Trump is actually right about Syria. Now let’s follow up

[mountaineer]

Trump is actually right about Syria. Now let’s follow up
 Daniel Horowitz   Â· October 10, 2019   

A simple analogy vividly depicts the lesson lost on most in the Republican foreign policy establishment who believe we need American soldiers left precariously and indefinitely on the ground in tribal civil wars in order to keep us safe. When there are killer whales, sharks, snakes, and scorpions in a cesspool fighting each other, you don’t dive head-first into the tank to try to fight one of those dangers without understanding how you will survive the others or avoid tipping the balance of power to the other beasts. You stand outside from a position of strength, define your interests, and zap any one of the adversaries that comes out of the tank and inside your zone of interest.

President Trump is well on his way to learning the lesson of not diving head-first into the cesspool. He should follow up with strong action to protect our interests, using the right soft power tools to deter our enemies. That will go a long way toward framing his move out of Syria as a more effective means of deterring a complex web of multiple enemies – often at war with each other – and putting our interests first.

As I’ve noted many times, there is simply no reason for us to have a ground presence in Syria at this point. That is a position I’ve maintained since the beginning of the civil war, regardless of who was president. ...

Yes, we have been allies with the Kurds, but many supporters are blurring the distinction between the Iraqi Kurds and the PKK folks in Syria who have not traditionally been our allies and were courted as part of Obama’s broader pro-Iran realignment. If this is all about showing compassion for the Kurds, then the same “Kurd-first” Republicans should be promoting Kurdish independence in Erbil, Iraq, not putting our soldiers in Syria to fight the Sunni insurgency for Iran. ... 

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[Sanguine]

This is an excellent piece.  Thanks for posting it @mountaineer.

[truth_seeker]

Eisenhower farewell, Jan. 1961:

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex."

Revised version:

"military-industrial-congressional-bureaucratic-intelligence complex"

As in it has become a self-sperpetuating operation, more powerful than any President.

Trump seeks to change the paradigm, but it is very difficult. Maybe impossible.

Like "How dare Trump, move our cheese, take our cheese away."

Threaten it, and the heads of CIA, FBI, NIA will mount a Coup d' Etat