NATO countries' citizens should oppose to a foreign military intervention in Syria

The order for this round will be Pro's case, My case, and, lastly, Voting Issues. PRO's CASE: C1: Chemical Weapons. It is important to note that Pro no longer denies that chemical weapons were used; he simply asserts that the rebels could have used these weapons. Firstly, this charge is fairly unsupported--the Telegraph evidence on which Pro's claims rest never mentions that CWs were given to the rebels by the West. In fact, it is highly unlikely that this is the case; the West is well aware that CWs could be mishandled by rebels and make the situation worse. It is not in NATO's interests to grant the rebels CWs. I admit that munitions were given to the rebels, but munitions are not the same thing as CWs, and Pro's source only references munitions and light arms. Pro also makes a critical drop: (1) Pro drops that Assad is the only actor with the means of deploying CWs, meaning he is the most likely to have used them. Next, Pro tries to claim that Assad never thought NATO would intervene. Pro then cites the geopolitical risks Assad was facing, concluding by stating, "if NATO intervenes directly, Syria can't be helped. " None of this evidence actually addresses whether or not Assad thought the U. S would really attack. Assad was well aware that if NATO attacked, he wouldn't stand a chance, but he thought it would never come to that. Sure, Russian doesn't border Syria, but it has warships off the Syrian coast and has been stymying NATO efforts in the Security Council. On top of that, Russia and China form a powerful political and economic block--NATO doesn't want to annoy them too much because both of them have the power to do even more to hurt us diplomatically and economically. Assad thought these deterrents would be enough to spare him, especially when you consider how unpopular war in Syria is with many NATO citizens. So yes, he knew he could repel NATO, but he never thought he would have to. These leads to a second key issue: the logic for Assad's attack. Pro claims Assad's forces could vastly outnumber rebels; however, this is fallacious for several reasons: (1) Assad's whole ARMY might be 100,000, but they are fighting all over the country and it is unlikely that more than a few thousand would have been defending any one city, even Damascus, (2) those few thousand are not going to be concentrated in one area of the city, they will be disbursed to hold as much of the city as possible, (3) the rebels were about to gain control of a key neighborhood that could have caused some of Assad's forces to be cut off, which would have enable the rebels to make huge inroads. Assad fired weapons into the area after withdrawing his forces, so it didn't matter if the CWs were hard to control, because there is a predictable radius in which the damage would be inflicted. Withdrawing soldiers from that radius would prevent ancillary harms to his own forces. And, we're talking about a chaotic war zone; the UN investigator may not have been deliberately targeted; that's very hard to prove. Additionally, the U. S. investigators did not go into areas that were as volatile as the ones the UN inspectors did, so it's logical that the U. S. inspectors weren't shot at. Ultimately, Assad was the only actor with the ability to deploy CWs, and he had a logical motive for using CWs, it is safe to say that his regime was the one that massacred/gassed those people. C2: Rebels. Pro completely drops my source and my analysis about how NATO can intervene and support moderate groups, and by doing so, NATO can curb the influence of al-Qaeda. Extend this. C3: Democratization Pro drops my two points that (a) U. S. intervention isn't about democratization, but rather humanitarianism, and (b) that even Pro's example of Libya is still better after intervention than before. Extend these arguments. C4: Other Interests Pro claims that the U. S. isn't reacting strongly to the al-Qaeda elements of the Syrian opposition because of a profit motive. However, this completely ignored the arguments I made in response to Pro's C2 which Pro dropped. These arguments demonstrated that NATO would intervene in support of moderates. Even Pro's sources agree that the FSA is a "moderate" group. Furthermore, the evidence Pro dropped suggested that NATO intervention in support of moderates would give moderates more power within the opposition, and therefore, NATO intervention would reduce or eliminate much of al-Qaeda's influence within the opposition movement. As for the assertions that the rebels used CWs, this evidence is minimal and lacks the credibility that the evidence against Assad does. The U. S. is also not aggressive against Assad; it's aggressive against CW use, and currently, the evidence of CWs use is strongest against Assad. Finally, you can hardly call Obama's hesitancy to become involved in Syria "aggression. " Let's clear up this notion of "invasion. " The U. S. would engage in limited strikes that would disable Assad's ability to launch CWs. It would take no other action--John Kerry and Obama have emphasized this point at length. Therefore, NATO wouldn't be using force to guarantee a change of government, merely, we would be preventing WMDs from being used. Assad still has a fully operational army without CWs, so simply striking against CW facilities does not guarantee his downfall. A NATO strike doesn't equate to invasion. CON's CASE Overview: CFR So, Pro claims that 3 out of 8 of the major donors to CFR are right-leaning. That's not even 50%. Furthermore, the left and center groups do donate hefty amounts of money, and so do help to counterbalance those issues. Additionally, arranging meetings with members of Congress does not mean that CFR's publications are biased. It's one thing to arrange meetings, in which no CFR representative is present, and to publish false literature. On top of that, Pro makes a ton of drops: (1) Richard Haass is a reliable author and (2) the actual text of the CFR publication is logical, and unbiased. So, when we evaluate the credibility of the actual text I cite, we can see that the article was written by a reliable source and is, itself, logical. Even if the CFR as an organization were faulty, that does not mean ALL of it's publications are unreliable. Tis particular source I quote is reliable, and should therefore be considered valid. Even if you don't buy that, the CFR evidence is only one of many sources I cite, and the only one Pro challenged. It's a small portion of my argumentation, and I can win without it. C1: Stability Pro makes more drops here: (1) we can't distribute aid in Syria because this situation is too volatile, and (2) humanitarian aid alone won't stop WMD use. Extend this contention. C2: WMDs Pro makes more drops here too: (1) diplomacy will take too long, (2) it's unlikely Assad will truly surrender all of his CWs, and (3) a strike will bolster the norm against using WMDs. Extend these as well. C3: Iran Again, Pro COMPLETELY drops this contention. Extend the following points: (1) Iran supports terrorist groups, (2) intervention in Syria will harm Iran, (3) keeping Iran weak is beneficial. C4: Lives Spared Yet more drops by Pro. Extend the fact that a Con vote will actually save more lives by reducing WMD use, etc. Also, Pro uses the HuffPost--Pro criticizes me for using a right leaning sources (CFR) but then uses a very leftwing source. Pro cannot just say that my source is biased, and then go on to use biased sources of his own. It's hypocritical. Final point that is dropped: an oppressed minority--in this case the opposition--can call for outside support, and the outside would be obliged to intervene on a moral level. Pro makes a comment about how past actions matter because they're indicative of what will happen in the future, but consider the following: (1) Many NATO leaders, including Obama, are extremely hesitant to wage wars, (2) the U. S. doesn't want this conflict, (3) there is clear evidence of CW use. At this point, it doesn't seem likely that the NATO would be acting imperialistically by striking because there is such clear indication of violations of int'l law. FINAL COMMENTS Pro makes a very pathos-based concluding argument that was, frankly, devoid of any logos appeal. Pro paints the U. S. as some imperialistic devil--but, even if you buy this, in this particular case, the U. S. does have legitimate cause to intervene. We're not here to impeach the U. S. 's past actions, we're here to discuss Syria--and in Syria, there are many good, ethical, and legal reasons to initiate a limited strike for the purposes of disabling Assad's CW capacity. Also, Pro, in his attempt to excoriate and defame the U. S. , forgets that the topic is not U. S. specific--it's referring to the whole of NATO. With that, I ask you as judges to set aside your personal feelings on the conflict in Syria; please, judge only on the merits of the arguments and vote solely on who you thought won this debate on a technical level, whether that is Pro or Con. Thank you. SPELLING AND CONDUCT: I will leave the determination about spelling to the judges. I would like to note though, that in the comments, Pro stated that he could not use new sources in the last round; yet he uses at least one new source in R4 (for example, thenewamerican. com). I will also leave this up to the judges to decide whether this should factor into the score; I just wanted to mention it. VOTING ISSUES First VI: Pro's Case lacks offense: (1) Assad is most likely to have used CWs, (2) Pro drops his own C2, (3) Pro drops his own C3, (4) Pro drops that a NATO intervention would harm al-Qaeda, (5) intervention would not be an invasion. Second VI: Con's Case has a ton of offense: (1) The CFR evidence is valid, and even if weren't, it's only used in one contention, (2) Pro drops my C1, (3) Pro drops my C2, (4) Pro drops my C3, (5) Pro drops my C4. At this point, the ENTIRE Con case STANDS UNREBUTTED. Thanks for judging!