I think it unlikely that bombing Syria once would lead to regional war. [View all]

[cthulu2016]

Last edited Sat Aug 31, 2013, 12:07 PM - Edit history (4)

Folks who live to respond only to headlines are already typing their furious replies. For those reading this, the statement in the headline is so obviously true as to hardly be worth stating, yet will be read by many as controversial.

This post is about how to think about SERIOUS issues. (As opposed to sporting events, TV shows, etc..) Of course our contemplated "kinetic military action" is not likely to lead to regional war.

It is also not likely that bombing Syria once would lead to anything meaningful, worthwhile, helpful, humanitarian, etc..

90%+ of the time, the contemplated action would result in nothing beyond the deaths of some hapless military personnel somewhere.


Sensible opposition to this thing is mostly driven by risk assessment, not by predictions.

Our contemplated action carries serious risks of the sort that, though unlikely, would require an astonishing potential upside to even put striking Syria on the table.

When the upside of something is negligible then the tolerable risk approaches zero.

"If I point what I reasonably think is an unloaded gun to my head and squeeze the trigger I am unlikely to shoot myself."

This is TRUE. The majority of guns people think are unloaded are, in fact, unloaded. However, what does squeezing the trigger on an unloaded gun held to your head do for you? What is the upside?

Since the upside is negligible the weight of the downside becomes overwhelming.

I do not think that us killing some soldiers to make a point about how serious we are will lead inexorably to a restart of the Lebanese civil war (and/or hezbollah war on Israel via Lebanon) or lead inexorably to jihadists launching Sarin laden rockets across the Syria-Israel border.

I don't think our contemplated "kinetic military action" will inexorably lead to much of anything. And if that is correct then the potential downsides balloon in their weight, though not their probability.


If there was NO potential catastrophic down-side then a purely symbolic, pathetic looking expression of our view of chemical weapons achieved by the homicide of a small number of persons might be worth talking about.