Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Peace needs us to act when we must

Four years ago the world watched as Syria was taken up in the Arab Spring/Occupy movements. Sadly the demonstrations were also when Syria began its slide into civil war. Everyone hoped there would be a calming point. Again it was with a sad heart we watched the chaos grow. As the chaos grew we fought about who should be at the peace talks, who should lead Syria, what countries have a legitimate reason to be involved and what strategy is best to solve the chaos. Then a three year old child washed up on a beach. Let this war be a turning point for all of us on how to deal with the chaos of war. Today the world is scrambling for a solution to the refugee problem. From now on we must understand to get such issues dealt with before hand. This would be our risk management teams focus of work. As for the Russia and RUSA standoff, this should have ended twenty years ago. However there are still some that need to have the cold war rage on. The standoff between these two is causing more civilian deaths, more refugees and more destruction. In many reports we hear how this war was caused by Assad. Well in truth there was another major player in the chaos and that partner is the Islamic State. They took advantage of a tenuous situation and helped make it worse. In absolute truth the entire world helped the Arab spring demonstration get out of hand. From the supply of weapons, equipment then coupled with a do nothing of serious impact ideology Syrian society was left to ravages of war. Four years ago we knew what could take place and we did nothing. Today we are now experiencing what was warned by many. What is so frustrating is that the media are telling us we had no idea this was going to happen or we have no idea how this war got to this point. The exact same thing is taking place in Libya. We knew what was going to happen and no one cared to take the advice of the experts. Now we have to work ten times as hard, a hundred times as long and suffer a thousand times more tragedy in both countries/regions. These are the impacts of chaos. If we do not have the courage to do what is necessary we can expect to endure the chaos of war in Syria and Libya for decades to come. From this moment on you can stop crying about how sad it is to experience the loss of life as three year children wash up on beaches. You can stop crying because now you know that we could have stopped both Syria and Libya from this hell. We did nothing when we should have. Why we did nothing was due to fear and intolerance. That is the impact of chaos. We get caught up in rhetoric. By the time we regain some sense of order we become perplexed as to the complexity of relationship building, peace talks and how to fight a war without actually physically fighting. We are well past the point of not engaging in a physical fight. Boots on the ground will be a cornerstone of ending the chaos in Syria as well as Libya. Who is strong enough to stand up for that duty?

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