So what exactly is happening in Syria? I have found that many high schools students are not entirely aware of what is going on the world. Syria has undergone a civil war within their country, and it is speculated that almost 1,000 Syrian people have been killed by chemical warfare, which is illegal throughout the world. The President of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, has intentionally killed almost 100,000 of his own people. The President of the United States wants to authorize an attack on Syria to stop the killing innocent people, especially with the use of chemical weapons. Recently, Russia has gotten involved in the race to stop the mass murders. Why isn't the United Nations getting involved? Because Russia, one of the permanent members, voted it down. Why did Russia vote a military attack on Syria down? Because Syria buys almost all of their weapons from Russia. Which means attack on Syria= financial hurt on Russia. Al-Assad told Russian TV on Thursday that the United States must call off any potential attack on Syrian government forces before he gives up his large chemical weapons. Weapon experts say that the idea of taking control of Syria's chemical weapons would be virtually impossible while a civil war is occurring. Syria is beginning to cooperate, and Syria told the United Nations on Thursday that it has sent the paperwork for joining the Chemical Weapons Convention, which bans all use of chemical weapons. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov continue to have more talks about the Syrian crisis. In 2011, there were few talks about trying to consolidate peace throughout the Syrian regime. But since then, the process has been on hold. If the talks between Kerry and Lavrov go well, the peace talks can be initiated once again, and the renewal of peace in Syria can be established. While the threat of a military attack is subsided, there needs to be an establishment of a serious consequence if this happens again. As the Secretary of State John Kerry says, "This is not a game."

• 22,530,746: Syria's estimated population in July 2012, according to the CIA World Factbook

• 0.311: Approximate percentage of the Syrian population killed so far 

0.311% of the population would be 976,066 people for the United States, 196,077 people for the United Kingdom and 4,177,476 people for China.

(source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/08/world/meast/syria-civil-war-compare/index.html)