a long time or the burns kill them slowly or the environment is poisoned for a long while. WMD are over the line. I think we all agree.

You can tell me if I am wrong. It wasn’t too long ago that Assad was merely driving tanks into select cities, like Homs, and blowing up neighborhoods, neatly.

Well the buildings would fall down of course, or catch fire, but he actually had his guys come in afterward and sweep up for the Twitter police. I remember being upset when three thousand civilians had been slaughtered. Not many in terms of WMD capabilities… but as many as died in 9/11. But 9/11 was uglier I guess … commercial airliners instead of tanks. Same number of civilians crushed or burned or blown up, but … it was different.

Terrorism in both cases, but 9/11 was “them” (someone) against us, not “them against more of them.”

I remember the number hitting five thousand and then ten. I remember reading about Syria a long while before we started hearing about any significant opposition, about “armed rebels,” a catch phrase that sounds not altogether respectable to many of us here. Its been a long while in our country since “armed rebels” staved off the repressive English government, mounting defense and uprising, and became the hallowed figureheads of US History.

Now “armed rebels,” smacks of jungles and Communist backed guerillas, and what not. We aren’t too sure about their motivations in defending themselves against atrocities that are being perpetrated on their families. The thing that occurs to me is that what bothers us, to the extent it does, is not who dies or how many cumulatively, I say cumulatively because more than 70,000 Syrians have been killed by their own leader now… but rather, the method of their death. Carpet bombing is OK with us but the use of Sarin is out.

Phosphorus bombs, (Fallujah)….OK…. but don’t be pulling out WMD. Strafe convoys of trucks and refugees…OK. Burn them…OK…but if Assad shows any signs of using WMD…that is unacceptable. I am not sure that civilians are so refined in their thinking.

Maybe its preferable to be on one of the thirty thousand houses in Fallujah watching something that cant be extinguished, phosphorous, burn through your leg or though your child’s body. Maybe you should be gratfeful that you didn’t die in an unethical fashion…in a way that was unacceptable to people with sensitive minds.

When Assad’s tank crashes though your living room, you may thank God that it wasn’t Sarin exposure that killed your relatives. WMD, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, are the affront to humanity and the last straw of tolerable practice. But are they? In fact, when I do a search for US manufacture, sales or use of WMD or simply chemical and biological weapons, the screen lights up. Among many of the links possible I find the following information:

"And that the US has encouraged the use of such weapons and provided the technology to develop such weapons in various nations abroad including Egypt South Africa And Iraq. The US has refused to sign Conventions against the development and use of chemical and biological weapons, and has either used or tested (without informing civilian populations) these weapons in the following locations abroad: Bahamas (late 1940s- mid 50s) Candada (1953) China and Korea (1950- 53) Vietman, Laos, Cambodia (1961-1970) Panama (1940s- 1990s) Cuba (1962,69,70, 71,81,96) And that the US has encouraged the use of such weapons and provided the technology to develop such weapons in various nations abroad including Egypt South Africa And Iraq." http://www.the-philosopher.co.uk/whocares/popups/warcrimes.htm

I don’t know if every item here is accurate or not. But you are free to contest them and if one or two is stretched..point out how and why. The balance still indicate that, although WMD are unacceptable to you and I of course…. they sure has hell have not been off the table nor the field for the administrations you and I elect. But how many of us, without research, can say (Oh yeah, we all know about this?)

My usual number of detractors will say I am putting out un-researched statements as facts… but I remind you… I am inviting conversation, not trying to present myself as the final authority on the subject at hand. I am on a search for truth and invite you to do the same.

The search suggests to me a few things:

1. We are more than disingenuous when we present ourselves as the defenders of the non-deployment of WMD. The facts indicate that huge American corporations manufacture the technology and supplies to make these, that they have no shortage of buyers and that they are doing a huge trade. 
2. The “red line,” or the lines in the sand (sand painting in my title), specifically on WMD, are very effective ways to justify military incursion, whether or not WMD are being used or may be. Presenting the looming threat of WMD, is a good way to get the public behind an incursion or war. It is a tool and a ruse and makes little rationale sense given the fact that the optional methods used often are as devastating or are quite devastating and the second, even more significant fact perhaps, that we manufacture WMD and do not agree to conventions against doing so. 
3. WMD make millions and millions for the companies involved in their manufacture. Corporate leaders, who run these companies, often have very close ties to government administrations. Bush’s war arm, Donald Rumsfeld comes to mind, with his board membership on Searle, Gilead Sciences and Phizer as well as Amylin Pharmaceuticals. Although the CIA had already warned that Iraq was using chemical weapons almost daily. But Mr Rumsfeld, at the time a successful executive in the pharmaceutical industry, still made it possible for Saddam to buy supplies from American firms. They included viruses such as anthrax and bubonic plague, according to the Washington Post.
4. Wherever millions and millions…billions, in fact, can be made, in places where there are vast oil deposits, in countries we want to keep military bases, in areas where our corporations have huge financial investment… it is quite likely we will see US military incursions, US support or direction of coups, US directed assassinations and Presidents spouting faux ethical rhetoric while waving fingers about WMDs. Hey, what worked in Iraq and Afghanistan and was good for a trillion two…cant be all bad! Or can it? 

I invite conversation about the methods of war relative to justification for incursion, support, or declaration of war. I want to know what you believe is acceptable justifiable aggression, and what is not. I want to know how killing innocents is OK, where it's OK, why it's sometimes OK, and when it is really wrong. A last note …President Obama said that indications of WMD use would be a “game changer” in our current non-involvement (tacitly suggested) regarding Syria. I have to say that I find that very offensive language. If foreign policy is viewed as a game, and it seems to be to an extent, particularly in our use of language but also in the abstract way we deal with it, we will continue to see the world in lethal turmoil.

Arbitrary lines drawn in drifting sands of policy and political rhetoric, and foreign policy as sport thinking … will perpetuate the madness we see around the globe, while the corporations bloat and their stocks soar.