In comments made to the anti-ISIS coalition, President Trump once again talked up the idea of leaving Syria. He said the troops have defeated ISIS, and says the US military couldn’t have done anything more than they already have.
Trump said he spoke with commanders a week ago on the final defeat of ISIS within Syria, and asked them how long it would take. He said they told him a week once they got going, and he said for them to do so. He suggested a formal announcement of this is imminent.
Yet Trump also presented this as an enduring fight, saying the coalition would continue for many years to come, and that there might always be some ISIS around somewhere. He also tied the fight to his anti-immigration position, saying the US is very tough on anyone they think might be coming here to aid “radical Islamic terror.”
With the ISIS fight continuing, however, he predicted that the number of troops involved globally would get smaller and smaller as the ISIS movement is diminished further. This suggests a broad drawdown trend beyond just leaving Syria, and one which is sure to anger hawks.
Is this from 6 weeks ago ?
Ha! Good one.
Or 6 weeks from now?
Trolls in chief Dave and Wars r u.s. (good name) pile in -like clcokwork, like a machine almost like a .. bot.
It’s sad when we have a pro-war congress rebuking the president and an anti-war left doing the same thing. If we don’t stand up and support Trump then who do we have to blame if he falters after being screamed down by everyone, including the anti-war movement?
He has made it clear by his actions as well as his words that he is working to get us out. Sending out teams and teams full of diplomats who are all under orders to find political and diplomatic solutions to end these wars is exactly what the people here at anti-war used to demand that Obama do. But when Trump sends out teams of diplomats and attempts to get support here at home to get out, he’s just paying “lip service”.
I’d say that I don’t know what they want but I know pretty much what they claim to want. They want a president who will simply shut it all down. The MIC has to go and so does the spying and drone wars and blah blah blah. Pragmatically it’s 100% useless to demand that happen. But we could get out of the ground wars and then be in a position to demand an end to the rest. They can’t seem to get it that we have to get out of the ground wars and that everything else comes from them. The war on terror itself will not end so long as the ground wars continuing. Same thing for the spying on the American people. Even the massive military spending that everyone knows is driving us to the poor house is driven by the ground wars, no even so much for their cost alone but for the simple reason that a nation at war gives it’s Army whatever it needs and a bunch of stuff they don’t, just in case.
It’s all connected to the ground wars and any of the politicians who are on the side of keeping us there need to be replaced by ones who don’t. And by the way, that is the only thing on the table anyway, getting out of the ground wars, that’s it. Nobody serious is even talking about ending the larger war on terror until after the ground wars. So it really does come down to a simple question. Do you want to get us out or not? If they want us to stay they are not on our side, if they want us out they are.
I don’t know why everyone has to make this so damn difficult. Trump wants to get us out, he’s on our side, same for Tulsi or Rand Paul or Sanders. It’s such a DUH moment, it’s bizarre we are even discussing it like there is a question as to who we should support.
I support Trump leaving Syria you babbling moron.
By running down the guy who is getting us out? Is that also how you help get us out of Afghanistan? Like I said, you have behaved the same as Congress. If
it’s wrong to rebuke our president then conversely it’s correct to support him. Instead what I see, is people who refuse to support what he does by claiming he’s not even doing it. That’s YOU right there. You encourage people to not support Trump across the board by claiming he is no better than any of the rest of them. But we both already know what you have been doing and so does anyone else who reads your crap. Every time Trump does something good, you claim it’s not even good or that it’s all fake etc. etc. etc. Putting together huge teams of diplomats to try and end the wars isn’t even a thing to you, so you haven’t supported it, don’t pretend you have. You have done nothing to support our president as he tried to get us out, in fact you refuse to even believe he is trying. So don’t try and BS me out what you have been doing. I’ve read far more than enough of your tripe to know that you are not helping and in fact making thinks a bit harder by helping to keep anti-war people from supporting Trump when that support could make all the difference.
Let me know when you can admit to yourself that Trump is in fact trying to get us out of these wars then get back to me. Until then you are part of the problem.
Once again for the slower members….. REPLACING US TROOPS WITH PROXIES, MERCENARIES, AND OR SPOOKS IS NOT ENDING A WAR …..
Do we have to draw you two pictures ?!?!?!
It would be an interesting picture for sure. When getting out of a war isn’t getting out, because he said they will still have intelligence gathering abilities. Sure think Dave. Draw two pictures of that one. Then tell me of an scenario where the US would get out of Afghanistan or Syria and not keep intelligence assets in place to the extent they can? Tell me where they are going to get out and not keep jets within striking distance? None of that is going to end until after our wars are done for a while, people who actually think it through understand the realities of how this is all interconnected.
Trump is trying to get us out and you should support that instead of pretending that he isn’t. Honestly, it just makes you look silly. Denying reality isn’t a good way to make yourself convincing on anything.
By the way, he did not say he was planning on continuing the war. But who is it you think all these mercenaries will be killing if we are no longer at war with the Taliban? You act as if they are planning a peace treaty where we actually stay at war with them via mercenaries and that is not what is being proposed no matter what you think you heard Trump say. Reassuring congress and everyone else that we can keep people safe from Terrorism and get out of the war is exactly why he made his statement the way he did. He was trying to explain that we can still keep everyone safe without a ground war. Did I repeat myself enough?
Trump is getting hammered left and right and the claim is that he is getting out too soon and that we will be handing over ground to terrorists who want us dead. He is just telling them that we don’t need ground troops to fight the war on terror and he is right. He also mentioned that the Taliban will be fighting ISIS for us. That’s more of the same cover. What he wasn’t doing was saying that we will be continuing the fight against the Taliban. How you can’t see the difference is beyond me.
You’re the one pretending, not me. When the sanctions end, and the funding of terrorists inside that country stop, you may have something.
When you can prove the POTUS actually has the power to end any CIA initiated war, please let us know.
Until then, good luck with your “hope and change”.
Obama said he wanted to shut down the war on terror authorization in 2016, didn’t do it, shall we send him another peace prize ?
I keep telling you the same thing Dave. Just because you have terrible judgement when it comes to believing the wrong people, it don’t me I do. I’ve been spot on when it comes to my predictions of what they will all be like, including Trump. And it’s Trump who actually has teams of diplomats making real progress and it’s Trump who just went in front of the nation and told us all it’s time to end the endless wars. I bet that chapped your hide didn’t it Davey? Being so wrong so often must get really frustrating.
No, it’s you who doesnt get it box, trump can take the troops out of Syria now, or 6 months ago, or, he could have not put the 3000 marines in there as soon as he was elected. No one is preventing him, the recent congressional vote means nothing in law. I will support him pulling the troops out WHEN HE ACTUALLY DOES IT.
Grow up Dave. In the real world no adult was going to stop the war against ISIS when we had them surrounded. If Trump was handed this mess when we were not in an active bombing campaign against them crazies you might have a point. But you don’t, so that’s not surprising.
I watched a reporter in Syria yesterday. He was at the front line with the special forces. They have the very last much of die-hards holed up. Maybe three thousand or so ISIS fighters left fighting, many with their family members though. They were taking in people fleeing ahead of the last push and trying to sort out the ISIS from non-ISIS. The artillery had devastated everything for miles and driven the last of the ISIS fighters in that part of Syria into a final town that is surrounded. It’s actually the end of the territory they once held.
Trump hasn’t changed his story because he knew this last push was coming. He’s made it clear that after this we are not going to stay to mop up every last lone fighter. Once they are driven from this town they will no longer hold any territory in the Kurdish section of Syria and Trump then plans to pull out. It’s mostly US artillery that is being used to finish them off with. Watching the interview I could understand why they are still there finishing them off. What exactly would be the point of walking away a month taking the last towns? Right now the Kurds need the artillery to do the job, they won’t need it after this town though, so then they can pack up our guys and get out. It’s actually very clear from watching it that this is in fact the last stand for ISIS in this part of Syria. It could be over within days depending on how fast they can process people through and how many stay to fight and die. Maybe two weeks max and then they won’t need the artillery for this last offensive.
But I guess, Trump should just stop right now and leave the last town standing to ISIS and the Kurds can fight door to door without the artillery, I’m sure that would just make everything better somehow. Or I suppose they could starve them out or wait for Assad’s artillery to do the same thing. The end result is still going to be the town will be taken and people will die.
It’s jacked up that we created ISIS in the first place but I can’t blame Trump for finishing them off, especially considering that he took over right in the middle of it.
It’s funny really. I watched people here on anti-war and elsewhere cheering on Putin as he bombed the snot out of Aleppo but it was wrong to kill off the last of ISIS? Maybe I guess, but it’s really hard to see any scenario where a president would have stopped bombing ISIS right in the middle of that campaign can you? Really? I can’t see it happening. It might be the right thing to do, but like I said I don’t think any president would have been able to do that and not get impeached for something. Here is the Caliphate’s capital under siege and being destroyed and a new president comes in and says: Nope I’m gonna let these guys live. Is that something that would happen in real life? Nah, that’s fantasy stuff, kids believe in silly stuff that can never happen, not adults. No president would have just packed up Obama’s war against ISIS, not with the way it had been sold to the US public. It’s laughable to think otherwise.
It’s like the schoolyard bully who beats up a whole bunch of kids and steals their lunch money. At one point he scales back his operation and beats up lesser kids but takes just as much lunch money, if not more. Good for the bully not beating up as many kids but he’s still a fucking bully.
I don’t know man, you troll with the best of them. I really can’t accept being called the chief while you’re still commenting. But thanks anyway.
When all you got is what trump said…….
https://original.antiwar.com/Nauman_Sadiq/2019/02/06/us-will-retain-a-military-base-in-syria-despite-withdrawal/
If you have to use an ad hominen you’ve already lost. Let us know when you master enough critical thinking to figure out that replacing our troops with mercenaries, proxies, or spooks is not ending a war in any way shape or form.
In DC, seeing is believing.
Order, counter order, disorder.
What does “talked up” mean in this context? I mean, he’s the CIC … he can order the military to do what he wants. If he wants out of Syria in a month, he just has to command it be done. It will in fact happen if he orders it.
Yes, Congress can huff and puff and pass “sense of Senate” this and that … those things are all for show. They would not dare really interfere in the president’s constitutional power as CIC.
Nice, finally a headline that matches the story!
What a mess. I read in sime British media, and today in some media in Balkans that ISIS fighters are being shipped to Albania, but many are turnjng up in nearby Bosnia and from there moving on to Croatia. Move to Bosnia is nit surprising as there are a number of colonies consisting of former Islamic fighters that came to Bosnia to fight Serbs. Back in the nineties -/ it was a rehearsal to Islamic fundamentalism. Head chopping was in vigue thenn, but it was evil Serbs that were beheaded, so not mmuch attention was paid in the Western media. After the war, they were given Bosnian citizenship, they married and remained in several communities where they live separate from other population. But now, they are getting new fighters from Syria and Iraq — former ISIS or other defeated Salafi groups members. There is a real fear about their presence. But there is another cause for concern. Throughout Middle East wars against Islamists — Bosnia and Croatia were known suppliers of old weapons to these “rebels”. One has to know what this means. Crostia eould not do anything unless approved by either US or NATO. Details of many shipments were known. If these militants have connections with Croatia — they will be using Bosnian passports and via Croatia, a EU member, travel easily to any European country on acsix month visa. Or uf they get Crostian passport, they can travel without restrictions. Anyone bring shipped from ME battlefield to Albania, and beyond — had to have been brought for nefarious purposes. We will find out sooner or later.
He can say what he wants……he is not in charge.
That’s how inverted totalitarianism works. Controlled democracy is a great cover unless you get a D level elitist trust fund baby into office that sounds too much like Mussolini.
Then you have to create all kinds of bread and circus to discredit him so he won’t blow your cover and reveal there’s a whole team of Mussolini’s running the country.
Exactly.
Are we still listening to what this vacillating, weak-willed, totally neocon-controlled bozo is contradicting himself from one day to the next? Seriously?
It should be obvious by now that he has no clue what he’s saying or why
and he’s just faking being a President with any real agenda.
Here’s the bottom line: Tell me the US is out of Syria when the US is ACTUALLY out of Syria. Until then, I couldn’t care less about Trump’s random pronouncements (unless he’s declaring war on Syria, Iran, Russia, China, or someone else of significance.)