Henry Payne for September 15, 2013

Nicely played, MichaelW!Despite the justifiable cynicism of this agreement, it is how it plays out over the next weeks and whether the weapons are used again that will show the will of the Arab League and the UN to lead in this matter. It is not the place of the USA to do more than observe and report until a UN coalition votes to do more. This accidental diplomatic change is hopeful and it to that hope we should hold.That said, rockets will fly. Bullets will be fired, and tanks and aircraft will kill Syrians everywhere.What a wondrous work is Man.Sadly,C.

What do you want? No response at all to the use of WMD? Or a full scale war? The critics of Obama seem to vacillate between these two extreme positions randomly. Personally, I’ll go for something short of perfection if it reduces the ability of the Syrian government to use MWDs and if keeps US boots off the ground.

I recall Obama saying the offer had to be taken with a grain of Salt….

I’m sure glad the U.S. doesn’t support any bazaar puppet regimes. Or even more radical regimes that have lots of weapons, but NOT the total support of their citizenry, but have Americans convinced they do! PR is an interesting thing in this region of petty tribal arguments, all of whom can trace to Shem, but only one segment is allowed to posses the label that goes with that!

Frankly, we’d probably be better off, given even the current Turkish regime, had we NOT batted down the Ottomans!

The best military strategy is to get the other side to lose its will to fight before any shots are fired. That may require quite a bit of saber-rattling, the build-up of a lot of fire power, and the will to use it if all else fails. *But if all else doesn’t fail, the other side gives in, and no shots are fired, does that make the “winner” indecisive? Isn’t this how Kennedy successfully handled the Cuban Missile Crisis? *Of course, one cannot use this tactic, then immediately gloat and say what they were thinking. And the Syrian situation is not over. For both reasons, it is premature to say whether Obama handled this well or just got lucky.