Introduction to International Politics
Foreign Event Analysis
| Locale | ![[]](http://www.kvasaheim.com/flags/flag15-sy.png "Flag of Syria") | Syria |
|---|---|---|
| Title |
Syria’s Borders Violated
| |
| Summary |
American Special Forces crossed the Iraqi Syrian border Sunday in an attempt to locate and apprehend a suspected Iraqi Al-Queda terrorist who had been smuggling troops and weapons across the border. The raid began early Sunday morning with four helicopters crossing the border. Two helicopters provided support fire during the raid while two dropped troops who quickly stormed the suspected terrorist’s compound. Eight Syrian’s were killed in this action and the Syrian government says they were all civilians including two children. No American casualties were reported. The American’s have refused to comment on the success of the mission and whether they found the suspected terror suspect. Syria is asking for a formal apology from the United States for the total disregard of international law and international borders. A rally was held in Damascus protesting this raid by Americans and showing support for the Syrian people from the Syrian government. The United States as of this time has issued no formal apology.
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| Analysis |
America acted in a realist thought way in attacking a target over Syrian borders. It was a rational actor by realizing there was a threat in Syria that needed to be neutralized. They also realized that they must do this in order to secure their power in the region and bring peace to Iraq something the United States has been trying to do for many years. America also realized that since they are a superpower they could do this without much fear from other states and the United Nations will never place meaningful sanctions against the United States. America also acted in a realist way by seeing that they had to help themselves. There was a direct threat they saw in another nation and realized that they needed to take it out and no other group especially the Syrian government would help them. They completed this action with total disregard for international law and international borders however in the realist perspective these are not important. The United States truly fulfilled the role a realist thought pattern in conducting their raid into Syria.
Syria’s response to these attacks must be very careful. Syria could not fight an all out war with America so they must find another way to execute their power over America. They are realizing that no actors above the state so they see U.N. as not a valuable option. However, they could form a realist style alliance. This means they could go to other countries that have problems with the United States and form an alliance to try and equal the power of the United States. Though this option is hard to accomplish it is their best option at the moment. They are also trying to sway world opinion by showing how illegal this action was. A realist would no see this action as illegal but the whole world are no realists so Syria’s hope to gain world opinion against the United States is another valuable option to gain power over the United States. Syria does not have many true realist actions because they cannot go directly got war with the United States but must try and form alliances and gain world support before trying to compete with American power. | |
| Perspective |  | Realist |
| In-Region URL | ||
| Out-of-Region URL | ||
| Submitted | October 31, 2008 at 10:24 am | |
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