Obama’s ‘red line’ finally enforced by President Trump

At 3:45 a.m. local time on April 6, a barrage of 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles blasted off from their homes aboard the USS Porter and the USS Ross and headed toward their target near Homs, Syria. The target was a Syrian government controlled airport that was used as the launching base for a horrible chemical weapons attack that killed at least 86 civilians, including 28 children.

The missile strikes, approved by President Trump, have drawn both support and criticism from across party lines. Critics say that the president should have gotten congressional approval for the strikes, while other critics say President Trump should refrain from using military action against a foreign government. They also think that the quick switch-up on his previous policy of no regime change in Syria was too quick and should have been thought out more.

Supporters of the strikes say that military action was necessary after seven years of weakness and the failed “red line” under the Obama administration in order to keep the murderous Bashar al-Assad regime in check.

The people calling for congressional approval seem to forget about the Obama administration’s little venture into Libya in 2011 to topple the Gaddafi regime. President Obama never consulted Congress before launching strikes against that foreign government, and yet no liberals were crying then about getting a declaration of war, the only reason they are whining now is because Donald Trump is president. The president was simply enforcing International Law, something the United Nations hasn’t done for a long time.

Of course, there was agitation among liberals about “dropping bombs on Syria, to prevent a guy from dropping bombs on Syria.” These people act like we haven’t been flying sorties in Syria since September of 2014. Critics are whining about bombing a foreign country, but again they seem to forget that seven different countries were bombed under the Obama administration. But yet again, no outcry during his presidency.

The only reason these strikes are being attacked is because Donald Trump is our president, and anything he does is either “fascist” or “Hitler-esque” according to liberals.

It absolutely baffles me that liberals are so quick to defend a man who kills children with chemical weapons. Of course they claim that conservatives are no better because we don’t want to bring in more Syrian refugees.

Well, there’s only one problem there. It’s because we have a better solution. Part of President Trump’s policy is to set up safe zones in Syria, obviously guarded by coalition forces, in which the refugees can wait out the horrifying civil war. Humanitarian aid programs would be a crucial piece of this puzzle.

There are several reasons why Tomahawk cruise missiles were the best tool of diplomacy with this ruthless regime. In 2012, former President Obama drew his “line in the sand,” vowing to no longer tolerate the use of chemical weapons by the Assad government, otherwise there’d be American military intervention.

Well, in August of 2013, Assad dropped chemical weapons on rebel held areas near and around Damascus. It wounded more than 1,500 civilians. The red line had been crossed, and yet a few days later, the president punted and let Assad get away with it.

The Assad regime and his buddies Russia and Iran have had almost free roam since that point. Obviously, the red line incident proved that Obama did not have the stomach to do what needed to be done.

This paved the way for Russian intervention into Ukraine; Iran’s military forces in Iraq, Yemen and other hotspots; China’s involvement in the South China Sea; and, of course, North Korea’s nuclear program.

On April 6, President Trump finally enforced that red line. The strikes were far more effective symbolically than they were tactically. The Russians were warned ahead of time there was an impending strike on the Shayrat Airbase, so, obviously, Syria was warned as well, meaning not too heavy of damage, and obviously some fighter aircraft and supplies were destroyed, but the attack was not meant to do physical damage. It was directly meant as a way of telling the world that the United States is back in business.

The Tomahawk cruise missile attack was meant to be a message to both our allies and our enemies that there’s a new sheriff in town, and he won’t back down. The message set a new precedent, that the lawlessness that has become the new international order for the past seven years is no more.