Blurred Red Lines

After a week of beating the war drums, President Obama reversed course on Saturday and announced that he would seek congressional authorization for military action in Syria. The attack, which the administration has suggested to be a few days of missile strikes from American ships in the Mediterranean Sea, would come as retribution to Syria’s tyrannical president, Bashar al-Assad, who has been massacring thousands of civilians with impunity but ran afoul of the U.S. “red line” that use of chemical weapons would draw intervention.

In an uncomfortably reoccurring scene, America is prepared to rush into the powder keg Middle East with unclear justification and little certainty of the outcome.

The thorniest issue with Obama’s planned strike is the decidedly vague objective. While the gruesome images from Damascus are appalling, the administration is not seeking a humanitarian intervention. It is not seeking a regime change. And it is not seeking a strike strong enough to change the tide of the war.

What exactly is the United States hoping to accomplish?

President Obama said we must punish the Syrian government for “violating well-establish international norms of chemical weapons,” though the legal justification for such an intervention remains unclear. The necessary United Nations Security Council authorization is sure to fail from vetoes by Russia and China.

Instead, it seems that the United States feels obligated to take some sort of action—no matter how inconsequential—as a face-saving measure. Obama blundered in issuing the red line ultimatum, and Assad is calling America on its bluff.

But America’s military might will remain credible to the world no matter what one dictator thinks of it. And the dangers of our half-hearted limp toward war far outweigh the possible benefits.

At best, the cruise missile strikes will admonish Assad for using further weapons of mass destruction against civilians—so that he can go back to massacring them with conventional bullets, cluster bombs, and airstrikes. At worst, the minimal intervention would make American complicit in a sectarian war that spills to Syria’s neighbors—an Iraq-like quagmire many times over.

The Syrian government and anti-American groups could also manipulate the strikes as rich fodder for propaganda.

President Obama’s decision to seek congressional authorization for the strike, as constitutionally required, was correct. But Congress is elected to speak for the people— the vast majority of whom oppose intervention.

A war-weary America does not need another intervention. In an unexpected embarrassment for the Obama administration, British Prime Minister David Cameron backed out of plans to strike Syria after the House of Commons rejected a preliminary motion. The president should similarly stand down if Congress rejects military action.

Less than two years have passed since America withdrew from the Iraqi disaster. There’s no reason to relive that experience.