No war, and I'll donate a lot of it back to charity.

And arm them with unicorns. Those sharp horns are murderous.

That's sure to bring peace in the Middle East.

Also, "moderate" seems to mostly mean "those we favor at the moment" and "extremists" the opposite, at best.

I'd be extremely surprised if this one time, the people we arm would be so grateful as to not turn on us as soon as they get in power. In fact, that statement reminds me of statements to the effect that we would be 'greeted as liberators' a decade or so back.

Because I don't want one nickle more of my tax monies poured down that rathole.

Do it yourself and leave me out.

The worst sort of war is one where the two sides are evenly matched - that's where it tends to grind on, neither side has an incentive to look for a way out, and you wind up with a whole country, a whole population destroyed. That's about how Syria was for a year or so, though now Assad has the upper hand. If we tip it back against him the insurgents get a second wind and a new cycle of horrible destruction begins.

The death toll is bad enough as it is. If Assad wins, with all his flaws, that's still better than evening the back again. If we wanted to tip the odds in the rebels favor, $500 million is a drop in the bucket, its not much of a commitment. Its just throwing a bunch more fuel on the fire, saying "that should do it", and walking away. Its inadequate, and worse than doing nothing.

Let the Syrians and Iraqis slaughter themselves and each other on someone else's dime for a change.

In America.

Wolf

Less bloodshed and more chance of getting something in return.