Shuddering Syria

As a healthcare provider the recent coverage of the exposure to chemical weapons is atrocious.  I am appalled and can only wonder how I would feel if I were those people in that situation asking who can help?  I am also extremely disappointed in the media coverage, or rather, the lack of coverage of what is happening in Syria.  I feel like everything I hear from the major NBC, CBS, FOX, CNN news outlets is a lot of supposition and regurgitation of what one or two reporters for NPR or the BBC have documented.  For such astounding and outlandish actions being taken in Syria a 3 minute excerpt on the national news is ridiculous- they spend more time on the "human interest" stories at the end of half hour than on the actual news that can affect millions around the world depending on the decisions of a few at the top of the political spectrum.

Having said how horrible the situation in Syria has become I respect the action that British prime minister David Cameron took in calling parliament to a vote on whether or not to get involved in Syria.  I do believe the negative vote is a good one at the moment, for in the interest of that country that has not been attacked, they really has no reason to get involved.  I think the US, should take a similar vote in the house as to whether or not to allow action for we have not been harmed nor attacked and I don't think that our involvement would help the situation other than killing more people, likely innocents.

The US is not a guardian of the world, we have not been elected by the UN to enforce a chemical weapons ban.  That being said, I would like to see a UN that has the kind of power that is recognized by all countries.  Currently the UN, in my opinion, seems to act more as a figure head; I do think that it is an important arena to allow peaceful discourse between nations but I think it needs to have a little more strength in it's executive branch.  One can see UN peacekeeping troops in various countries but they withdraw almost as soon as any type of attack comes, to my knowledge there is no offensive mobility or even defensive unless serious endangerment of life is present.  What good is that?  How can one truly protect unarmed people if whoever the opposition is knows that they will withdraw?

The point I am trying to make here is that the US should not get involved unilaterally in Syria, and the UN entity that should be involved, has no power with which to become involved and force a change of action in the civil war. 

The US civil war was a horribly bloody affair in which thousands of thousands died.  However, unless my history is incorrect there was little to no foreign intervention, but rather an observance of action.  Yes, war is horrible and the innocent should not have to suffer, but in this day and age in absence of a strong supported global body to say, "you've gone to far" what can we do but cry out in opposition of senseless death and record the actions taken by both sides?  Anything else would be putting millions more around the world at risk due to allied nations forced to choose sides. 

In a nation as religiously divided as Syria this civil war may be the only way in which the country can learn how to coexist with one another.  I believe countries learn from their mistakes, the US learned from the Civil War and Martin Luther King showed the world how to change things with peaceful protests.  South Africa faced the Apartheid.  Rwanda is still struggling to move forward but the resolution to not allow such blatant hateful genocide is strong.  Europe has taken lessons from WWII and Germany and many eastern countries have emerged stronger.  There are still factions in all these places where hate resides but in resolution to create a better future and stop the killing all these countries have succeeded in increasing the ability of individual citizens to live and survive.

Maybe war is necessary?

And the only thing we can do is send as much humanitarian aid as we can to help those who want to survive peacefully live; maybe that kind of action would go further in bolstering support for democracy and peace than in bombing for peace.  Maybe we are training too many snipers and technicians in our armies and together we should be training more medical, more structural engineers, more carpenters- people who can take up a hammer or a scalpel as easily as a gun if attacked (different from the peace corps).  Talk about a new direction.  A different army.  I wonder if that would get any different media coverage? 

It's human interest.