How We Can Stop War In Syria

The latest Syrian war justification makes even less sense than the last one. The one from a year ago, which claimed Assad had attacked Khan Sheikhoun with chemical weapons, was cast into doubt by the very UN report that had tried to prove it; James Mattis has admitted there’s no proof that Assad was behind that attack; the Syrian and Russian governments, as well as the consistently credible Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, say that the incident was in fact an unintentional chemical spillover that happened when a Syrian aircraft bombed an ammunition depot.

Yet when Mattis made that crucial statement about the incident in February, corporate media headlines almost entirely ignored it, instead emphasizing that Mattis “warns of a coming Syrian chemical attack.” Then later that month, Russia charged that the U.S. was training its Al-Nusra partners to stage “false flag” chemical provocations which would be blamed on Assad. It’s still possible that Russia’s claim wasn’t true. But the events of the last week have only made it seem more plausible.

Upon the Syria chemical explosion on April 7, the State Department reportedAssad’s guilt within hours. No investigation had been made. The case was immediately solved. The U.S., the U.S.’ NATO allies, and the media of all these countries would now promote this baseless charge, with the sheer ubiquity of agreement on it among authorities making it seem impossible to question. This made things surreal for those who saw the glaring holes in the story.

Government sources told Reuters on April 9th that they “had not yet conclusively determined whether the attack was carried out by President Bashar al-Assad's Syrian government forces." And it isn’t just a matter of time before they do find evidence. Assad had almost won the war before the incident, with his main strategic worry clearly being how he would get rid of the military onslaught from the West. Attacking a crowd of Assad’s own people-especially a civilian crowd largely made up of children-would have done nothing to benefit Assad. And Assad has known this for a long time, as evidenced by Syria’s having totally removed its chemical weapons as of 2016.

But no amount of facts will make a difference in what the U.S. decides to do next. The American empire, as the Pentagon’s own data has shown, is quickly declining, and the U.S. political establishment is trying to regain geopolitical dominance by engaging in war with total abandon. This has been made clear in the empire’s careless escalations with Russia, which the fate of the Syria conflict ties in with.

So the American people need to stop their government from careening us into a third world war. Saying that all attempts at this are futile is an excuse for inaction. It’s our responsibility to take every action we can to stop this war. And these actions include refusing to pay war taxes; sowing resistance among armed service members; putting daily pressure on representatives to oppose these war escalations; spreading online counter-propaganda against the establishment’s Syria and Russia narratives; and taking part in antiwar demonstrations, which are planned for several major U.S. cities on April 14-15.

When the president carries out another Syria strike, it’s likely amid the current propaganda assault that most Americans will support the strike. But most Americans still haven’t given their permission for a broader Syria escalation, something the deep state is evidently doing all it can to change. In the next few weeks, if we can convince Americans to not be pushed towards war, we’ll be able to avert irreversible disaster.