Why the US Shouldn’t Support Syrian Rebels

The United States should avoid military intervention in Syria for a variety of reasons but the biggest reason is because we should not encourage a proxy war with Russia. Russia and Syrian President Assad have been allies for decades. Putin has been openly supplying Assad's forces with weapons, aircraft, tanks, intelligence, and human resources in the form of military advisers since the beginning of the conflict. When Obama failed to raise enough public support for direct military action to change Assad’s oppressive regime, he took the less direct approach by authorizing the CIA to arm any group apposed to Assad creating the proxy war. The intervention of superpowers allowed for the conflict to cause a stalemate between Syrian Government forces and rebel groups which is furthering the humanitarian crisis. If that isn’t enough of a reason to persuade you, consider the next few arguments.

ISIS has an enormous amounts of US made weapons paid for by United States taxpayers. An Amnesty International report concludes that ISIS has acquired a huge amount of US from victories against the Iraqi Army and Syrian rebels. The large arsenal of US weapons contain humvees, trucks, rockets artillery pieces, and anti-aircraft stinger missiles. During the United States withdraw in Iraq the US left the Iraqi army “armed to the teeth” with weapons and military equipment. The Islamic State captured a large amount of these weapons, including 2,300 American made Humvees worth over a billion dollars, during their victories in Northern Iraq. This proves that if the US continues to provide weapons to Syrian rebels they can easily end up in the hands of the Islamic State, just like how the weapons we gave to the Iraqi Army have been captured.

This is not the only reason we shouldn’t provide aid to Syria rebels. According to Carla del Ponte, a former prosecutor for U.N. tribunals investigating war crimes in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, Syrian rebels may be using nerve gas as a weapon. She claims the evidence came to light during interviews with victims and physicians. Although their is an outstanding amount of proof that the Syrian government is using chemical weapons they have accused the opposition of using chemical weapons at least twice. Syrian authorities rationalize their accusations by claiming that rebels committed chemical attack to frame the government to kick start international intervention. With both sides pointing fingers and both sides capable of these attacks the United States should stay out of their Civil War and save US tax money.

Even if Syrian rebels weren’t responsible for any of the chemical attacks they still have been know to side with terrorist groups in order to strengthen their chances in their fight with their common enemy, President Assad. One known Syrian group that pledged their alliance, Jabat al Nursa Front, did so because “(ISIS) provided them early on with technical, military and financial support.” The Syrian rebels have no choice to side with terrorist groups since President Obama refuses to supply rebels with direct military aid. Who could blame him though? After all that approach has lead to ISIS’s multi-billion dollar US-made arsenal.

The US has been involved in the Syrian Conflict since 2011 and it is time to get out for the sake of everyone in the world especially for Syrians. Our military involvement is not going to stop the crisis it is going to drag out the crisis and can make it worse. The conflict cannot come to an end while this proxy war continues. Assad’s forces and rebel forces have a huge amount of support which is leading to a unresolvable conflict. Though Assad is a dictator who has violated human rights shouldn’t rely on rebel forces since they have proven to side with terrorist organizations as support against Assad. While the rebels appear to be on our side they are only oppose ISIS to get US aid and would turn on us just as fast as the Sunni fighters that formed Al-Qaeda after all the aid the US gave them.