Having thrown hundreds of millions of dollars at the various “moderate” Syrian rebel factions, the US has very little to show for it, as not only have groups like ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra long surpassed the moderates as the dominant rebel faction, but ISIS appears to be on the cusp of forming its own country, carved out of Iraq and Syria.
Still, President Obama sees no reason to try something new, and is doubling down with a request to Congress for another $500 million for Syrian rebel funding, aiming at both training and equipment for the factions.
The White House is presenting this as an effort to do two things: oust the Assad government in Syria and create an “alternative” to factions like ISIS. Yet a casual glance at the situation suggests it will do neither.
The moderate groups like the Free Syrian Army (FSA) are in shambles, and US aid seems to accomplish little but postpone the inevitable collapse of the group, which controls no meaningful territory and is at this point more of a rebellion inside ISIS territory than what remains of Syria itself.
As an alternative to ISIS, the FSA has an even more uphill battle, as their long-term lack of success and reliance on groups like ISIS to do the heavy lifting in conflicts suggests that they are not a competent rebellion on their own, and $500 million more thrown their way isn’t likely to change that.
Asking the Tax payers to "Ben Dova" and "give 'till it hurt$" has become the new National Anthem.
And I'll bet our Congress is stupid enough to say yes to this idiotic request.
This could be interesting. There are enough of the "new breed" in Congress that could set up considerable resistance against the warmongers. This could be the event horizon for the Republican party. And it will be perilous for Dems also since a very large majority of the American people have said "NO" to further engagement in the ME, Iraq especially.
Or maybe I'm just over-projecting my own hopes…
Sadly you are "over-projecting" your hopes. A moment's reflection and you will realize that what the American people want is way down the list of Congressional priorities. Top priority, as always: reelection. Which means: what AIPAC wants comes first. And AIPAC wants as much US military engagement in the Mideast as it can get.
Of course you know that, curmudgeon, but you let your humanity — an inherent hopefullness re human affairs — momentarily distract you from the sorry state of reality.
damn that humanity stuff………I always get bit by that.
Just make sure you get the message that its hopeless and we are all dooooomed and nothing we can do can change anything so we might as well not try.
For fun, count how many times a day you see some variation of this 'do not try to change anything' message in comment columns on the internet in a day.
The interesting thing is that while the Dems and the left appear to have bitten into this poisoned apple and fallen asleep, its the right-opposition that just showed that they didn't get the message and did the supposedly impossible task of defeating one of the most powerful members of Congress backed by a supposedly invincible warchest of millions of corporate dollars. …. expect to see the 'do not try to change anything' message get stronger on conservative and libertarian sites.
Just keep in mind that yes, Cantor got beat but his arrogance and superiority complex is what beat him. If he had bothered to really campaign and get out and touch his constituents, Brat would not have even come close. Cantor and his advisors beat themselves. You can be sure that Cantor's fellow incumbents have taken notice and will act accordingly in the future.
The bigger evil is helping its product that called lesser evil with $500 million dollars worth of weapon and etc, which the other, the bigger evil ISIS will take it from them and use it against all. The USG have no other option but continue with its double moral and language policies using all kind of terrorists and fascism and dictatorial regimes as they have done since Tehran conference and beyond, the English colonialism and USA imperialism, Their intention from Churchill to Bill Clinton to Bush to Barack Hussein Obama always been to divide nations and create countries with their own lapdogs regimes, now Barack Hussein Obama doing it again but this time he wants to do it "legally" washing his hands from all the illegality involving USG and EU of entire matter, there is no stupidity in this, its simply idiotic.
Yep, this is giving a hundred dollar bill to the kid who gets his lunch money stolen by a bully every day.
Or, if ISIS doesn't just take it, our rebels will probably trade it to them for something our rebels need. Those old enough to remember the old TV show MASH (see the movie if you haven't) will just need to ask "What Would Radar Do?" when he needs something but has this whole batch of supplies to trade.
Again Obama doubles down on an already failed policy. Previous aid is what strengthened ISIS.
Sounds like Afghanistan, or Libya, or Ukraine, or Egypt, or Honduras, or Venezuela, or …….
There's a famous book on strategy that advises that 'doubling down on a previous failed attack' is the dumbest thing you can do. The equivalent of the WW1 infantry charge across the same no-man's land at the same machine guns that the last 5 attacks had failed to conquer.
Obama is a dictator. The vast majority of the US population demands not to have tax money used for this, and the vast majority of the Syrian population supports Assad.
Obama is just a tyrant dictating to us what he's going to do with our money, and dictating to the Syrian people that they don't get to have the president they want.
"When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it–always." — Mahatma Gandhi
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If this wasn't true, we'd all be wearing togas in the Roman empire, or following the tulip markets in the Dutch empire, or digging for gold in the Spanish empire, or singing God save the Queen in an old boys club in the British empire or toasting a Thousand Year Reich ….. but none of them last, none of them.
Here is Obama doing one of his classic act. Ok, congress I’m asking you to fund these rebels in Syria, if the money goes missing for any reason (which it will) the blame will be on congress, or he can say see, I’m doing my part by funding the “moderate rebels.” Anyway you spin this Obama will come out on top. By the way, did he ask congress for permission to armed and trained these rebels during early stage of the rebellion?
So far Obama's "anyway you spin this" type of tactics have a way of somehow spinning around to him being on the bottom. It would be funny if America wasn't forced to go along with him.
Like Dubya, he appears to be a stupid strategist because he's implementing strategies that make his backers rich in the short term while being as doomed to long term failure as a strategy of trying to empty the ocean with a child's beach bucket.
So why not carry on supplying ISIS with arms and equipment in Syria, while putting American troops on the ground to fight it in Iraq? Even the FSA admit that anything the US supplies is either bought or simply stolen by ISIS just as soon as it crosses the border. How can the administration not understand this? That the weapons they are sending will be used to kill Americans?
They used to get very upset when some presented evidence (usually dubious) that Iran was supplying militias in Iraq. This is a lot worse than anything the Iranians ever did. And it's self-inflicted.
I'm sure the American servicemen in Iraq, advisors or not, will be intrigued to find out what it feels like to experience TOW missiles from the other end for a change.
How long does it take Americans to figure out that it's insane to be arming the people you are fighting?
"How long does it take Americans to figure out that it's insane to be arming the people you are fighting?"
… unless your aims are to keep selling weapons to both sides, & to wreck the Middle East to the benefit of Israel & the Gulf monarchies. Things are humming along fine.
What about $ 500 000 000 for Detroit? oh yeah, they are part of America. = DENIED'. The Caliphte MUST BE CREATED..!! keep voting sukkkers..
More like the Merchants of Death get their silver. Or our silver to be more precise.
The key to wisdom is to understand Obama doesn't care who wins the war. But he's expertly created a situation where the same Merchants of Death get to sell to both sides of a war. Their favorite situation of course. In this case, they've got the American citizen paying for it on both ends.
The American citizen, living in a society which demands oil consumption, gives a lot of their money to buy Saudi oil, which is then used to fund the Islamacist factions in Syria. Meanwhile, more money is taken from the same American citizen in the form of taxes which is then given to both the mythical 'moderate' rebels in Syria and our mythical 'unity' government in Baghdad.
But the key thing to note is that no matter the route, the money ends up in the offshore bank accounts of the Merchants of Death who've got customers on both sides of a war funded by unlimited credit platinum cards drawing on the American people.
The Frau asked last night…with all the flooding in the upper midwest of AMERICA, how much flood mitigation could have been done with the taxpayer $$$$ we've wasted in the ME adventures over just the past 15 years? She's right, of course…
Someone should ask those suffering the current episodes of flooding whether they still think it a good thing to support our troops…over there…where they are not fighting for "our freedoms" but for the multinationals and the politicians.
And no, it's not your god's will…that's pretty much the silliest thing I've ever heard.
Remember, the Corp of Engineer's budget got diverted from working on New Orleans levees before Katrina to instead fund the Iraq War.
I'm a civil engineer. I could build a whole LOT of flood control for just a few of the billions we waste in a month on our constant and useless wars.
Exactly sir. That is my main argument almost every time. The colossal waste on these illegal wars. Thank you for your info.
Al Qaeda says thanks.
Again, what is the punishment for providing material support to terrorists?
I''m happy he is going to Congress to ask for this money. Because this allows us time to organize and put pressure our Representatives to reject the Presidents request. If we can mount a serious effort like took place last August. When the President was about to attack Syria. Then I think we can success in stopping a major escalation in the war in Syria.