This Time the Yanks Are Deadly Serious
By Patrick Buchanan October 15, 2019, 12:01 AM
President Donald Trump could have been more deft and diplomatic in how he engineered that immediate pullout from northeastern Syria.
Yet that withdrawal was as inevitable as were its consequences.
And whenever the Americans did leave, the Kurds, facing a far more powerful Turkey, were going to have to negotiate the best deal they could with Syria's Bashar Assad.
It was Russia that stepped in to broker the deal whereby the Kurds stood down and let the Syrian army take over their positions and defend Syria's border regions against the Turks.
Today, the Middle East and world have been awakened to the reality that when Trump said he was ending everlasting commitments and bringing U.S. troops home from "endless wars," he was not bluffing.
The Saudis got the message when the U.S., in response to a missile and drone strike from Iran or Iranian-backed militias, which shut down half of Riyadh's oil production, did nothing.
Said Washington, this is between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Thus, the Saudis have begun negotiating with the Houthi rebels, with whom they have been at war in Yemen since 2015. And they are seeking talks with Iran. A diplomatic resolution of quarrels seems to have come to commend itself to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, once he learned that the Americans do not regard Saudis as we do NATO allies.
Where the Americans spent much of the Cold War ruminating about an "agonizing reappraisal" of commitments to malingering allies, this time the Yanks may be deadly serious.
This time, the Americans may really be going home.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/buchanan/this-time-the-yanks-are-deadly-serious/