Armed intervention is only option for Syria

Kofi Annan has been trying to wipe the blood off his hand from when he shook Syrian President Assad's hand three days after Assad had ordered his Alawite militia to massacre 40 children and 30 women in Houla.

After the hand shake, he listened politely to Assad's denials. By meeting with Assad, he reinforced Assad's legitimacy as Syria's leader and that Assad intended to abide by the United Nation's peace plan.

Everyone except for Annan knows Assad and his regime must go and that the U.N. and its observers have only increased the massacre of Syrian citizens.

We, Europe, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the Arab League can wait no longer for the feckless U.N. approval that will never come and need to start a Libya-like intervention plan which started in 1988 when Reagan ordered a squadron of F-11s from England and two squadrons of F-16s from a carrier to attack Moammar Gadhafi's palace to kill him. This policy continued in 2010 and 2011 with U.S. and European airstrikes of Gaddafi's tanks and artillery, which ended with the overthrow of Gaddafi's regime and his death.

The sooner Assad can be thrown out, the less killing will occur.

Armed intervention will be violent as Saudi, Turkey and U.S. fighter jets take out Assad's armor and artillery and create safe zones around embattled Syrian cities. There will be collateral civilian causalities, but in the end, there will be less killing by not allowing the violence to continue. God only knows how many months or years more.

William Peterson

North Liberty