President Donald Trump ordered the withdrawal of approximately
2,000 U.S. military personnel in Syria this week. An immediate withdrawal
appears to have begun. There also
appears to be debate about whether U.S. air power might still be used within
Syria to further U.S. limited objectives there.
When the Arab Spring erupted in Syria in 2010 the United
States chose not to participate in the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad of Syria as
he suppressed the uprising among his people.
President Obama did not want to become engaged in the web of Middle East
tribal warfare. He later erred in
declaring red lines that he did not enforce, but he was right about not
becoming engaged.
Later, in 2014, as ISIS grew and began to control territory
in Iraq and Syria the U.S. position changed and President Obama advanced a
military presence to confront the growth of ISIS under authority originally
given President George Bush in 2001.
U.S. forces were deployed to Syria.
They also returned to Iraq for one purpose – to defeat ISIS.
A secondary effect of both the Syrian rebellion and the
growth of ISIS was the creation of a refugee crisis as millions of Syrians fled
to neighboring countries and Europe. The
instability created as far away as northern Europe by the Syrian fighting was
further impetus for U.S. resolve in defeating ISIS. Stabilize Syria and stop the flow.
President Trump campaigned on defeating ISIS and withdrawing
forces from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
Almost immediately upon entering office he ordered a top to bottom
review of the war with ISIS. He then
issued an Executive Order that is still classified secret but reportedly
shifted decision-making to appropriate levels and stopped the whack-a-mole
approach to chasing ISIS out of one location only to have them appear in
another. Instead, they would be destroyed
where they were.
In short order, under the leadership of Secretary of Defense James Mattis, the changes began showing results and ISIS was essentially defeated in
little more than a year. The president withheld
decisions regarding withdrawals based on the advice of his cabinet, but now
appears intent on moving forward on those promises.
ISIS is defeated in Syria and Iraq having lost nearly all
the territory it previously held. Yes, expect
that it will raise its head again somewhere.
But the explicit mission is complete.
There is no Congressional or UN mandate
to expand that mission to remove Bashir al-Assad, to eject the Russians and
Iranians, or to fight our NATO ally Turkey to protect our Kurdish partners in
Syria in their pursuit of an independent state.
For two decades the United States has been over-committed in
the Middle East and Asia – the operational tempo endured by our forces has worn
very thin both the equipment and the human beings who must meet those commitments.
It is time to pull out of not only
Syria, but Iraq and Afghanistan as well.
This was part of the President’s mandate when elected in 2016. He withheld fulfilling those promises based
on the counsel of others. He no longer
sees their arguments as anything more than illegitimate mission creep that is
contrary to the national interest.
Trump said this week, “Does the USA want to be the Policeman
of the Middle East, getting NOTHING but spending precious lives and trillions
of dollars protecting others who, in almost all cases, do not appreciate what
we are doing? Do we want to be there forever?”
He has said it all along and he has acted on it. Many agree with him.
Secretary of Defense James Mattis, having served two years,
submitted a letter of resignation this week effective in February. The former Marine Corps general indicates in
his letter of resignation that his views for the direction of the DoD are not
consistent with President Donald Trump’s. The differing views were well known, but the
announcement seems to have been sparked by Trump’s decision to immediately
withdraw from Syria.
Mattis places tremendous emphasis in his resignation letter
on alliances and partnerships as part of the structure of American power. In particular, he may perceive it as an
abandoning of the Kurds. No doubt
Mattis (former Central Command Commander) has probably placed his own personal
credibility on the line with the Kurds.
They have played a tremendous role in supporting U.S. objectives in Iraq
(where we abandoned them after the first Persian Gulf War) and an even greater
role in the Iraq War.
Senator Lindsey Graham has also criticized the President’s
decision, expressing specifically his concerns about the Kurds as well.
The Kurds are always suspicious about U.S. reliability as a
partner. But they once again joined us
and played a front row role in defeating ISIS in Syria and Iraq. Make no doubt about that. Also, have no doubt that the Kurds, and other
partners such as Arab and Syriac Christian militias that have supported U.S.
objectives in Syria, face tremendous threats from Syrian government forces,
Russia, and Turkey after a U.S. withdrawal.
The Kurds have been sturdy partners to the U.S. They should be recognized and aided in any
manner that does not conflict with other major U.S. interests. Our interests are not fully aligned.
Kurds are a persecuted ethnic group that seeks to establish
self-government and even an independent state of its own for its people. Nearly 30 million Kurds are spread across
Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Armenia, and Syria.
Turkey, a NATO ally of the United States, views some
organized Kurdish groups as terrorists.
The U.S. and Turkey both classify the PKK as a terrorist
organization. Turkey also classifies the
YPG as a terrorist group, but the U.S. does not and has partnered with the
group in its fight against ISIS.
One must place all of this in historical context. At the end of World War I the Ottoman Empire
was dismantled. There was talk of
creating a Kurdistan for the Kurds that basically would have encompassed about
half of modern-day Turkey. The leader
of the Turkish people, Ataturk, warned the Allies that a bitter fight would
ensue if this was attempted. The War of Turkish Independence developed,
extending fighting for two years after WWI.
The British suffered a great loss at the Battle of Gallipoli. Greek forces that led the charge were routed.
The objective of U.S. involvement in Syria was to destroy
ISIS. That goal was achieved. Those who seek to retain a presence in Syria see
remaining as a means by which to prevent an ISIS resurgence and to use the
presence to thwart the expansion of Iranian and Russian influence in the
region.
That is a mission creep that the President is not willing to
support. There is no U.S. policy to
remove Assad by force. There is no U.S.
policy to establish a Kurdish enclave in Syria contrary to the interests of a
U.S. ally – Turkey. There is no U.S.
policy to remove forcibly Russia and Iran from Syria. There is no policy to destroy Hezbollah in
Syria.
The Middle-East is a tangled web of historic animosity, ancient
grudges and fanaticism. The U.S. has
been dragged into this web in Afghanistan and Iraq and now peripherally in
Syria and Yemen. There is tremendous
disagreement about the efficacy of such actions.
Place the historical animosities within the context of a
blatant struggle between Turkey and Saudi Arabia over who will lead the Middle
East’s Sunnis and a concomitant struggle between Shiite Iran and the Sunnis
over who will dominate the Middle East more generally.
The President appears to have decided that the never-ending
engagements in Syria and probably Iraq and Afghanistan are no longer worth
continuing. Only time will tell if he is
right. His Secretary of Defense
disagrees with him strongly and has resigned.
The Secretary of Defense is resigning after serving two
years in the position. That is not
unusual. President Barrack Obama had
four Secretaries of Defense, each serving about two years. President Obama fired General Mattis when he
was Central Command Commander without as much as an email or phone call heads
up. Obama’s team did not like the
general questioning their approach toward Iran as they secretly worked on a
nuclear deal. Fine, it was President Obama’s
prerogative to fire him. It was not the
end of the world.
What is important is the fact that President Trump is
forcing a debate on the direction of U.S. national security strategy. For decades hawks have been able to justify
almost anything based on 9/11. That
time is rightfully coming to an end.
There are much bigger fish to fry.
Asymmetric cyber warfare is the
greatest existential threat to the United States. U.S. National Security Strategy and resources
should shift to that very real and dangerous threat.
