The messages coming out of Washington these days are loud and clear. "(Bashar al-Assad) must step aside and allow a democratic transition to proceed immediately," Obama said over the weekend. "Your days are numbered," said Susan Rice, US Ambassador to the United Nations, delivering a message to the Syrian president in an interview with CNN.

But missing in those statements was a call for military intervention, as was the case with Libya. In a speech delivered prior to the Libyan intervention, President Obama said the US had a responsibility toward other people and could not stand by and observe human rights being violated. "As President, I refused to wait for the images of slaughter and mass graves before taking action," he said in March 2011.

In the case of Syria, however, the US government prefers a political solution. A meeting with friendly nations is the next step.

Differences to Libya

After all, Syria isn't Libya, argues Aaron David Miller, who has advised six foreign ministers from both sides of the political spectrum on Middle East issues. "Syria is a formidable power," he told DW. "It has weapons of mass destruction. It has a very dense air defense system, one of the most sophisticated in the world."

Another difference: The opposition in Syria, unlike Libya, can't retreat to safe areas and operate from there. It isn't well armed and organized. The situation in the large cities is still relatively peaceful. Any military intervention, if necessary, would have to include the use of ground forces. And there is one more significant difference between Syria and Libya: While the dictator Moammar Gadhafi was isolated internationally, Syrian president Assad is supported by Russia, China and Iran.

The options for the US are limited to "clandestine support, military and non-military aid, including intelligence sharing with the Syrian opposition," Miller said. There is always a danger, he notes, that the situation could escalate. His sober analysis: "This is a situation in which there are no good options, and right now I don't see any good outcome." Miller has his doubts about what sanctions against Syria could achieve.

James Carafano, defense expert with the conservative Heritage Foundation, believes that the best move the US could make is to put pressure on Syria's neighbors - for instance, on Iran to stop supporting Syria and on Israel, Iraq and Turkey to pursue a common strategy.

Diversity of interests

"All three of them have an interest in having a transition that doesn't result in a civil war that doesn't result in massive refugees, and that is indeed destabilizing," he told DW, adding that one needs "to start punishing Russia for bad behavior." Together with China, Russia vetoed the Syrian resolution in the UN Security Council.

Carafano compares the diversity of interests in Syria with that in Bosnia in the 1990s. "The Allies were able to bring that conflict to a conclusion because when they went into Bosnia, the killing had pretty much ended," he said, adding that everyone had exhausted themselves and "pulled into their own corners." "If NATO had intervened in Bosnia on day one, as opposed to day last, the nature of that intervention would have been hard," he said.

A military intervention is not in the interest of the US or NATO, according to Stewart Patrick, foreign policy expert on the Council of Foreign Relations who served in the US State Department from 2002 to 2005. "We can easily make the case that the degree of suffering and depression and atrocities are worse in Syria than they were in Libya," he told DW.

Like other experts, Patrick points out that this fact alone doesn't warrant military intervention. "Humanitarian intervention, whether under the responsibility to protect doctrine or otherwise, is always going to be something that is going to be quite conditional on the circumstances on the ground and also the interests not only of the United States but also of other major powers," he said.

Miller argues that the super powers behave in a hypocritical, contradictory manner, which is part of their nature. They would only intervene, he maintains, if such action served their interests and was likely to succeed, but wouldn't budge if the costs were too high.

The Americans have just ended a war. President Obama has promised to improve the domestic infrastructure and stimulate the economy instead of pushing ahead with rebuilding Iraq and Afghanistan. In the event of an intervention in Libya without receiving congressional approval, the president could stand accused of misusing the War Powers Act.

Fear of a second Iraq

The situation is further complicated with the upcoming elections in 2012. Americans are war-weary. Carafano believes that if there were a military intervention in Syria, it  would have to be massive to avoid a situation similar to the one in Iraq in 2005. He points to parallels - a government that is only capable of maintaining power, incredible corruption, terrorist connections and ethnic tension.

Even the Republicans aren't showing any support for a military intervention, at least for the time being. Senator John McCain, who ran against Obama in the 2008 presidential election and is a member of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, believes the diplomatic options are exhausted and has called for arming the Syrian opposition as a next step. The US government officially rejected that idea.

President Obama's spokesman, Jay Carney, said the government is currently weighing humanitarian aid. Such restraint in the case of Syria is a continuation of the sober, calculative Obama policy that was already evident in Libya where the Americans offered support but gave the leadership to others. The Americans only want to be the world police, it appears, if the costs don't exceed the benefits.

Author: Christina, Bergmann, Washington / jrb
Editor: Rob Mudge