Tag Archives: Bashar al Assad

International news, military news

Time to think strategically, Mr. POTUS

Donald Trump needs to start crafting a strategic thought pattern as it regards Syria.

In a major hurry.

The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations has declared that Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad’s presence in power eliminates any “political solution” to the crisis and the bloodshed. So, what does Nikki Haley recommend to remove Assad?

She isn’t saying, given that it’s not her call.

That decision needs to come from the president of United States. Moreover, it needs to be made with a complete understanding of what will happen if we manage to implement “regime change” in Syria.

This situation is getting more than a little scary. Sure, we launched some Tomahawk missiles at a military target in response to Syria’s use of chemical gas on civilians. The result of that strike is mixed … at best.

What is the next course of action? What is the president planning and what will be the consequence? Will he consult with Congress, which Republican leaders used to demand of President Obama whenever he sought to take military action against the Islamic State or al-Qaeda? For that matter, where are the demands for congressional approval now that Trump is president?

Do we go in with guns blazing?

Trump used to think it was in our national interest to stay out of Syria. Let the Russians handle ISIS, he once said. Let the Syrian government root out the terrorists, he added.

No more.

Now that we have entered the fight — even in this limited fashion — there needs to be some thought given to an “end game” if we choose to escalate this military intervention.

Think strategically, Mr. President, if you are able.

International news

Still waiting for Russia to get ‘blame’ for Assad atrocities

Donald Trump is correct to label Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad a heartless criminal.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson also speaks wisely of the U.S. effort to rid the world of the Islamic State in Syria.

World leaders are applauding the president for launching the air strikes that hit military targets … even though the result of those strikes hasn’t dealt anything close to a crippling blow to Syria’s military capability.

I am waiting with bated breath for the president to hurl some angry public rhetoric at Assad’s benefactor, Russian President/goon Vladimir Putin. U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley at least has spoken about the Russian role in financing the Syrian government’s efforts to put down forces that have risen against the tyrannical Assad.

The president, however, needs to speak for the United States of America in condemning Russia’s complicity in the use of lethal gas by Assad’s forces against defenseless civilians. Dozens of people died in that horrifying attack, including several children. To witness the agony of those afflicted by the gas is to witness a major crime against humanity.

Assad must share most of the blame. But not all of it.

Russian military personnel have been actively engaged in this monstrous activity for years. They answer to Donald Trump’s pal Putin.

My patience is wearing out waiting for Trump to speak as forcefully about Vlad as he has about Assad.

International news, military news

Here’s a thought: Go after Assad’s house

U.S. military forces tonight launched a few dozen Tomahawk cruise missiles at Syrian military targets.

Donald Trump ordered the strikes in retaliation for Syrian government forces’ use of chemical weapons on civilians, killing dozens of them, including children.

It was a reprehensible act. The thought occurs to me: The strikes hit military targets, but why not zero in on where the dictator, Bashar al-Assad, hangs his hat?

It’s not unprecedented. I recall when the Persian Gulf War started in late 1990. The first weapon was a Tomahawk cruise missile launched from the USS Wisconsin, the World War II-era battleship that had been brought back into active duty. The ship’s target? Saddam Hussein’s palace in Baghdad!

Saddam commanded the Iraqi military that had invaded Kuwait. He served two roles in Iraq: head of state and the supreme commander of the Iraqi military. President George H.W. Bush, thus, considered Saddam to be a military target.

Assad is just as ham-handed a dictator as Saddam Hussein had become. He also has a tight rein on his military forces. Therefore, he is a military — as well as a political — figure.

We should hit Syrian military targets. What the Syrian government has done is reprehensible in the extreme.

It does nothing, though, without the approval of the dictator who is in charge.

Make the dictator a target, too.

International news

UN envoy says what Trump should say … about Russia

Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad gassed citizens, killing dozens of them.

The president of the United States condemns Assad, as he should do; then he lays the blame for the attack on the inaction of former President Barack Obama.

Then in wades the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, to say what should be said: Russia is complicit in this heinous action and must be punished.

My question: Why, oh why, cannot Donald John Trump muster the guts to speak ill of Russia in this regard?

The president continues to remain mum on Russian misbehavior. He cannot admit in public that the Russians hacked into our election system; he cannot agree that Vladimir Putin is a “killer”; he keeps wishing for a more cooperative relationship with Russia.

But, wait, Mr. President. The Russian are bankrolling Assad’s murderous regime in Syria. They are funding the dictator’s ability to obtain the murderous weapons he uses on his citizens.

Ambassador Haley speaks out

The U.N. Security Council is considering a resolution to condemn the Russians over this attack. Russia is one of the five permanent council members and has the authority to veto any such resolution. Where is the president on this one? Will he condemn the Russians if they veto a resolution that seeks to slap additional sanctions on them?

Ambassador Haley said this, according to The Hill: “Russia has shielded Assad from U.N. sanctions. If Russia has the influence in Syria that it claims it has, we need to see them use it,” Haley said at an emergency meeting of the council. “We need to see them put an end to these horrific acts. How many more children have to die before Russia cares.”

Mr. President, it’s your turn now. It’s time for you to “tell it like it is” concerning Russia.

International news

Stop the blame game, Mr. POTUS

Leadership doesn’t involve blaming someone else for problems one inherits.

So, what does Donald John Trump do? He lays the blame for the Syrian gas attack on civilians on the inaction of his predecessor, Barack Obama. The president calls Obama’s “weakness” in dealing with Syria for the heinous act that occurred at the hand of Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad.

What about the here and now?

The president rightly calls the action reprehensible. But what is the current occupant of the White House going to do about it?

I must stipulate that I am acutely aware of the many times President Obama laid blame on his predecessor for the financial collapse he inherited when he took office in January 2009. The new president, though, then got to work and sought to stimulate the economy to prevent a total collapse of its underpinnings.

I am waiting for the current president to assert his own world view  and to deal forthrightly with the Middle East crises that he inherited from Obama — and the many men who preceded both of them as president.

Trump’s assigning of blame dates back to President Obama’s failure to act on Syria’s crossing the “red line” when it used chemical weapons in a previous action. OK, I get that.

The here and now, though, requires leadership that looks forward and ceases blaming others.

International news, national news, political news

Listen to this guy, Mr. President-elect

mccain

One might not expect Donald J. Trump to take much of what Sen. John McCain has to say all that seriously … even about things with which he is intimately familiar.

After all, Trump said McCain wasn’t “really a war hero” during the Vietnam War, adding that “I like people who weren’t captured, OK?”

McCain, though, offers a serious word of advice to the president-elect: Do not make nice with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/john-mccain-trump-no-putin-231423

According to Politico: “Vladimir Putin has rejoined Bashar Assad in his barbaric war against the Syrian people with the resumption of large-scale Russian air and missile strikes in Idlib and Homs,” the Arizona senator who was the 2008 Republican presidential nominee, said in a statement. “Another brutal assault on the city of Aleppo could soon follow.”

“With the U.S. presidential transition underway, Vladimir Putin has said in recent days that he wants to improve relations with the United States,” McCain added. “We should place as much faith in such statements as any other made by a former KGB agent who has plunged his country into tyranny, murdered his political opponents, invaded his neighbors, threatened America’s allies and attempted to undermine America’s elections.”

And Trump wants to try to get Putin on our side? He wants to link arms with the Russians in a fight to the death against the Islamic State?

McCain is correct to underscore Putin’s one-time role as the head of the Soviet spy agency, the KGB.

I’m no fan of McCain, although I certainly honor his service during the Vietnam War. He’s a war hero, no matter what Trump has said about him. McCain also understands the world stage in a way that Trump hasn’t even begun to grasp.

I almost can hear Trump now: “Who is this guy McCain telling me how to conduct foreign policy. I mean, I won a presidential election. He’s a loser.”

Sure, McCain lost the 2008 election. He knows his way around the world stage. The new president would do well to heed this man’s advice.

International news

Russia showing it might want Assad out, too

assad

Cracks may be appearing in the once-ironclad alliance between Russia and Syria.

The Russians are now indicating that they’d accept a world without Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad if the warring factions ever can find a way to stop the shooting, bombing and plundering of that ancient land.

It’s not the same as an outright ouster, which the United States and many other western allies would prefer. But the language from diplomats close to the Russians seems to indicate that Assad’s support in Moscow might be fraying around the edges.

Western powers should welcome this bit of news.

The Russians have been bombing anti-Assad forces. They also have joined the fight against the Islamic State, flying combat sorties against ISIS targets. The Russians, of course, have reason for their outrage,  given ISIS’s taking of responsibility for the downing of the Russian passenger jet that was flying out of Egypt.

Assad’s departure, of course, cannot occur until there’s a peace agreement that ends the horrific violence in Syria.

Is there reason to mistrust the Russians on this? Well, yes. Russian President/strongman Vladmir Putin, one must remember, once was a KGB spy who got paid to lie. So, he’s not the most trustworthy head of government in the world.

However, if there’s diplomatic pressure to be applied to Putin, now is the time to start ratcheting it up.

 

International news

Up next? A ‘pitiless’ response to terror

epa05024278 French president Francois Hollande speaks in Paris, France, 14 November 2015, following a series of coordinated attacks in and around Paris late 13 November 2015, which left more than 120 people dead. Hollande blamed the Islamic State group for the attacks in Paris that left at least 128 dead, calling them an 'act of war'. EPA/STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / POOL MAXPPP OUT

There can be nothing good to come from the Paris attacks this week that killed at least 120 French citizens.

However, the response from French President Francois Hollande gives one hope that the civilized world has gained another full-time participant in the world war against terrorism.

Hollande has vowed a “pitiless” response to the coordinated, well-planned attacks at several locations throughout the City of Lights. And from across the English Channel, British Prime Minister David Cameron told the French that “their fight is our fight.”

France brings considerable muscle to this global effort. The country has a significant military force capable of bringing great harm to whomever it engages. Its intelligence network ranks as one of the more sophisticated on the planet.

Meanwhile, the United States has been waging its own brand of warfare against the Islamic State — which has taken “credit,” if you want to call it that — for the horrifying act it committed in Paris.

Air strikes are continuing. President Obama has decided to send in a small cadre of special operations forces to help train the Kurds in their fight against ISIS in Syria. The British continue to provide air support for the air strikes against terror targets. And, yes, the Russians have joined the fight, too — although it remains an open question whether the MiG fighter jets are actually hitting ISIS targets or merely going after rebel forces fighting the brutal regime of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, who remains a sworn enemy of the United States.

What will it take to defeat the Islamic State? Perhaps it will take more acts of brutality by the monstrous organization against more of our allies throughout the world.

We should continue to accept and welcome all the help we can get.

 

International news, military news, national news, political news

Should the president return that Peace Prize?

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barack obama

Barack H. Obama campaigned for the presidency vowing to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

His election in 2008 prompted the Nobel Committee to award him the Peace Prize the following year with the hope of a peaceful future in those two countries. The new president accepted the prize while acknowledging the unusual context in which the committee awarded it.

I never thought I’d say this, but I have to wonder if President Obama has ever considered giving the award back.

Why? Well, consider that that he vowed to end both wars. They haven’t ended. Now he’s about to commit a handful of U.S. troops into a third country to engage in the battle against the Islamic State.

Obama faces dilemma

The president recently announced that he would keep troops fighting in Afghanistan past the time he leaves office in January 2017; our commitment in Iraq remains, despite the pullout of frontline combat troops. Now this, the deployment of Special Forces to assist the Kurds fighting ISIS in northern Syria.

He took office while the country was fighting in two countries. He likely will leave office with the nation fighting in three countries.

This is not the legacy that Barack Obama ever wanted, but it’s part of the legacy he will leave the next president of the United States.

I get that circumstances have changed since he took office as the so-called “transformational” president. The Islamic State has exploded onto the scene. Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad has brutalized and murdered hundreds of thousands of his people. The Iraqi military has fallen far short of its mission to defend the country against Islamic State murderers. The Taliban has fought back in Afghanistan.

Yes, we killed Osama bin Laden. We’ve continued to hunt down and kill terrorists all across the Middle East and South Asia. And we’ve known all along that the Global War on Terror would not end in the conventional way, with one side signing a peace treaty to end the hostilities. We are fighting an elusive and cunning enemy.

However, all that hope that Barack Obama brought to the presidency has dissipated as he heads for the final turn of his two terms in office.

I’m not going to say President Obama should give back the Nobel Peace Prize, although I wouldn’t complain out loud if he did.

 

International news, military news

Special forces to Syria? What’s next?

islamic-state-syria759

It’s been said many times that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

Syria’s dictator, Bashar al-Assad, is our enemy. So is the Islamic State, which also is Assad’s enemy. Thus, Assad becomes our “friend” because the United States and Syria oppose the Islamic State?

My head is spinning.

President Obama has just performed a major pivot on Syria. We’re sending about 50 special operations forces to Syria to assist the government in fighting ISIS. Does that mean we’re getting engaged in a ground war in Syria? The president says “no.” I’m not so sure.

We’re putting “boots on the ground” in a place that’s been involved in a bloody civil war for many years now.

I don’t like this change of direction.

The issue of who’s our friend in the Middle East is complicated enough as it is. By my reckoning — and I’m sure many others — we have one true ally in that region: Israel. Many other nations’ leaders say they’re with us in the fight against ISIS. By and large, they have been — at best — not totally reliable.

So now we’re going to reverse ourselves and commit a handful of ground troops to this terrible conflict. Are they going to be frontline forces? The Pentagon says no and that they won’t necessarily be thrust directly into harm’s way.

What will the nation’s reaction be when we get word of the first person killed in action?

And … for what? To assist a brutal dictator who our own president has said should be removed from power?