positronic Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 Is it really so? https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/10/03/the-united-states-is-done-caring-about-syria/ Link to post Share on other sites
Homer Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 I agree with the subtitle! Link to post Share on other sites
uhtred Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 In the old "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie there is a scene where the female lead is captive on the pirate ship, about to have dinner with the elegant but eviil captain. She stabs him - and discovers that he is undead and can't be killed. He looks at her and says "I'm curious Ms Swawn, what was the next part of your plan, after killing me I mean". (since killing him would have left her on a ship full of angry pirates. That is how US foreign policy feels to me. It always seems to fail the "next part of your plan" test. We never seem to have any idea what to do when we win. Get rid of Saddam Husseian - then what? Help overthrow Kadafee - and then? Now after having supported and been supported by the Kurds, what was our plan? We *knew* that they wanted their own homeland and that Turkey waned to crush them - so how did we think this would work out???? I think abandoning the Kurds is a dishonorable thing to do - and we should have had a plan when we started working with them. Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 While Trump is President, we can't really speak about "US foreign policy." He simply runs foreign policy by tweets, which often reverse each new day. Link to post Share on other sites
Zagadka Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 "Done caring," as if most people cared before. We've been doing dirty by the Kurds for decades. The single nice thing about Trump's presidency is that he hasn't gotten very many people killed (directly, at least), but he doesn't seem to like that legacy anymore. Link to post Share on other sites
daveb Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 From what I've seen on news reports it looks like a lot of people care about the Kurds and Trump's decision. Even many/most of his usual allies and apologists in politics and in the media are speaking out against his decision to abandon the Kurds. Sally is right, with Trump there is no "policy"; there are only erratic decisions, many of which seem to be prompted by phone calls with autocrats or suggestions from his worst advisers (including certain media people) or over-indulgence in hamberders or something. Link to post Share on other sites
Nick2 Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 The USA has been neutered. Link to post Share on other sites
positronic Posted October 10, 2019 Author Share Posted October 10, 2019 On 10/8/2019 at 9:34 PM, Sally said: While Trump is President, we can't really speak about "US foreign policy." He simply runs foreign policy by tweets, which often reverse each new day. Kinda Twitter king Link to post Share on other sites
positronic Posted October 10, 2019 Author Share Posted October 10, 2019 21 hours ago, daveb said: From what I've seen on news reports it looks like a lot of people care about the Kurds and Trump's decision. Even many/most of his usual allies and apologists in politics and in the media are speaking out against his decision to abandon the Kurds. Sally is right, with Trump there is no "policy"; there are only erratic decisions, many of which seem to be prompted by phone calls with autocrats or suggestions from his worst advisers (including certain media people) or over-indulgence in hamberders or something. I think that every decision of the officials may affect people someohow, whether it is distant Turkey or smth. Hiroshima and Nagasaki`s catastrophe is the fault of the american government`s desicion too, and we are responsible for this now. Link to post Share on other sites
njosnavelin Posted October 13, 2019 Share Posted October 13, 2019 The video above is Mr. Kalin is the Turkish Presidential Spokesman speaking clearly on this operation. To blame one Presidential Administration over this is not even fair. The whole area has been neglected, perplexed, and mishandled by other world powers for years and it has been left for Turkey to make a tough decision. Turkey has had an influx of 3-4 million Syrians and other refugees come into their country. Their economy can not with stand this pressure. PKK YGP ISIS is listed as a terrorist group globally. Turkey to make this enormous operation happen is a build up for decades. The link below is to help give context the havoc PKK has been going on to Turkey for 30 years. Quote Total amount of civilians that were killed by PKK throughout the years in bombings, massacres and executions combined is estimated to be over 7,000 people. Link to post Share on other sites
smellincoffee Posted October 20, 2019 Share Posted October 20, 2019 The US should have never been in Syria to begin with. If DC hadn't broke Iraq, it wouldn't have needed to be there to combat ISIS. Every debacle in the middle east creates the next debacle. It's insane and the one silver lining to this bizarre administration is that Trump seems to be sincere about getting out of the ME, at least to the extent that his Saudi business partners will allow him. Link to post Share on other sites
Chihiro Posted October 25, 2019 Share Posted October 25, 2019 On 10/9/2019 at 7:38 AM, daveb said: From what I've seen on news reports it looks like a lot of people care about the Kurds and Trump's decision. Even many/most of his usual allies and apologists in politics and in the media are speaking out against his decision to abandon the Kurds. The US is known in the world for being a reliable partner, someone that doesn't break promises, a leader. I dunno what support or promises US made to Kurds, but it is completely shitty to abandon them in times of need. This is why most people except Trump is upset. US has spent decades building this image, both political parties have put in a lot of effort to make US a world leader and now Trump is just ruining it all. To win the war, US needs allies from local region and US needs to win the war to keep it's influence over the region (by taking active role in the war) and to prove itself as world leader. And I believe it took a lot of help from Kurds and now it has abandoned them. Trump has been doing this all along, he has been a bully of a friend. He doesn't get along with NATO members, EU etc. These are all nations, seen as friends since decades and he does everything to annoy and pain them. However, he loves pleasing someone like Putin, a member from a nation considered US enemy. And he rubs shoulders with dictators like Kim. The reason why Trump likes dictators is because he wants to be one. Since the start of his presidency he has been acting like one anyway, doing whatever the fuck he wants with complete disregard for laws, people, money etc. Its no secret, he has been seen publicly envying dictators so many times. On 10/10/2019 at 6:08 AM, positronic said: I think that every decision of the officials may affect people someohow, whether it is distant Turkey or smth. Hiroshima and Nagasaki`s catastrophe is the fault of the american government`s desicion too, and we are responsible for this now. US foreign policy affects common man very much. As an example, think of this - US has trillion's of dollars of national debt, but it is still a rich nation, a world leader. How? Because people who give money to US govt, charge very little interest rate.... if nations had credit score, then US has almost perfect score of 820! Thats because US is seen as reliable world leader, people have confidence that US will return their money (The same is true for investments, so many foreigners pour billions of $$$ into US economy... unlike many other nations who have to beg/entice foreigners to invest money in their economy). Other nations also have huge national debts but they pay so much more interest rate depending on how the world perceives them. Link to post Share on other sites
Alawyn-Aebt Posted October 25, 2019 Share Posted October 25, 2019 On 10/19/2019 at 9:19 PM, smellincoffee said: If DC hadn't broke Iraq, it wouldn't have needed to be there to combat ISIS. Every debacle in the middle east creates the next debacle. It's insane and the one silver lining to this bizarre administration is that Trump seems to be sincere about getting out of the ME, at least to the extent that his Saudi business partners will allow him. I'm not quite sure is ISIS is the result of the US invasion of Iraq, or of an outgrowth of the Arab Spring. The Arab Spring has ended, ushering in a chilly breeze (although present events in Lebanon might prove me wrong). I would argue ISIS was the result of the Arab Spring, there were many differing ideals upheld in the Arab Spring: religious vs. secular, neoliberal vs. controlled economy, democracy vs. just a new leader, etc. ISIS fits right in as the extremist outgrowth as a combination of the forces underneath the Arab Spring and religious extremism that dates back specifically to the 1980s Afghanistan but ultimately can be linked 1750s Wahhabism. Certainly events in the Middle East are so intertwined there was probably some effect of the Iraq Invasion on the creation of ISIS. I'm less sure if we can or should fully get out of the Middle East. It is presently very unstable and tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran remain. Events in Lebanon will probably increase the tension as Lebanon has been used as a proxy war for influence before. Iraq is really unstable and unless Americans, the international community, and Iraqis are willing to risk losing what little Iraqi democracy there is the US influence should in some capacity remain. Iraq is also wedged between Saudi Arabia and Iran, Saddam Hussein was able to fairly masterfully play the nations off one another, even if he did damage his own country. He was able to allow Iraq to chart its own course and not get dragged into the sphere of one or the other nations. A less-capable leader in Iraq might not be able to pull it off. Even if one tosses Iraqi democracy into the trash and withdraws from the region and waits for the inevitable strong-man to take charge, Iraq might be more unstable or even develop into a battleground between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Back to Syria, is looks so. We just must hope the Kurds do not face ethnic cleansing and hold out hope that Rojava, a pretty amazing democratic experiment in an unstable region, will be remembered by history, since it will definitely be wiped out. Link to post Share on other sites
Chihiro Posted October 26, 2019 Share Posted October 26, 2019 Way to entice selfish Trump with oil.... This is a shitty reason to stay in Syria. "President Trump was persuaded to leave at least several hundred troops behind in Syria only when he was told that his decision to pull them out would risk control of oil fields in the country’s east, according to U.S. officials". Article here- https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/us-defense-secretary-mark-esper-says-us-will-leave-forces-in-syria-to-defend-oil-fields-from-islamic-state/2019/10/25/fd131f1a-f723-11e9-829d-87b12c2f85dd_story.html Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted October 26, 2019 Share Posted October 26, 2019 On 10/19/2019 at 6:19 PM, smellincoffee said: The US should have never been in Syria to begin with. If DC hadn't broke Iraq, it wouldn't have needed to be there to combat ISIS. Every debacle in the middle east creates the next debacle. It's insane and the one silver lining to this bizarre administration is that Trump seems to be sincere about getting out of the ME, at least to the extent that his Saudi business partners will allow him. I don't think he cares about that; if so, he'd withdraw troops from Afghanistan and Iraq. He just wanted to do his strong-man buddies, Erdogan and Putin, a favor. I'll bet when he leaves office, he'll go build his hotel in Moscow and live there. The US certainly won't want him anymore. Link to post Share on other sites
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