BrooksBearLives said:
ATL Bear said:
BrooksBearLives said:
ATL Bear said:
BrooksBearLives said:
ATL Bear said:
BrooksBearLives said:
ATL Bear said:
BrooksBearLives said:
This isn't an episode of leave it to beaver where Wally learns a lesson about doing his chores.
Our President just sold out our allies and now he's talking about how Turkey needs to "clean things up." People our nation made promises to are dying.
Antics.
Get out of here.
Turkey is an ally, just FYI. Not sure how you sell out an ally to an ally. You know who's hosting over 3 million refugees from Syria? An ally. You know who likes to attack our ally? Our ally. It's a wicked web.
BTW, you know who's setting up shop in Raqqa now, which was the stronghold of ISIS until Syrian Army and Kurds with US assistance drove them out? The Syrian Army. You know who likes to fight ISIS as much as us? The Syrian Army. The thing that's sticking in most people's craw at State and the Pentagon is that this was a retreat from regime change with Assad. A welcome retreat in my book. Let the crazies do the dirty work. We can monitor from Iraq and Turkey if something is needed with ISIS.
You don't know how you sell out an ally to another ally?
Really? Ever get stuck between two family members? It is absolutely possible to **** over one ally for another.
And that's what we did. You're being a little dualistic.
This take is just trash and COMPLETELY discounts the fact we can no longer trade on our word in the region. Turkey knows they can roll us because Trump is a pushover. Go spend some money at one of his ****ty resorts and flatter him in public and he'll do whatever he wants because he's constantly searching for the love his father would never give him.
Oh. And there's also the genocide being explained away by the supposedly pro-life people.
But even past all that, you keep acting like this isn't destabilizing -it is. And that makes us MORE dangerous. Moving 150ish soldiers completely destabilized the area. 150 soldiers is a GREAT investment.
Ridiculously short-sighted.
Trash? Not only are you an emotional child in these threads and responses, your positions are formed not by independent thought, but your disdain for Trump, and a steady diet of US media bilge. I mean what the hell does Trump's hotel and whatever Father issues you're assigning to him have to do with US Near East policy? I mean, at least stay on task.
Genocide? As someone who's seen first hand genocide aftermath in East/Central Africa, that's not what's happening here. Oh the Kurds have had a beef with Turkey for decades, and they may be trying to tie that into it, but nothing is happening even close to a genocide type action due to US troop withdrawal, or other recent decisions or actions. It's a nasty war, so casualties are happening, but our good ol' Kurdish allies have been using the arms we gave them to attack and mortar Turkish border towns, so no one's hands are clean. In fact, the cease-fire seems to be holding mostly, and I know this will be disturbingly shocking, but Turkey and Russia are talking about how to normalize Northern Syria with a safe zone, resettle some of the millions of refugees they're having to deal with, and convince Syria that Turkey doesn't want that land for themselves (something Assad thinks they're doing, and the Kurds actually DO want).
And it isn't just about how many troops we have there, but how much weaponry and direction we're giving to a military force that is a) Viewed as and shown that it is an enemy to Turkey b) Is not only fighting ISIS, but also the Syrian Army, thus agitating and acting as a Civil War rebel army, thus putting the US as a player in the War against Assad. c) Is simply a militia with no sovereign interest, but is fighting to garner land claims from an independent sovereign nation.
And you want to play the "we can't be trusted in the region anymore" card? If we could be trusted in the region, we wouldn't be in so many damn skirmishes there in the first place. That American tradition was unfortunately carried on by Trump, but has a long history across numerous administrations. I remember when we flipped allegiance on a guy named Saddam Hussein, which is likely the catalyst to why we're even arguing over this topic nearly 3 decades later.
Let the crazies work it out instead of always putting our lives, money, and weaponry on the line that inevitably complicates it for everyone involved. As quash mentioned, unless we see some ISIS camps training export terrorists, we have no reason to have any involvement.
How's that troop withdrawal going?
Oh. Wait.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/10/24/pentagon-planning-send-tanks-armor-syria-protect-oil-fields/4089195002/
So would it surprise you that I disagree with this move? We're really going to protect Syrian oil fields from ISIS? Where have I heard this story and bad outcome before?
I want to know if you're actually surprised by this.
My claim all along is that this had NOTHING to do with any strategic move on Trump's part. He didn't talk to advisors. He just got rolled by Erdogan. Reports from
The front lines reflect that the Pentagon had no idea this was going to happen and troops were essentially ordered to get in a car, drive, and they'd be told where to go when they got there. It's nuts.
And this all goes back to the point of this thread.
The President is REALLY bad at being President. He's a massive ****up. He doesn't know what he's doing.
I disagree that he got rolled by Erdogan, and I'm not surprised that he would make decisions outside of the circle of the bureaucrats. Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't. But this is an erratic reversal if it follows this path.
Ok. I'm glad we're talking.
What leads you to believe he did not get rolled by Erdogan? There are reasons to think he did. 1) this was an ABRUPT change of course. Just last year he defended his decision not to pull out. He called the Kurds "heroes" and "allies that died for us." This was a sharp change of course. 2) his advisors were taken by surprise completely. That could work, I guess, if you're knowledgeable on the subject matter, but no one is saying the President is. He's very much NOT an insider. 3) the messaging around this is so bad. First it was about one thing, then it was about supporting Turkey. Then we were threatening Turkey with economic ruin. Then it was about Isis. Then it was about bringing troops home.... now we're sending them back.
I know what YOU think. But this administration doesn't agree with your reasoning. Obviously.
I can't really speak for this President, or any other for that matter. All I can do is express my opinion based on the knowledge I have of the region, the history, and the information we all try to parse on the ground situation from various sources. Trump's decision to pull out was sound from a strategy perspective regardless of tactic. The political and diplomatic games played by all sides are simply distractions (flip flop, letter, making fun of the letter, etc.). I imagine he's having to appease several constituents behind the scenes who come into his office with all sorts of disturbing scenarios. It can make Trump's "decisiveness" difficult at times. Occasionally it's his sometimes amateurish approach to governing and other times it's the inherent fog of ingrained bureaucratic interests that create the problem for clarity.
The reason I don't think Erdogan "rolled the President" is because he had the military advantage over an enemy he'd love to crush, but he was willing to hold off. Turkey has not been afraid in the past to obliterate its enemies. It may not have been done with grace and the appearance of good faith, but it was done.
Finally, let's not forget his troop pullout is the reversal of an almost decade old approach to the Arab Spring, not to mention decades of anti-Syrian sentiment within the State Dept, the Pentagon, and the intel community. Those are people's lives dedicated to keeping our agencies believing Syria, ISIS, Iran, Russia, etc. are serious global threats due to this regional conflict and require our direct involvement. I'm simply not convinced on a micro or macro scale. To put it simply, I think it's foolish for us to die in Syria or for Syria.