In the article, House Grudgingly Approves Arms for Syrian Rebels, there is much concern to whether or not Obama should follow through with his plan to aid the Syrian Rebels to overturn the Syrian President.Wednesday, after House approved administration authority to train and arm Syrian rebels in the struggle against Islamic State militants in either Iraq or Syria, people have began to wonder if maybe House has given too much power to the Presidency. Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma said, "Members on both sides of the aisle are very
concerned that too much of Congress' warmaking power has gone to the
president". President Barack Obama also stated that American forces "do not and will not have a combat
mission".
The votes Wednesday seemed inconclusive and unbiased to one party, with a 273-156 vote in Congress. Some of the top Republican as well as Democratic leaders supported Obama and his provision to add it to the spending legislation, while another large group of lawmakers in both parties as well were strictly against it. Overall, 85 Democrats and 71 Republicans voted against Obama and against granting him the power he wanted to arm Syria. But with 159 votes
from Republicans and 114 from Democrats, the measure was passed.
In order to bring comfort to the liberal lawmakers, Obama made sure to reassure that the new military mission would be limited and that the House "took an important step forward as our nation unites to confront the
threat posed" by the Islamic State group. Even leaders such as the Speaker, John Boehner, R-Ohio, and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California supported Obama's plan while other Republican officials thought that the plans wouldn't work to defeat the militants that have overrun Iraq and Syria.
GOP lawmakers took comfort in the fact that it was a short-term legislation.
It grants Obama authority until Dec. 11, which grants Congress plenty of
time to return to the issue in a postelection session set to begin in
mid-November. In order to train and
equip rebels, it will cost about $500 million dollars. The cost wasn't a huge debate to the lawmakers, because they were mainly focused on the possible consequences of a new
military mission not long after America ended participation in the wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq.
Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif. said,"We simply don't know if somewhere down the line it will turn our
guns back against us". Rep. Sanchez isn't alone in her fear that the rebels we arm and are wishing for the removal of Syrian president Assad could eventually prove unreliable allies.
The final approval by the Senate is expected on Thursday.
This article is important to read in that once more, the idea of whether the President should be granted the power to arm troops and when and if that is necessary, is brought up. The idea of war in general, or anything that could possibly lead to war is important to grasp an understanding of so that you can begin to form your own opinions. After reading this article you can tell that the country as a whole and all of it's political leaders are split on whether or not the next move we are making is right or not, due to the fact that it's costly, timely, and could become a possible threat in the future to us.
