.\u00a0 There are effectively no freaking Syrian opposition moderates left.<\/em><\/p>\nMoreover, in the last year or two Russia has moved in to Syria big time.\u00a0 Yeah, that\u2019s right \u2013 this Administration\u2019s hesitant, bumbling inaction has allowed Russia to move back into the Middle East directly for pretty much the first time since Egypt kicked them out in the 1970s.\u00a0 Now, any \u201ctargeted military action\u201d against the Syrian government is virtually a lock to involve striking forces belonging to their Russian allies as well.\u00a0 That wouldn\u2019t have been the case if we hadn\u2019t sat on our hands and scolded at the beginning.<\/p>\n
In short, we\u2019ve fornicated Fido well and thoroughly here.\u00a0 There are no good solutions left that promote US national interests.<\/u><\/p>\n
Don\u2019t believe me on that last?\u00a0 Well, consider:<\/p>\n
\u2022 <\/b>If we stand by and do nothing, Assad continues to kill off his own people while fighting al Qaeda\/Daesh forces – with firm Russian and Iranian support.\u00a0 Russia will demand compensation for helping, probably in the form of a long-term presence in bases in Syria.\u00a0 Iran may well do the same.\u00a0\u00a0That\u2019s bad, but it\u2019s also IMO probably the best option we\u2019ve got now.<\/p>\n
\u2022 <\/b>If we intervene with \u201ctargeted strikes\u201d, we hit Russian and Iranian forces along with Syrian forces.\u00a0 The Iranians may well not be able to react.\u00a0 But does anyone here think the Russians won\u2019t shoot back?\u00a0 Then, we either go in with both feet or back down.\u00a0 If we go in with both feet, how does the possibility of \u201csimultaneous war with Russia and Iran\u201d sound?\u00a0 Is Syria worth that?<\/p>\n
\u2022 <\/b>Even if by some miracle the Russians and Iranians leave, we\u2019re still screwed.\u00a0 Let’s say we help the Syrian opposition take out the Assad regime, and the Syrian opposition takes over.\u00a0 That opposition now appears thoroughly dominated by al Qaeda and Daesh.\u00a0 If you think they\u2019ll willingly let a \u201cmoderate regime\u201d friendly to the West take power, you\u2019re na\u00efve as hell.\u00a0 So backing the Syrian opposition and winning now probably sets up an al Qaeda or Daesh Caliphate in Syria, either immediately or within a couple of years.\u00a0 (Remember \u2013 after the Iranian Revolution, Khomeini didn\u2019t immediately take power.\u00a0 It took several months for Khomeini to throw out the remaining Iranian moderates under Bakhtiar and Bazargan \u2013 who initially held power \u2013 and establish his dictatorial theocracy.)<\/p>\n
Anyway:\u00a0 initially, we had options.\u00a0 Now, we really have no good options.\u00a0 So jumping in militarily with both feet \u2013 unless we\u2019re willing to conquer and occupy, possibly after fighting a war against both Russia and Iran \u2013 makes absolutely no sense at all.<\/p>\n
. . . <\/strong><\/p>\nYeah, the Syrian Civil War is nasty.\u00a0 Lots of innocents are dying.\u00a0 But there aren\u2019t any \u201cgood guys\u201d left to support that have a snowball\u2019s chance in hell of winning.\u00a0 We get involved, it\u2019s a lock that all we\u2019ll do is p!ss away more US lives and dollars to no good end.<\/p>\n
We had our chance about 4 years ago to make a difference in Syria.\u00a0 We screwed up by-the-numbers then, and the chance is no longer there.<\/p>\n
But here, we picked the worst possible course of action. We took actions that destabilized Syria (see “Spring, Arab”) – then failed to follow through, leaving those we encouraged twisting in the wind and leading indirectly to the rise of Daesh. Hell, letting Assad continue to rule Syria with an iron hand would have cost fewer innocents their lives, kept Russia “on the outside looking in”, and likely marginalized Daesh or prevented their formation entirely.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve maintained all along that we had no \u201cdog in this fight\u201d; that was true IMO from day one. Assad is a true bastard, but many if not all foreseeable potential alternatives and outcomes of his overthrow then were no better for the US. Now, barring a literal miracle all of those alternatives are IMO far worse than his continued rule.<\/p>\n
Sometimes, \u201cBetter the Devil ye know . . . . \u201c is damn good advice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Well, our \u201cesteemed\u201d Department of State is at it again.\u00a0 And as usual, they are being … More “Words of Wisdom” About Syria from the State Department<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":623,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[209,9,238],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-teh-stoopid","category-foreign-policy","category-government-incompetence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/623"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=66382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66382\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=66382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=66382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=66382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}