Listen to London: Don’t Bomb Syria

I want to add my voice to the chorus that is urging President Obama not to bomb Syria. Yesterday the British Parliament issued a sharp rebuke to PM David Cameron’s sabre-rattling when they voted against any military intervention in Syria:

WASHINGTON — President Obama is prepared to move ahead with a limited military strike on Syria, administration officials said Thursday, despite a stinging rejection of such action by America’s stalwart ally Britain and mounting questions from Congress.

The negative vote in Britain’s Parliament was a heavy blow to Prime Minister David Cameron, who had pledged his support to Mr. Obama and called on lawmakers to endorse Britain’s involvement in a brief operation to punish the government of President Bashar al-Assad for apparently launching a deadly chemical weapons attack last week that killed hundreds.

Ban-Ki Moon, the Secretary General of the United Nations is urging peaceful solutions to the crisis in Syria.

Both Republican and Democratic members of Congress are expressing serious concerns about the lack of reliable information they’ve gotten about Syria.

Nevertheless, the president seems poised to start bombing.

While the crisis in Syria is obvious urgent and terrible, more bombs are not the answer. After Iraq and Afghanistan, we have unequivocal evidence that US bombs are not nearly as surgical as our military leaders claim. It’s similarly obvious that, for the foreseeable future, there will always be a country in crisis in the Middle East. We simply cannot keep getting baited into these conflicts.

While weapons manufacturers are surely giddy at the prospects of more million-dollar bombs being launched from billion-dollar warships, the US economy struggles, minority students are floundering in our public schools, and we’ve got an immigration crisis to solve. And don’t even get me started about healthcare.

It’s time for the president to turn his sights on his homeland and let the Middle East solve its own crises — with our diplomatic, but not military, help.

Other faith leaders weigh in here.