The myth of the Red Line : an international relations analysis of the Obama administration’s argumentation for and against a military intervention in Syria

Abstract: This paper aims to examine the arguments proposed by the Obama administration regarding a U.S. military intervention in Syria due to the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime in 2013. During his presidency, Obama stated that the He draws a ‘red line’ at the use of chemical weapons against civilians, but the threat proved to be empty a year later when thousands of people were killed in a chemical weapons attack in a Damascus suburb and the Syrian regime were found guilty of the deed. Obama firstly suggested and tried to legitimize a limited military operation in Syria, but then shifted his stance entirely and instead, tried to delegitimize his own former stance. By collecting arguments from speeches, interviews and such made by the former president Barack Obama and some of the closest people in his staff, the research aims to recognize what kind of arguments were being used. The arguments are extracted and structured according to Arne Naess’ argumentation analysis, followed by a set of research questions to apply the theoretical framework. The theories consists of international relations theories as well as Aristotle’s three types of arguments - ethos, pathos and logos. The results of the research are then discussed and concluded and eventually finds what a noticeable shift of the arguments’ nature was made.