Risk Seen in a Strike on Syria
攻擊敘利亞 風險不可免
By Elisabeth Bumiller

WASHINGTON – Despite growing calls for the United States to help stop the bloodshed in Syria, senior Pentagon officials are stepping up their warnings that military intervention would be a daunting operation, requiring at least weeks of exclusively American airstrikes, with the potential for killing vast numbers of civilians.
儘管各界日益要求美國出力，終止敘利亞政府的血腥鎮壓，五角大廈高級官員卻更明白地警告，軍事干預代價極高，美國至少需要獨力進行數周空中攻擊，而此舉可能使大量敘利亞平民喪生。

The officials say that Syria presents a far larger problem than did Libya, which required a seven-month NATO air campaign last year in which hundreds of aircraft dropped and fired 7,700 bombs and missiles.
這些官員表示，敘利亞的問題比利比亞大得多，而北約去年對付利比亞時仍需進行七個月的空中攻擊，出動數百架次飛機，投下或發射7千7百枚的炸彈及飛彈。

Although the United States has the military capability to launch sustained airstrikes in Syria – “We can do anything,” the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin E. Dempsey, told the Senate this month – defense officials say they are concerned about four tough challenges: the risks in attacking Syria’s plentiful and sophisticated Russian-made air defenses; arming a deeply splintered Syrian opposition; the potential for starting a proxy war with Iran or Russia, two crucial allies of Syria; and the lack, at least so far, of an international coalition willing to take action against the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
美國有能力在敘利亞發動持續的空中攻擊，參謀首長聯席會議主席鄧普西這個月便在參議院說：「我們有能力採取任何行動」，但國防部官員們指出他們擔心四項嚴峻的挑戰：對敘利亞量多質精的俄製防空設施發動攻擊；武裝敘利亞分裂的反對派；可能與俄羅斯及伊朗這兩個敘利亞最重要盟國展開一場「代理人」戰爭；以及至少目前還沒有一個願意對巴夏爾．阿塞德政府展開行動的國際聯盟。凡此皆存在著風險。

One senior defense official said that even creating “safe havens,” or protected areas inside Syria for civilians, would be such a complex operation that military planners were “looking at a serious contingent of U.S. ground troops” to help establish and maintain them, should the United States take such a course of action.
國防部一位高級官員表示，即使建立一些「安全區」，亦即在敘利亞境內設置一些平民保護區，也是相當複雜的作業，因為如果要採取此類行動，軍事計畫人員「考慮以相當人數的美軍地面部隊組成特遣隊」，來協助建立及維持。

The planning is in response to a request by President Obama for preliminary military options from the Pentagon, even though the administration still believes that diplomatic and economic pressure is the best way to stop repression of Mr. Assad’s government. Senator John McCain of Arizona and some of his fellow Republicans continue to argue that the United States has a responsibility to involve itself in the Syrian rebellion.
這項計畫是五角大廈應總統歐巴馬所提初步軍事行動選項要求而做，儘管政府仍認為外交及經濟壓力是制止阿塞德政府鎮壓行動的上策。亞利桑納州聯邦參議員馬侃及另幾位同屬共和黨的議員持續主張，美國有責任親身參與敘利亞人的反政府行動。

Defense and intelligence officials say that Syria’s integrated air defenses are not only more advanced than those in Libya, they are also arrayed in densely populated areas, meaning that even with precision bombing, civilians nearby would probably be killed.
國防及情報官員表示，敘利亞整合良好的空防系統不但較利比亞先進，而且部署在人口稠密地區，這意味即使進行精準的轟炸，附近的平民也可能遭殃。

A major concern of the Pentagon is Iran. Military and intelligence officials say that Iran has recently flown into Syria small arms, chiefly rocket-propelled grenades, as well as technological equipment and high-ranking experts to assist the Assad government in interrupting social media and the internet.
五角大廈的一大顧慮是伊朗。軍事及情報官員指出，伊朗最近把一些小型武器空運至敘利亞，主要是火箭彈；另並提供科技設備及高階專家，來協助阿塞德政府阻截社群媒體及網路。

At the same time, Russia is a leading arms supplier to Syria and maintains a naval station at the Syrian port city of Tartus.
同時，俄羅斯也是敘利亞的主要武器供應者，並在敘利亞的塔圖斯港市設有一座海軍基地。

Administration officials say that they remain concerned about Syria’s chemical and biological weapons and that they are in discussions with allies in the region about how to secure them.
美國政府官員表示，他們仍擔心敘利亞的生化武器，正與該地區的盟國討論如何確保這些武器的安全。

“I’m not saying it’s a fait accompli that if they’re left unsecured, automatically someone can grab them and use them,” said General James N. Mattis, the head of the American military’s Central Command. “They may end up frying themselves. But I think that it’s going to take an international effort when Assad falls, and he will fall, in order to secure these weapons.”
美軍中區指揮部指揮官馬蒂斯將軍說：「我並不是說這是一種必然的結果，也就是如果這些武器無法獲得保護，就自然會被某些人奪取並且利用。它們最後可能會自行消滅。但我認為阿塞德終將垮台，而當他垮台時，必須有國際間共同的行動以確保這些武器的安全。」

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/12/world/middleeast/us-syria-intervention-would-be-risky-pentagon-officials-say.html

2012-03-20聯合報/G5版/UNITEDDAILYNEWS 任中原譯 原文參見紐時週報四版下