At Politico Aaron David Miller, Eugene Rumer, and Richard Sokolsky explain why removing our troops from Syria is the right course of action:
U.S. policy in Syria has been unclear, confused and unrealistic for nearly a decade—a never-ending mission impossible without realistic goals or the means to achieve them. Yes, people are rightly enraged at Trump’s willful abandonment of the Kurds and his disregard for U.S. credibility and interests. But this indignation should not obscure the fact: U.S. policy in Syria was headed for trouble. Chaotic and destructive as they are, Trump’s actions have served to lay bare some uncomfortable truths and realities about U.S. policy toward Syria. Yes, Trump has played the role of both arsonist and fireman. He can sanction Turkey and send Vice President Pence on any number of cease-fire missions. But there’s no going back. A new approach, and not a quixotic American vision of how we would like Syria to be, is now required.
They present five reasons:
- The cooperation between the United States and Kurds in Syria has been purely pragmatic on the part of both parties. Now pragmatism points in another direction.
- Allowing Russia to be the power broker in Syria is more in our interests than trying to assume that role ourselves.
- Assad is not a good guy but he or his regime will remain in power in Syria for the foreseeable future and that’s better than the likely alternatives.
- DAESH won’t go away but fighting terrorists in Syria won’t stop terrorist attacks in the United States.
- Syria is not a vital U. S. interest.
The three authors of the article are genuine authorities in their fields with extensive credentials and experience; they are not partisan hacks. But they don’t represent the interventionist cabal that has dominated Washington foreign policy thinking for so long, either. If your antipathy for the Trump Administration is not based solely on the person of Trump and you wish that Trump would consult with some experts before acting, these three are precisely the sort of experts he should be heeding.
They dint say anything that hasn’t been said here by the Trumpkins. Getting out of Syria is a good idea. The way he did it was incompetent and showed his lack of discipline and leadership skills. Of course he offsets this with sending us in to Saudi Arabia in numbers.
Steve
My point in this post was not to defend Trump but to note that there are some experts who support the same course of action. I’m concerned that Democrats are falling into the trap of believing good policy means doing the opposite of Trump.
We need to control our borders, eschew the use of military force except when there is no alternative, and ensure that trade benefits the broad majority of the American people. Experts have been telling us the opposite for decades and it isn’t working for most of us. Whether Trump supports them or not should be irrelevant. An uncontrolled border, endless wars, and our expansion of trade with China are not in our national interest. That should be enough.
The authors had a similar observation to what I said.
“Indeed, after a December 2018 phone call with Erdogan, Trump was all but ready not just to redeploy U.S. forces from the Turkish-Syrian border, but to withdraw them entirely. Pentagon and State Department planners should have realized that sooner or later Trump would return to the issue of withdrawal of U.S. support for the Kurds and were either unwilling or unable to prepare for this eventuality.â€
Putin’s meeting with Erdogan this week will determine in large part if Trump made the right bet. Putin has all the incentives to rein in Erdogan’s expansionist tendencies; but you never know.
“Pentagon and State Department planners should have realized that sooner or later Trump would return to the issue of withdrawal of U.S. support for the Kurds and were either unwilling or unable to prepare for this eventuality.â€
Not how it should work. The leader should tell the staff what is likely to happen and what they should plan. They should bee given time frames and goals. A lot of this would have meant contacting non-US actors and US staff should not be doing that without a go ahead from Trump.
“Putin’s meeting with Erdogan this week will determine in large part if Trump made the right bet.”
We would still have dozens/hundreds of deaths that might hav been avoidable with planning.
Dave- Most of what I have been reading is criticism of the way Trump is leaving, not so much leaving, although I am sure that there are some hardcores who have decided we should stay just because Trump wants to leave.
Steve
Mitch McConnell, Washington Post op-ed:
New York Times editors:
Wall Street Journal editors:
None of these opinion pieces limit themselves to criticizing the manner of withdrawal. They are criticizing withdrawal itself.
The authors of the piece with far more experience in diplomacy and planning in government were making that point about planning.
Tell them why their experience is wrong.
“Pentagon and State Department planners should have realized that sooner or later Trump would return to the issue of withdrawal of U.S. support for the Kurds and were either unwilling or unable to prepare for this eventuality.”
One thing the Pentagon does pretty well is planning. But plans always come with assumptions and one of those is always the resources and timeline for plan implementation. Plans usually require posturing as well – IOW you have to prepare to implement a plan.
So just because a plan exists doesn’t mean you can’t implement it on a moment’s notice. As much as it would be nice for the DoD and State to pivot immediately on a dime, that is not the reality of how things actually work. They can pivot immediately if they are postured for it, but that requires resources, preparation time and orders from on high.
This is where there isn’t enough info to know; did Trump order no contingency plans made for withdrawal, or the bureaucracy decided not to make plans.
Not making contingency plans is a true and tested bureaucratic technique to force superiors into the decision you prefer.
The technique was used to bounce Trump into granting the first Iran deal waiver, and getting Theresa May to abandon no deal Brexit even when the EU negotiations were unsatisfactory.
The NSC and DOD are/were staffed by Bolton, Mattis, both were committed to a US presence in Syria.
It’s also takes about 5 minutes in planning on a withdrawal to realize it requires working with Russia, Iran, Syria, which for various reasons is not allowed.
In the end the wisdom of the decision depends on which analogy you prefer. Is it like the Chinese Civil War, where the US abandoned an ally in war, and also suffered huge geopolitical consequences as well. Or is it like Lebanon, which I recall someone lamenting; US had enough troops to be targets, not enough troops to enforce the peace.
“Not making contingency plans is a true and tested bureaucratic technique to force superiors into the decision you prefer.”
It is a sign of poor leadership. If a leader asks for contingency plans and is not offered any or planners drag their feet, then what you say is true. From my POV having spent time in the military and also a lot of time in middle management what you suggest is kind of bizarre. You simply dont have the time and energy to plan for every contingency. You can help point leadership in the right direction but you ultimately need top leadership to set the agenda including time parameters.
“The technique was used to bounce Trump into granting the first Iran deal waiver”
Nope. If Trump had clearly articulated that he was not going to grant a waiver and actually lead on the issue they could have offered alternatives. Since Iran was in compliance they had no reason to offer alternatives without his leadership.
Steve
Steve
Because history reports that is how it happened.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/17/us/politics/trump-iran-nuclear-deal-recertify.html?referer=
“Mr. Trump did not want to certify Iran’s compliance the first time around either, but was talked into it on the condition that his team come back with a new strategy to confront Tehran, the official said. Last week, advisers told the president they needed more time to work with allies and Congress.” — The advisors were Tillerson, Mattis, and McMaster, and there was no new strategy. It worked and Trump ended up certifying a second time. Trump fired Tillerson and McMaster before the decertification.
I think it is Trump’s responsibility to be so liberal in his hiring that he staffed his NSC with people who disagreed with his campaign promises so much that they would actively undermine them.
But Presidents and Prime Ministers work under political restraints despite processing the ability to fire. Mattis/Bolton have their supporters in Congress, and since inauguration Trump knows he cannot alienate too many Congressional Republicans in case of impeachment. Similarly, PM May couldn’t fire her finance minister even when he supported a referendum to overturn her signature policy, for fear of fracturing her party and collapsing her minority government.
If Trump does survive 2020 — for future NSC hires, I hope he learns to apply what PM Johnson did on succeeding PM May — make it a litmus test on not undermining the core priorities of the government.