Stupid is as stupid does...

Stupid, Stupid, Stupid:

BEIRUT -- As the U.S. continues to ramp up its plans to target the Syrian military with cruise missile strikes, Syrian citizens and opposition figures have voiced a mix of optimism and deep concern about what may happen in the aftermath of a bombing raid.
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Abdulkader al Dhon, a Syrian human rights activist who now lives in Turkey but travels regularly to his home country, said on Friday that many people he speaks with are worried that the U.S. war plan could spiral into a larger conflict.
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"The regime might use the attacks and say: 'we are victims,'" Col. Ahmed Hamada, a rebel military leader, said in the report. "They could grow more powerful."

In Beirut, a Syrian activist and analyst who stays in close contact with friends and allies in Damascus and elsewhere told HuffPost Friday that he was "surprised by the attitudes" of some of his friends in light of the U.S. plans.

"Even some of the ones who are extremely anti-regime, they were still anti-intervention," said the analyst, who asked to remain anonymous. "A lot of them see the whole thing as hypocritical: they feel like the West doesn't start thinking about a serious solution to their problem until it starts to see it as a threat to their own national security."
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Military experts say it is unlikely that the U.S. will attempt to dismantle or destroy Syria's copious chemical weapons stores, something that might risk releasing deadly toxins into the air and killing more civilians in the process.

But many rebel fighters and western policymakers also worry that the jihadi groups who have risen in prominence in the opposition might take advantage of the period of disarray after an American strike to take more ground, or even gain control of some of the chemical weapons stocks.
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Meanwhile, military analysts say, it remains unclear if the strikes would actually work, even by the stripped down standards of the White House. And by the time that question is resolved, the situation in Syria could already be much worse.

"It’s still not clear if that will necessarily have the desired impact of restraining the Syrian military’s willingness to employ brutal military tactics," said Charles Lister, a military analyst with IHS Janes in London who has been closely watching the Syria conflict. "This is where punitive strikes carry some element of political risk –- it’s not always clear that their objectives can always be achieved until sometime after the fact."

Even some top U.S. military officials have said they worry about the aftermath of a limited military engagement in Syria.

"Once we take action, we should be prepared for what comes next," warned Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the U.S. joint chiefs of staff, in a letter to lawmakers last month. "Deeper involvement is hard to avoid."