Letter to the Editor: October 10, 2013

To the Editor,

After reading Julia Carpey’s column on the Syrian crisis published on Monday, Oct. 7, I’m disappointed by the ahistorical viewpoint expressed by the columnist. The crisis in Syria has been going on for about two years now, yet it has only prompted military action when President Bashar al-Assad allegedly used chemical weapons on his own people. Where were we when women and children were being raped and massacred using “traditional” weapons? Why the outrage now? 

She justifies military intervention by making an ill-advised parallel to the Holocaust. I caution you and others to restrain from making these overreaching comparisons (Obama to Hitler, slavery, lynch mobs, etc). The insurgency in Syria is balkanized and some factions are affiliated with Islamic extremists. Why would we support these factions when they are against anything Western or American? This bears no similarity to the Holocaust where six million Jews were exterminated in concentration camps. 

Also, why didn’t we see moral obligation during the 1994 Rwandan genocide? Our country was in a much better state during that time, but we were silent. Clearly, we pick and choose when we feel like being the “world police.” It might be selfish to suggest that our country should stay out of this foreign conflict, but our country is currently in economic and political malaise. Yet we have the audacity to go to other countries and promote democracy when our country is barely functioning. Let’s take care of home first before we even think about putting boots on the ground in another foreign conflict.

Fola Arowolo

The Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences