Syria and the Pax Americana

The use of chemical weapons does not change that underlying calculus: There is still no case for putting U.S. boots on the ground or making regime change an immediate American priority. But it does represent a uniquely-brazen violation of our era’s wartime norms, carried out in defiance of a specific warning from an American president. Yes, those norms are somewhat arbitrary (though chemical weapons really are more indiscriminate and inherently terroristic than many other means of wartime killing). Yes, that warning may have been ill-advised (though I suspect most American presidents in my lifetime would have felt compelled to issue it). And no, I don’t think the Pax American would give way to 1930s-style predation if the White House found a way to wriggle out of its “red line” commitment.