Letters to the Editor

Hamilton Spectator

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

“West should get out of Syria”

Re: editorial: “West cannot walk away from tragedy in Syria”, Page A11, April 9

Doug Brown, co-chair, Hamilton Coalition To Stop The War

The U.S., its NATO partners and Arab monarchs have attempted regime change for the past seven years in Syria, using proxy armies of terrorists, mostly aligned with al-Qaida. Lately, the U.S., Turkey and Israel occupied large parts of Syria, apparently aiming to partition the country. Syrians paid a very heavy price for these illegal actions.

Syrians may pay an even heavier price as a result of an unproven chemical weapons incident in Eastern Ghouta. Police look for means and motive in criminal investigations. The Syrian government has neither. It divested itself of chemical weapons in 2014. It has nothing to gain by using banned weapons to antagonize the U.S. when tanks and warplanes have worked very effectively to defeat the proxy terrorist armies.

Foreign-backed terrorists, on the other hand, have every incentive to use chemical weapons to implicate the Syrian government. And they have the means. A terrorist chemical lab was captured and exposed last week in Ghouta, for example.

Moreover, they have the White Helmets, an Academy-Award-winning propaganda outfit, richly funded by the U.S. and U.K., to create slick ads for direct western military intervention in Syria.

Before Trump turns the latest incident into the flashpoint of a wider (world) war, western countries should re-evaluate their strategy of illegally interfering in Syria’s domestic affairs.

Instead, they should leave decisions about Syria’s future to the Syrian people, end economic sanctions on Syria, restore diplomatic relations, and contribute to the reconstruction of the once-beautiful country they have nearly destroyed.

Doug Brown, Hamilton Coalition To Stop The War