We need to bring everyone home from everywhere (europe, korea, etc) but I don't see that happening anytime soon so I'll take pullouts whenever and wherever I can get them especially one that allows someone like Russia or China to take our place because that kind of thing is hard to reverse.

Trump obviously has a bunch of different people in his ear all the time and listens to different advice everyday. Its a shame that pretty much all of the foreign policy "experts" any president gets advice from are hawks who think we should police the world and drive corporate profits.

Combine that with the fact that Presidents always need to keep oil prices down to win elections and you can see that we're never going to leave.

BTW, Iraq is falling into civil chaos again.

No joke CNN had a foreign policy expert (who was really just an old CIA agent) on earlier this week say 'pulling out of Syria was the worst thing to ever happen since the pullout from Vietnam.'

10/25/2019 11:04:17 PM

We're not pulling out of anywhere though, this is a complete and outright lie Trump is telling, like practically everything else he says.

Quote :

"President Trump has sent 14,000 American troops to the region since May," McGurk told MSNBC anchor Chuck Todd on "Meet the Press" Oct. 20. "So he can't tell his political rallies that he's getting troops out of endless wars when he's sending 14 times the amount back into the region.""

10/26/2019 12:49:59 AM

Just got word one of my friends who had been fighting with YPG was killed, not much info yet but may have been an airstrike? Incredibly frustrating that just one more week and he probably would have left the area.

[Edited on October 28, 2019 at 9:46 PM. Reason : Yes, it was a Turkish air strike ]

10/28/2019 9:39:00 PM

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/weapons-inspector-sayd-no-chemical-attack-douma
Surprise surprise. Tulsi was right.

[Edited on January 23, 2020 at 8:35 PM. Reason : and the media blackout is real]

1/23/2020 8:34:54 PM

Forever blame Obama for going back on his red line and not changing regime when he should have.

1/23/2020 8:48:38 PM

surprise surprise, russia found someone to contradict a ocpw report that they didn't like

1/24/2020 9:04:15 AM

there is nothing new under the sun

12/1/2024 9:12:46 AM

OH, WE BACK!

12/1/2024 10:14:02 AM

Seems like a big deal

I know nothing about Syria except Steve Jobs was half Syrian

12/7/2024 10:51:52 PM

Ideally I wish the US would exploit this to weaken Iran and Russia. A puppet government set up by the US would be awesome. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like this is heading in that direction. Trump certainly wouldn't want to cross his handlers, and Biden is lame duck as fuck.

12/7/2024 11:04:04 PM

Will the rebels help reduce the flow of migrants or increase them

12/7/2024 11:06:33 PM

12/7/2024 11:22:58 PM

I hope I am wrong, but this almost certainly devolves into a new ISIS/al Qaeda hotbed. And that's ignoring the sectarian violence that it's almost certain to start very soon

[Edited on December 8, 2024 at 1:01 AM. Reason : ]

12/8/2024 12:42:50 AM

LOL! Who do you think the "Rebels" ARE?

12/8/2024 8:44:05 AM

Based on what he wrote it sounds like he thinks the rebels are isis or al qaeda

12/8/2024 10:25:27 AM

Right.

12/8/2024 10:41:18 AM

Russia is saying Assad is in Russia with his family

Internet is pointing out tulsi gabbard is best friends with Assad

Will be the first test of trump admin though… does he simp even more for Putin at the behest of Russia, does he burn tulsi, or something else

12/8/2024 1:33:10 PM

Have a great stay in Russia. Say hello to Snowden for me.

12/8/2024 2:09:21 PM

Quote :

"LOL! Who do you think the "Rebels" ARE?"

They aren't a homogeneous group. It's 4 or 5 ideologically disparate groups united only by their hatred of Assad's regime.

One group is an offshoot of al Qaeda and is designated a terrorist group by the US. Another is a Turkey-supported group. Another is a group of Kurds. Those last two don't like each other, and have actually been fighting each other at times. Then there's the remnants of ISIS chilling...

Their common enemy is gone. There's a vacuum of power now. Battles between these factions are an almost certainty, and it's an open question if any one is strong enough to subdue the others.

12/8/2024 7:52:55 PM

Quote :

" BREAKING NEWS: U.S. launches wave of airstrikes against ISIS in Syria, hitting 75 targets - CENTCOM via BNO"

Reports saying Israel is moving in now too

Guessing Biden admin is going to do as much cleanup as possible before trump hands it over to Russia

[Edited on December 8, 2024 at 7:54 PM. Reason : ]

12/8/2024 7:54:17 PM

Tulsi's MO has always been Islamists in power are the worst case scenario. That's mostly why she was content to prop up assad. Lesser of two evils.

when the shah of Iran fell, it was islamists who took over and have tried to spread their revolution all over the region ever since
when the soviet union collapsed, we ended up with the Taliban in Afghanistan
when bush took out saddam, islamists took over and started a civil war. Shia militias with Iranian backing mostly prevailed.
when mubarak fell, it was the muslim brotherhood who filled the void.
Similar stories in Sudan, Algeria, Somalia, Libya, Gaza, Lebanon, etc, etc over the last half century+

Time will tell what HTS does in Syria, but there's a reason many governments have held their nose and propped up relatively undemocratic/authoritarian leaders in Muslim majority countries.

[Edited on December 8, 2024 at 7:57 PM. Reason : I still don't know if I trust tulsi, but I do feel she's been intentionally misunderstood ]

Quote :

"before trump hands it over to Russia"

what do you mean? Putin pulled himself out of this chess game, he has no pieces left to play other than providing the assads safe exile.

[Edited on December 8, 2024 at 7:59 PM. Reason : Trump will probably exert whatever will he finds useful in the region regardless ]

[Edited on December 8, 2024 at 8:00 PM. Reason : it's the Turks I've got my eye on tbh]

[Edited on December 8, 2024 at 8:01 PM. Reason : etc]

12/8/2024 7:56:39 PM

^ trump keeps saying “USA stay out “ which seems to be his way of saying “Russia do whatever you want in Syria” or maybe Russia’s ally Iran

Russia has a vested interest in keeping things unstable. Stoking a migrant crisis pushes Europe further to extremists which also happen to be pro Russia

Seems very multifaceted though. I keep thinking back to I wish the Obama nuclear deal was never killed

12/8/2024 10:12:08 PM

Not that I generally disagree, but...

Quote :

"when the soviet union collapsed, we ended up with the Taliban in Afghanistan"

The US propped up the Taliban...

12/8/2024 11:46:16 PM

Quote :

"The US propped up the Taliban..."

that's my point though

Quote :

"That's mostly why she was content to prop up assad. Lesser of two evils."

it's the same thing about how the US supported saddam vs iran in the 80s. maybe we didn't think saddam was a saint, but he was better than the Ayatollah who had just taken a few dozen americans hostage. maybe we didn't think the shah was ever going to be a jeffersonian liberal, but he was better than other regimes in the region and what choice did we have. same story for mubarak and gaddafi. when there's no good options you still have to at least make the most with what you got. and if you don't form alliances (even if uneasy) with the leaders in geopolitically strategic regions, our adversaries will have no qualms doing so.

Quote :

"^ trump keeps saying “USA stay out “ which seems to be his way of saying “Russia do whatever you want in Syria” or maybe Russia’s ally Iran"

obviously there's a lot of uncertainty right now, but even though I think Trump means it when he says "USA stay out" I think he's still very likely to try to use any opportunity arising out of Syria's transition to his advantage. Think of the infamous zelensky call. "USA stay out" applies to ukraine in his mind as well, but if he can use his power/leverage to his personal advantage, don't think he won't.

Quote :

"Russia has a vested interest in keeping things unstable. Stoking a migrant crisis pushes Europe further to extremists which also happen to be pro Russia"

i mean like a third of syrians already dispersed into europe over the last decade+. it certainly could get a lot worse depending on how the other opposition groups respond at this point, but if al-Jolani over the next few weeks and months prevents further chaos and starts to bring some stability, his rhetoric at least seems to include a heavy dose of "you can come home now" to the refugees.

i think putin is likely to press pause a little bit, complete the ukraine deal once trump arrives, and re-evaluate the chess board over the rest of the year

[Edited on December 9, 2024 at 9:47 AM. Reason : .]

12/9/2024 9:33:33 AM

Quote :

"maybe we didn't think the shah was ever going to be a jeffersonian liberal, but he was better than other regimes in the region and what choice did we have"

Maybe my own ignorance but didn't the US help install the Shah in place of a democratic government?

12/9/2024 11:01:55 AM

Yep. Cause the democratic government got tired of us fleecing their oil money away...

12/9/2024 11:51:36 AM

Quote :

"didn't the US help install the Shah in place of a democratic government"

the CIA definitely helped the UK overthrow Prime Minister Mossadegh in 1953
but, the Shah had been leading the country as the constitutional monarchy head of state since 1941, when he took over from his father, who himself was appointed Shah in 1925 by the Iranian Parliament.
so he wasn't really "installed", he was already the head of state.

so why did the US+UK want to get rid of Mossadegh?

Mossadegh was appointed Prime Minister by the Shah in 1951 (following the assassination of the previous PM by a you guessed it a Shia fundamentalist political organization member) with popular support to nationalize the oil industry.

It's definitely understandable that the Iranians wanted a larger share of oil revenue and I don't have a problem with that, but ideally it should have been a negotiated process with appropriate compensation (as is how more successful post-colonial nationalization efforts across the world ended up playing out). but the British had agreements with the Qajars and then the Pahlavis for nearly 50 years at this point to develop Iranian oil fields. if your populist movement leads you to just steal all the infrastructure that the brits had invested in for decades, don't be surprised when they don't consider you a reasonable partner any longer. especially considering after they did kick out the Brits, they barely even had enough technical or managerial expertise to keep production going, state revenue dropped by like half, inflation and unemployment and public discontent all spiked (although Mossadegh continued to be seen as a popular nationalist figure).

in 1952, Mossadegh instigated a revolt against the Shah, demanding control over the military be transferred from the Shah to himself.
in 1953, Mossadegh unilaterally organized a referendum to dissolve the Parliament and allow him to rule by decree. It passed with 99.94% approval. super legitimate. super democratic.

3 days later Mossadegh was "couped"


so yeah, the CIA did help prop up the Shah. I know it's fashionable to hate everything the US ever does, but let's not pretend that Mossadegh was a paragon of democratic virtue either.

Quote :

"when there's no good options you still have to at least make the most with what you got"

and that's been my point. there's a reason why realpolitik wins out so often.

[Edited on December 9, 2024 at 2:49 PM. Reason : .]

12/9/2024 2:48:14 PM

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/hundreds-killed-syrian-crackdown-alawite-region-war-monitor-says-2025-03-08/

Quote :

"More than 1,000 people have been killed in two days of clashes between gunmen and security forces linked to Syria's new Islamist rulers and fighters from Bashar al-Assad's Alawite sect in the country's coastal region, a war monitor said on Saturday. The casualties included 745 civilians, 125 members of the Syrian security forces and 148 fighters loyal to Assad, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said."

3/10/2025 9:59:52 AM