No, you're wrong... an invasion of Syria back then would NOT have gotten support from the US public or UN. Plus you had Russia right here who would have most likely intervened, and they signaled this by sending warships to Syrian ports.
In 3 - 6 months from now when the US does actually invade Syria, they'll have support from both, the US public and UN in order to rid the world of ISIS, plus Russia will be working with one hand tied behind its back, since it's been vilified internationally so badly.
You don't see this? You think this is all happening naturally? You don't believe there's some groups / organizations pushing things a certain way to make them happen as they want?
Other way around, dude. The US got rid of the Russian threat due to Ukraine. Notice how Putin ended up on Times magazine recently as world enemy #1? Russian forces going in to protect the Syrian people from a US invasion would look pretty fucken bad at this point, wouldn't you agree? Especially since the US is just helping the world by ridding it of that evil ISIS regime.
When has the US ever started a war that was justified? WWII I guess, but that's almost it. I guess Kosovo, but even that can be debated. Vietnam war was false flag, and well proven now.
Iraq invasion in 2003 was total horse shit and lies, and we know that now. Afghanistan in 2001 I guess is still debatable, because there's no solid proof, but I'm pretty confident that didn't make anyone any safer at all. Both, Libya and Egypt are now far worst off than then were before the US bombed the hell out of them, and the list can go on and on and on. We haven't even touched on the atrocities in Latin America yet.
And you're actually going to believe what the government says about ISIS? As the old saying goes, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over again, hoping for a different result. They've lied to us time and time and time again, so why you would ever believe this bullshit rhetoric is beyond me.
1. Yes, Russia would have intervened. And it's true, a full blown invasion may not have got support, but something similar to how we dealt with Libya would've. And once you're in, 'keeping the peace', it's much much easier to then top up a little more, and again, until you have an army there. The US public & the UN didn't seem to have a problem with Libya, despite Libya being ranked as one of the most free countries in Africa by the UN themselves. Also, you haven't answered my question. Can you name a single major news source that weren't against the Syrian government, that wasn't Russian? I know Al Jazeera fully supported the revolution.
Your way, admittedly, it makes Russia look more like the bad guy, but they wouldn't have looked great anyway. Now, however, instead of distracting Russia away from their own borders, it just distracts the US and Western Europe away from their own borders. Russia is in a very good position thanks to that.
It depends how you define 'naturally'. Would it have happened if we hadn't got involved in the Middle East in the first place? No, because they'd have far less to be pissed off about, and they'd have been able to build up infrastructure, wouldn't have had the world's largest army to practice hide and seek against, etc, but I've outlined all that above. Of course people are pushing things certain ways, but that doesn't mean that the US is able to control everything either.
2. We're not doing shit about Ukraine at the moment. Yes, that situation would look bad at the moment, but it would have looked bad then too (depending on how it was played, but the aid agencies weren't talking about the pain and suffering in Libya back then, they were talking about Syria). The Russian threat still exists, and it's far closer to home. If Russia fully invade Ukraine, they're next to Poland, which neighbours Germany. But a full invasion of Europe isn't a sensible strategy for Russia, that's not the way they've played it in the past. They piss off the other countries just enough to get them to start fighting back, and then they take advantage of the Russian winters and huge landmass. Once Western Europe retreats, repeat, until you've weakened them enough to become the stronger power.
3. You'll have to give me a little leniency here, as I'm not fully up to date on US military history. But there's Haiti, Bosnia, Korea. However, I wasn't talking so much in terms of morals, more in terms of tactics and strategy. Iraq and Afghanistan, yes, but in the US at least, it was largely supported. It says a lot that the biggest protest against it was in England, the country with a population less than a fifth of the US. People were riled up over 9/11 (for the purposes of this discussion, let's assume that 9/11 was a genuine attack and the US had no involvement, or it'll really get messy). But no, it wasn't justifiable, however, that's what happens when people get very personally involved, it was a revenge war, rather than a tactical decision (I'm reminded of the Sikh that got shot that day/the next day by some ignoramus).
If 9/11 had been in England, or France, or Mexico, I doubt the same thing would've happened. But you can't make good tactical decisions in that short period of time, and I'm not sure I can think of any other wars that are comparable to that. Yes, I agree, Libya and Egypt are far worse off, and I was against those from the beginning. Whether we should've intervened in Syria is a difficult one, if the Iraq/Afghanistan war hadn't happened, I'd say definitely not, but this mess was created by us trying to stick our noses in other people's business. If we were guaranteed to have military action in either Libya or Syria though, I would've picked Syria without a second thought.
In regards to your last point, yes, I always remain sceptical of anything that the government or the media (or anyone, for that matter) says, however, the facts are there, and I can't think of a single source, Western or not, that's provided evidence that ISIS aren't all that bad.
P.S. Wow, sorry, I typed a lot here. I blame the Modafinil.
