RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://freebeacon.com/blog/israelis-nervous-about-u-s-withdrawal-from-syria-fearing

The Netanyahu government is projecting calm about President Donald Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of Syria, but no one in Israel, from politicians to pundits, thinks it is good news.

Israel’s main fear is that the withdrawal of U.S. forces will create a vacuum into which Iran will expand, affording it greater freedom of action. Iran’s ultimate goal is to build its long-dreamed-of land bridge to the Mediterranean—a corridor stretching through Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon.

That scenario is unacceptable from Israel’s point of view. Since 2017, it has launched over 200 bombing strikes against Iranian targets in Syria, mainly to prevent Hezbollah from obtaining advanced precision missile capabilities.

Noam Amir, defense commentator for Israel’s Channel 20, summed up the general feeling: “It’s a wonderful gift for Putin, a wonderful gift for Assad. And to our great sorrow, it’s a magnificent gift to the Iranians, who are themselves in complete shock that Trump is doing this at all.”

Brig.-Gen. (res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, former research division head of IDF military intelligence, similarly warned in Israel’s most widely circulated daily that the White House decision would “open the way to Iran, to transferring equipment by way of land through Iraq to Syria and Lebanon. It should definitely worry Israel.”

The harshest criticisms came from Netanyahu’s own government, albeit anonymously. A senior minister in Israel’s government called the American withdrawal “a spoiled opportunity, because Russia has been demanding for a long time that the U.S. pull its forces out of Syria. It would have been possible to demand of the Russians the pullout of Iranian forces from Syria, at least partially, in exchange for American forces leaving.”

https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/iranian-corridor-syria/

The surprise announcement by US President Donald Trump to pull American forces out of Syria has led to concern that Iran can now complete its “land bridge” from Tehran to Beirut.

In responding to President Trump’s surprise announcement of a withdrawal of all US forces from Syria on Wednesday, Israeli PM Netanyahu issued a brief statement that contained two messages.

“This is, of course, an American decision,” he said, emphasizing that it is not Israel’s place to tell its senior partner where to deploy troops. This is an important message to send, as it shows respect for America’s internal decisions on the use of military force.

Officially, Israel must not play a part in the argument now raging between the American defense establishment and Trump.

At the same time, Netanyahu’s statement did not contain any praise for the decision. This reflects real concern on Israel’s part over how the American exit will affect the regional balance of power.

“We will study its timetable, how it will be implemented, and, of course, its implications for us,” said the prime minister. “In any case, we will take care to maintain the security of Israel and to defend ourselves in this area.”

These comments are hardly a warm endorsement. Netanyahu’s statement reflects a veiled warning to the toxic regional actor that is set to most immediately benefit from Trump’s step: Iran.

http://thefederalist.com/2018/12/21/trumps-syria-withdrawal-policy-is-correct-but-communicated-horribly/

“Trump Criticized For Breaking With Longstanding American Tradition Of Remaining In Middle Eastern Countries Indefinitely,” joked the Babylon Bee upon the news President Donald Trump is bringing troops home from Syria, but the joke wasn’t far from the truth at all.

The news deeply angered the Washington foreign policy consensus, which argues that troops should stay in the region indefinitely even though the stated mission of defeating ISIS has been accomplished.

It’s true that Trump’s decision to depart Syria was sudden and poorly communicated. Viewed one way, however, it was not a complete surprise. Since at least 2013, Trump has repeatedly argued against the idea we need a sustained conflict in Syria:

During the campaign, he reiterated his views. But then he started sounding quite different, including getting belligerent with Russia over Syria:

Just a few weeks prior to that last tweet, Trump said he’d bring troops home very soon and laid out a bit of the rationale publicly in the video from March below:

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/272339/trump-bests-geniuses-syria-kenneth-r-timmerman

As one Democrat sputtered on national radio, “The Secretary of Defense just resigned, we’re pulling out of Syria. WHAT’S GOING ON?”

What’s going on is that Donald Trump, maligned by Democrats and the media as a petulant dummy, and worse, is doing what they could never imagine: he is making good on a campaign promise.

He campaigned on waging a real war to defeat ISIS, rather than tiptoeing around the battle in Syria and Iraq as Obama had done.

He committed U.S. troops, U.S. aircraft, and U.S. intelligence and diplomatic assets to the war, while making good on yet another campaign promise by having local forces who bore the brunt of ISIS brutality form the tip of the spear.

That was work the geniuses could never imagine. Only a “dummy” could have done it. A “dummy” who campaigned on telling the truth to the American people, and who has spent the past two years making good on his campaign promises.

The campaign to smash the ISIS caliphate in Iraq ended in victory more than a year ago. The battle to drive ISIS out of Syria ended more recently. Today, ISIS has no significant foothold territorially in either country. As the President said, that was the mission, and we have accomplished it.

Of course, for the geniuses who had been advocating a full-fledged U.S. military intervention in Syria, defeating ISIS was not enough. They hope you will forget that in 2012, they wanted the United States to use our might to support Islamist groups – some of whom later joined ISIS—to unseat Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Failing total victory, their goal was “establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in Eastern Syria,” according to a heavily-redacted 2012 intelligence report.

That would be the same ISIS caliphate that President Trump ordered U.S. forces to defeat.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/272337/withdrawing-syria-implements-trump-doctrine-daniel-greenfield

“We need to be more unpredictable to adversaries,” President Trump had declared.

In the spring of the year, he pounded Syria with air strikes after chemical weapons were used, obliterating Obama’s red line disgrace, and restoring American deterrence and credibility.

But the day before the strikes happened, he had tweeted, “Never said when an attack on Syria would take place. Could be very soon or not so soon at all!”

Now, in the last wintry days of the year, he suddenly announced a pullout of American troops from Syria. But the move only took those by surprise who hadn’t been paying attention all along.

When our first major airstrikes began, Trump had warned, “America does not seek an indefinite presence in Syria… under no circumstances.”

Politicians usually say things like that. But Trump remains unpredictable by actually saying what he means in a business where everyone assumes that you mean the opposite of what you say.

“I would not go into Syria, but if I did it would be by surprise and not blurted all over the media like fools,” Trump had tweeted five years ago.

Trump’s actions in Syria encompass his preference for flexibility, quick strikes or withdrawals with no long term commitment. And that’s exactly what frustrates a national security establishment whose watershed moment was still the post-war reconstruction of Germany and Japan. They foolishly misread Trump by confusing commitment with consistency, and unpredictability with inconsistency,

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/more-syria-thoughts-the-case-for-intervention-was-never-made/

My weekend column was about Syria, a topic that is raging because President Trump is pulling out, and because this seems to have been the last straw for General Jim Mattis, who resigned as secretary of defense.

I’ve been discussing this on Twitter and find myself on the other side of people with whom I normally agree — no surprise since, in my column, I am in disagreement with David French, with whom I am normally in lockstep on these kinds of issues.

And no surprise, then, that I am very sympathetic to the denunciations of President Trump for the impulsiveness of the pull-out. There is a lot to be said for this. As I observed in the column, it is especially shameful if the president decided to pull out in response to a threat from Turkey’s Islamist despot, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Even though I was against intervention in Syria, and even though I think it was playing with fire to ally with the Kurds under the circumstances (more on that in a moment), I would rather the president seek an authorization for use of military force (AUMF) to protect the Kurds than leave them to Erdogan’s tender mercies. I don’t think we should be in Syria, but I’d support it in order to show the world that we don’t let those who bleed with us get pushed around, much less annihilated.

On that subject, I’d note that the president is not the only one in this system who may seek an AUMF or a declaration of war. This is a power the Constitution vests in Congress.

While I have my differences from time to time, I like Senators Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio, and Tom Cotton, as well as some others who are complaining about the president’s rashness. But I object to the cynical game they are playing. They well know that their diva routine for the media is not the option the Constitution gives them. They could, at any time, have proposed an AUMF that would legitimize combat operations against whoever they believe are our enemies in Syria — not just those who would ravage the Kurds, but those they keep saying (with great persuasive force, by the way) are our geopolitical enemies: Assad’s regime, Iran, and Russia. They still could. If they were right, it would be a great way to show how wrong Trump is.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/mattis-and-syria-get-a-grip-on-the-hysteria/

Three, earlier this year Mattis was the subject of a lot of curious stories quoting appraisals of him as “bulletproof,” given that despite his numerous disagreements with Trump (reportedly on getting out of the Paris climate accord, moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, quitting the Iran deal, transgender soldiers, etc. ), he still was seen as invaluable to the president, who had given him, according to Washington conventional wisdom, unusual latitude and exemption to focus on rebuilding the military and reestablishing deterrent policies.
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Four, earlier this year Trump had promised to put troops into Syria to finish up destroying ISIS for “six months.” So his deadline was not really much of a surprise, although most had thought, given the success of the mission, that a continued presence would be in the country’s and the administration’s interests. And now we will see what happens, and pray that the Kurds and free Syrians can survive, while Russians, the Assad regime, the Turks, ISIS remnants, and the Iranians and their terrorist surrogates all fight over the carcass of Syria.

Fifth, on matters of entering or leaving the Middle East, U.S. strategists in the cases of Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, and Iraq must develop a more coherent rationale to justify long-term occupations — to convince Americans that these increasingly numerous and optional interventions (whether six months or 18 years) enhance U.S. strategic advantages, and in cost/benefit analyses are worth the human and material costs of maintaining them. So far, we rarely receive any real information on what the actual ends are, and whether the means to obtain them are sufficient or justifiable, at a time of $21 trillion in national debt and a seeming absence of gratitude from those we seek to help.

Four, earlier this year Trump had promised to put troops into Syria to finish up destroying ISIS for “six months.” So his deadline was not really much of a surprise, although most had thought, given the success of the mission, that a continued presence would be in the country’s and the administration’s interests. And now we will see what happens, and pray that the Kurds and free Syrians can survive, while Russians, the Assad regime, the Turks, ISIS remnants, and the Iranians and their terrorist surrogates all fight over the carcass of Syria.

http://carolineglick.com/pros-and-cons-of-the-us-pullout-from-syria/

President Donald Trump’s sudden announcement Wednesday that he is removing U.S. forces from Syria shocked many. But it shouldn’t have come as a surprise, because the move is consistent with key aspects of Trump’s military and foreign policy.

Trump promised to bring the 2,000 U.S. Special Forces home from Syria in April. When his announcement sparked opposition from the Pentagon and from key allies, Trump said that he would give the Pentagon six months to complete its mission to defeat so-called “Islamic State” (ISIS) forces in Syria.

Seven months later, he announced the troops will be coming home.

Trump’s decision will have negative consequences. But it will also have positive consequences. Only time will tell if the positive implications of the move will outweigh the negative ones. But it is important to set out both to consider the wisdom of his decision.

On the negative side, the most immediate casualties of Trump’s decision are the Kurdish-dominated People’s Protection Units (YPG) militia. The YPG has been America’s partner and its ground force in the U.S.-led campaign against IS in Syria. YPG forces are the only forces on the ground in Syria that are loyal to the U.S.

At the same time, the U.S. partnership with the YPG has raised the prospect of a war between the U.S. and Turkey. Turkish dictator Recip Erdogan. Erdogan threatened last week to launch an offensive against the YPG forces. He spoke to Trump on Monday. Trump reportedly decided to announce the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria on Tuesday.

Also during the course of their discussion, Erdogan reportedly agreed to cancel his order of the Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system and to purchase a package of U.S. Patriot missile systems valued at $3.5 billion instead.

https://www.bizpacreview.com/author/samantha-chang

Iran increased its defense budget 145% using the cash infusion from Obama’s disastrous Iran Nuclear Deal.

Former Obama adviser Ben Rhodes — one of the architects of the disastrous Iran Nuclear Deal — now says he’s worried about a possible US war with Iran after Defense Secretary James Mattis resigned, citing policy differences with President Trump.

Twitter torched Rhodes over his ironic observation, which spotlighted his comically shocking lack of self-awareness.

“No Ben, the $1.5 billion you and your overlord, Obama, gave to Iran makes war more likely.”

“No more so than the ‘deal’ you and your former boss made with them, not to mention the Pallets Of Cash you sent them.”

The US is now indirectly a leading sponsor of Islamic terrorism — thanks to the disastrous Iran Nuclear Deal signed under former President Barack Hussein Obama.

Under the Iran Nuclear Deal, Iran — the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world — promised never to acquire nuclear weapons.

In the lopsided agreement, Obama lifted economic sanctions that had crippled Iran’s hostile regime financially for decades, unfroze $150 billion in assets, and gave Iran $400 million in cash in the dark of night.

Shortly afterward, Iran increased its defense budget 145% and is using the billions of dollars that were unfrozen under the Iran Nuclear Deal to build up its weapons stockpile and foment terror worldwide.

https://bit.ly/2AeO6ez

Few people are as perspicacious in understanding Mideast woes and policies as Yoram Ettinger. Among the wise men he mentions, only J.B. Kelly really understood and exposed the role of militant Islam and jihad that drives so much of the violence in the Middle East including the Arab wars against Israel.Too often Professor Bernard Lewis air-brushed it especially when he was so enthusiastic about Camp David and the Oslo Accords. ….rsk

Western policy in the Middle East – from Iran, the Arabian Peninsula, through Jordan, Egypt and North Africa – has largely failed due to a multitude of erroneous assessments made by well-intentioned policy-makers, researchers, academicians and journalists.

The track record of past blunders

For example, the State Department “wise men” opposed the 1948 establishment of the Jewish State – which they viewed as a potential ally of the Soviet Bloc – contending that it was doomed militarily, demographically and economically. In 1977-79, the US foreign policy establishment courted Ayatollah Khomeini and deserted a critical strategic ally, the Shah of Iran, assuming that Khomeini was seeking human rights and peaceful-coexistence. In 1981, the US punished Israel – militarily, economically and diplomatically – for destroying Iraq’s nuclear reactor, which spared the US a potential nuclear confrontation in the 1991 Gulf War. Until Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, the US showered the ruthless Iraqi dictator with intelligence-sharing and commercial agreements. In 1993 and 2005 the US embraced the Israel-PLO Oslo Accord and Israel’s disengagement from Gaza, maintaining that they would advance peace, while in fact they fueled Palestinian hate-education and terrorism.

The 2010-11 eruption of the still-raging Arab Tsunami was greeted as an “Arab Spring,” “Facebook Revolution” and “Youth Revolution;” supposedly, leading Arab societies closer to democracy. During 2009-11, the US sacrificed pro-US Egyptian President Mubarak on the altar of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, the largest Sunni-Muslim terrorist conglomerate. In 2011, the US led the NATO toppling of Libya’s Qaddafi – who previously surrendered his infrastructure of weapons-of-mass-destruction to the US and systematically fought Islamic terrorism – contending that a post-Qaddafi Libya would be more democratic and pro-Western. In 2018, Libya is one of the largest platforms of Islamic terrorism. In 2015, the US led the JCPOA accord with Iran’s Ayatollahs, which provided the inherently anti-US rogue regime with an unprecedented tailwind to topple all pro-US Arab regimes, intensify terrorism in the Middle East and Africa, and try to push the US out of the Persian Gulf.

Notwithstanding the failure of all well-intentioned US initiatives to advance Israel-Arab peaceful-coexistence, the US may introduce another peace initiative, overlooking the face that the only successful peace initiatives were directly negotiated between Israel-Egypt and Israel-Jordan. And the list goes on….

Assessing the track record of past blunders

Such a track record provoked systematic criticism by “The Gang of Four,” who were the leading experts/authors on the Middle East: Prof. Elie Kedourie (London School of Economics & Political Science), Professor P.J. Vatikiotis (London School of Oriental and African Studies), Prof. Bernard Lewis (Princeton University) and Prof. J.B. Kelly (University of Wisconsin). Their criticism, which has been in publication since the 1960s, has been resoundingly vindicated by the Arab Tsunami, which has traumatized the Middle East, and threatened the West, since 2010.