White House Is Weighing a Syria Retreat

[cpwill]

Because you know.... the strong retreat, but taking over the middle east is a sign of weakness on Putins part.

A week into Russia's military intervention in Syria, some top White House advisers and National Security Council staffers are trying to persuade President Barack Obama to scale back U.S. engagement there, to focus on lessening the violence and, for now, to give up on toppling the Syrian regime.
In addition, administration officials and Middle East experts on both sides of the debate tell us, Obama's foreign-policy team no longer doubts that Russian President Vladimir Putin intends to prop up President Bashar al-Assad and primarily target opposition groups other than the Islamic State, including those trained by the Central Intelligence Agency.

Wait. They no longer doubt that? Did they ever doubt that?

The administration came to this conclusion late. Despite warnings from U.S. intelligence agencies that Putin's military buildup was intended to keep Assad in power, the White House nonetheless decided to explore cooperating with Russia on the ground. Throughout the summer and into the fall, top Russian officials -- including Putin himself in a meeting last month with Obama at the U.N. -- said they were not committed to keeping Assad in power for the long term, and would only target Islamic State fighters in their military offensive, according to U.S. officials.

These officials no longer believe Russia was telling the truth. Reuters reported this week that Putin was planning his Syria intervention for months with Iranian officials, while misleading the West

For the love of...

....how naïve are these people???

“The White House somehow thinks we can de-escalate the conflict while keeping Assad in power,” one senior administration official told us....

The NSC view is opposed by top officials in other parts of the government, especially Secretary of State John Kerry and U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power. They are trying to persuade Obama that the only way to solve Syria is to increase the pressure on Assad in the hopes he will enter negotiations....

:doh

I'm going to start drinking now.

 

[reinoe]

It failed with Castro, it failed with the Shah of Iran, it failed countless times.

The U.S. intelligence is a joke.

 

[Beaudreaux]

Leading from behind, as in cowering behind a wall. If Obama and his supporters don't want to be involved internationally, then fine, quit putting our military at risk and stay the hell at home. I would prefer that (at least while Obama is still in office) rather than having our military at risk with unrealistic restrictions and dangerous (almost nonexistent) rules of engagement.

Russia is doing in the ME what they did and are doing in areas around their border - consolidating power and land in a power grab the world has not seen since the great Soviet Expansion into the ultimate "Soviet Union", and before that, the Third Reich in the Sudetenland, Northern Africa, Poland, the Baltic States, the Netherlands, and so on.

Russia, China, Iran... what could go wrong?

 

[Higgins86]

Syria is lost, let the Russians pick through the bones.

 

[eohrnberger]

Because you know.... the strong retreat, but taking over the middle east is a sign of weakness on Putins part.




Wait. They no longer doubt that? Did they ever doubt that?



For the love of...

....how naïve are these people???




:doh

I'm going to start drinking now.

Just more 'leading from behind', and a clear indication how weak, without backbone, without a clue about international affairs and policy, this president really is.

He complains about 'half baked ideas' in his press conference.

Well Mr. President, your entire foreign policy has always been nothing more than 1/2 baked ideas!!
It's not important to you and your ideology, so it really doesn't matter, right?

 

[Fenton]

It failed with Castro, it failed with the Shah of Iran, it failed countless times.

The U.S. intelligence is a joke.

The US President is a joke.

Hey, its either that or he is literally trying to empower radical Islamist

 

[Fenton]

I don't believe he is leading from behind.

I think he has and is making conscious decisions to empower radicals. ISIS, Iran, Al Qaeda.

Its been his game plan since day one

 

[Higgins86]

I don't believe he is leading from behind.

I think he has and is making conscious decisions to empower radicals. ISIS, Iran, Al Qaeda.

Its been his game plan since day one

Ridiculous.

 

[mak2]

It is really entertaining to watch really conservative posters, especially on uberconsevative forums, in these meltdown threads.

 

[Fenton]

Ridiculous.

Prove otherwise.

From Obama's support of the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, to his disastrous ME policy that created a huge vacuum for ISIS to exploit in Iraq, Lybia, Sudan and while he did nothing to stop it to his pretend air campaign in Syria to his idiotic deal on Iran's nukes to his bailing out and enabling a coalition of Russia, Iran and Assad form to the end result is the same.

Empowering radicalism.

The end result over and over is the same.

Add in a couple of other odd things like NASA being a Muslim outreach center to landing a perfectly good drone in Iran and it doesn't point to incompetence, no.

 

[betuadollar]

I don't believe he is leading from behind.

I think he has and is making conscious decisions to empower radicals. ISIS, Iran, Al Qaeda.

Its been his game plan since day one

While simultaneously weakening our military. Would you join today's military?

 

[Higgins86]

Prove otherwise.

From Obama's support of the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, to his disastrous ME policy that created a huge vacuum for ISIS to exploit in Iraq, Lybia, Sudan and while he did nothing to stop it to his pretend air campaign in Syria to his idiotic deal on Iran's nukes to his bailing out and enabling a coalition of Russia, Iran and Assad form to the end result is the same.

Empowering radicalism.

The end result over and over is the same.

Add in a couple of other odd things like NASA being a Muslim outreach center to landing a perfectly good drone in Iran and it doesn't point to incompetence, no.

Prove that the President of the USA isn't a Islamic double agent hell bent on bringing down the Western World?

No sorry I can't tonight I'm busy proving that Santa Claus is actually under NSA contract to bug homes across the globe.

 

[SenorXm/Sirius]

I'm happier then hell someone else besides the US is using their money, weapons and blood in the ME. It's about time.

I'm sure any big talker who's PO'ed that some other country is finally stepping in over there can go sign-up to fight. Step up.

 

[reinoe]

Ridiculous.

And yet demonstratably and confirmed true. Ridiculous describes Obama's handling of Syria to a "T".

 

[Helix]

White House Is Weighing a Syria Retreat

not likely, but good. let Russia spend all of its resources in a multi-decade war there.

 

[DA60]

'It’s a week since the Russians began their air-strikes in Syria, and the countries that have already been bombing there for over a year — the United States and some other NATO countries — are working themselves up into a rage about it. The Russians are not bombing the right people, they are killing civilians, they are reckless, dangerous, and just plain evil.

...

And the wicked Russians are killing civilians with their bombs, we are told. Yes, of course they are. So is the American-led coalition with its bombs. Unless you are fighting at sea or in the open desert, there will always be civilians in the same area as the “legitimate” targets.

It’s particularly unbecoming for the United States to act holier-than-thou about the use of Russian air power in Syria, when it is simultaneously trying to explain why American planes bombed a hospital in Afghanistan last month and killed 22 civilians. Neither Americans nor Russians gain anything by killing civilians; it’s just an inevitable by-product of bombing.

But the biggest Western complaint is that the Russians are bombing the wrong people. Contrary to American and European assertions, they are indeed bombing the “right” people, the troops of Islamic State that Western air forces have been bombing for the past year. But the Russians are also bombing the troops of the Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham.

They might even bomb the troops of the Free Syrian Army, if they could find any.

Don’t they realize that these people are trying to overthrow the evil Syrian dictator, Bashar al-Assad, whereas the cruel and deluded fanatics who serve Islamic State are trying — well, actually, they are trying to overthrow the evil dictator Assad too. This brings us to the heart of the matter.

Western propaganda makes a systematic distinction between Islamic State (bad) and the “opposition” forces (all the other groups). The problem is that there is really little difference between them: they all want to overthrow the Syrian regime, and they are all Islamist jihadis except for the tattered remnants of the Free Syrian Army.

The Nusra Front was created in 2012 as the Syrian branch of ISIS (now Islamic State), and broke away early last year in a dispute over tactics and turf. It is now the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda. Ahrar al-Sham was also founded by an al-Qaeda member, and is a close military and political ally of Nusra. And until the propaganda needs of the moment changed, even the United States admitted that the “moderate” elements of the Syrian opposition had collapsed.

There are no reliable statistics on this, but a good guess would be that 35 per cent of the rebel troops confronting Assad’s regime belong to Islamic State, 35 percent to the Nusra Front, 20 per cent to Ahrar al-Sham, and ten per cent odds and sods including the Free Syrian Army. In other words, at least 90 per cent of the armed opposition are Islamists, and probably no more than 5 per cent are secular, pro-democratic groups.

There are not three alternatives in Syria. There are only two: either Bashar al-Assad’s regime survives, or the Islamists take over. Really serious Islamists, who hate democracy, behead people, and plan to overthrow all the other Arab governments before they set out to conquer the rest of the world.

They are probably being a bit over-optimistic there, but they would be seriously dangerous people if they commanded the resources of the Syrian state, and they would be a calamity for Syrians who are not Sunni Muslims. The Russians have accepted this reality, decided that it is in their own interests for Assad to survive, and are acting accordingly.

The United States and its allies, by contrast, are hamstrung by their previous insistence that Assad must go on human rights grounds. They cannot change their tune now without losing face, so they don’t bomb Assad themselves, but they persist in the fantasy that some other force can be created in Syria that will defeat both Assad and Islamic State.

Moreover, the leaders of America’s two most important allies in the Muslim world, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, are determined that Assad should go (mainly because he is Shia, and they are Sunnis), and they would be very angry if the U.S. helped him survive.

That, plus American anger at Russia over Ukraine and lingering hostility from the old Cold War, is why NATO is condemning the Russian intervention in Syria so vehemently. But it is all humbug and hypocrisy.'

The Russians in Syria: Humbug and hypocrisy - Merritt Herald

 

[Fenton]

Prove that the President of the USA isn't a Islamic double agent hell bent on bringing down the Western World?

No sorry I can't tonight I'm busy proving that Santa Claus is actually under NSA contract to bug homes across the globe.

Never said he was a " Islamic double agent ", just said there's a consistency to the consequences of almost everyone of his foreign policy decisions.

Can anyone be THAT incompetent ?? I don't think so.

 

[Fenton]

And let me offer up a pro-active apology to the Op's author. cpwill is and has always been one of my favorite Conservative posters here and I'm not trying to derail his thread with what would seem like conspiracy rhetoric.

Just trying to make some sense of the end result of Obama's foreign policy decisions.

 

[Mr. Invisible]

not likely, but good. let Russia spend all of its resources in a multi-decade war there.

With the way the Russians are going, its going to be much shorter than that my friend.

 

[Mr. Invisible]

And let me offer up a pro-active apology to the Op's author. cpwill is and has always been one of my favorite Conservative posters here and I'm not trying to derail his thread with what would seem like conspiracy rhetoric.

Just trying to make some sense of the end result of Obama's foreign policy decisions.

Well a lot of what you are saying is true at least to a large extent, however, you may want to ask yourself: What benefit does the US gain strategically from empowering radical Islamists, specifically in the places we have been recently bombing (eg Syria and Libya)?

 

[Helix]

With the way the Russians are going, its going to be much shorter than that my friend.

cool. meanwhile, we can build roads and bridges here in the states while they occupy large parts of the Middle East.

 

[Mr. Invisible]

cool. meanwhile, we can build roads and bridges here in the states while they occupy large parts of the Middle East.

I was talking purely in terms of Syria, by the way.

 

[US Conservative]

Because you know.... the strong retreat, but taking over the middle east is a sign of weakness on Putins part.




Wait. They no longer doubt that? Did they ever doubt that?



For the love of...

....how naïve are these people???




:doh

I'm going to start drinking now.

Retreating is what Obama does. That dog wont hunt.

 

[Helix]

I was talking purely in terms of Syria, by the way.

the problems stop at the Syrian border, in your opinion?

 

[Mr. Invisible]

the problems stop at the Syrian border, in your opinion?

I wouldn't say that, but I would say that Russia seems pretty focused solely on Syria. I don't think they are actually going to occupy anyone.