I’ve been hard on
President Trump recently. He’s deserved it. But, his decision to announce
without any prearranged warning a complete pullout of all U.S. forces in Syria
is something I can unreservedly applaud.
Whether he actually goes through with it or not is another
story.
But even just his tweaking the D.C. establishment on this issue
is enough for at least a golf clap. Nothing unites D.C. like the start of a new
war or the threat of ending an old one.
And
apparently Trump blind-sided nearly everyone on this. From the our NATO allies like France and the
U.K. to his outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, all of them found out when Trump took the bully pulpit and
informed the world.
This is the guy we elected. This is Loki-like behavior, not the
weak-kneed appeaser that we’ve seen since Helsinki, tweeting like a madman
trapped in a cage of his own making.
So, keep doing this Don and you might earn some trust.
The reality is that Turkey and Russia now set the terms of
what’s happening in Syria going forward. Trump just acknowledged the U.S.’s
untenable policy there is over.
In my latest piece for
Strategic Culture, written before Trump’s Syria announcement, I talk
about this weekend’s events leading up to Trump’s surprise announcement.
If these things weren’t enough Turkish Prime Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said recently that Ankara was now willing to work with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if he survives “democratic and credible” elections. This is rich coming from Turkey, but whatever.
The importance of this statement, however, cannot be overstated. Turkey was one of the major partners in the mission to destroy Syria. And now they have joined with Russia, Iran and China in negotiating the peace process.
They have gone from “Assad must go!” to “Assad can stay.” It is an admission that the US plan for balkanization of Syria will eventually fail and that their best bet is putting maximum pressure on the US to give up its regional plans.
Russia, of course, stands behind Turkey in this and themselves are now upping the costs on the US and the Israelis. Because, it is now Russian policy to assist Syrian Arab Army forces in proportional retaliation against Israeli aggression in Syrian territory, according to Elijah Magnier.
No longer will the Russians stand aside and allow Israel a free hand over bombing what it says are Hezbollah and Iranian targets within Syria. The SAA will now strike back with a proportional response.
An airport for an airport, as it were.
Trump just admitted that the Bolton/Dunford strategy of balkanizing
Syria has failed and he’s done subsidizing it. Hopefully, this will lead to
something better and a more coherent strategy to rescue U.S. foreign policy
from the cesspit of neoconservativism Trump still deserves heaps of scorn for
allowing to rule his administration.
But for
now, I’m taking a ‘wait and see’ approach. So too, is Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump had
to put something concrete on the table.
I’ve always said that there will be no resolution to the
situation in Syria until the U.S. takes responsibility for some of its actions
there and makes a move towards de-escalating it.
The U.S. had to act first. So, declare victory and get out of
there.
Smart.
Trump’s track record of threatening, sanctioning, insulting and
bullying has put him in a very bad place to negotiate the U.S.’s withdrawal
from Central Asia. There is no reason why anyone should sign an agreement with
him or believe a word that comes out of his mouth or that of his staff.
So, the two years he’s been in office have seen an
administration with few cards to play throw them down on the table for all the
world to see and still try to bluff their way to winning the pot.
It’s all so unbelievably amateurish and sad.
The best move here is to stop the bleeding, end the destruction
of what’s left of U.S. foreign policy credibility and bring the troops home
before the next financial crisis leaves them even more vulnerable than they were
before.
I’ve always argued that we wouldn’t have WWIII with the Russians
over Syria or Ukraine unless a massive mistake was made. Trump’s staff
maneuvered him into a position where the probabilities of that mistake
happening rose to an unacceptable level which culminated in the downing of that
IL-20 reconnaissance plane over Syria.
Putin took control of the situation there and Erdogan used the
gift handed to him by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman perfectly. Now,
Trump is talking about handing over Cleric Fetullah Gulen as well as a Syria
withdrawal.
On this
point I agree with Bernard at Moon of Alabama that
Trump decided to choose keeping Turkey in NATO rather than allowing it to jump
to the alliance of China, Russia and Iran formally.
And it looks like he finally had enough of trying to appease his
generals who have been bleeding him dry since he took office.