Since the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, there has been speculation that the US might also leave Syria, but the Biden administration has been quick to dispel such rumors. In the latest comments, Biden officials told Al Jazeera that a Syria withdrawal wouldn’t be happening any time soon.
An assistant to a senior Middle East official on Biden’s National Security Council said the administration had given “assurances” to the US-backed Kurdish forces in Syria that the US would not be leaving. Earlier in October, a Syrian Kurdish official traveled to Washington and met with Biden officials who promised the US would continue its military presence in Syria.
Officially, the US is in Syria to support the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) against ISIS. But the presence is really a part of a broader campaign against the Syrian government. The region of eastern Syria where the US has about 900 troops is where most of the country’s oil fields are, and the occupation keeps the resource out of the hands of Damascus.
On top of the military occupation, the US maintains crippling economic sanctions on Syria to prevent the country from rebuilding. Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently admitted that the US policy on Syria is to “oppose the reconstruction” of the country.
The Biden administration’s Syria policy has bipartisan support in Congress. An aide to a Senate Democrat told Al Jazeera that there are “pretty strong feelings in both parties that we should exercise full leverage, including our military presence” against the Syrian government. “From what I hear, when it comes to the issue of our boots on the ground, the White House is on the same page,” the aide said.
US position is a weak one. Supporting SDF has nothing to do with Kurds. Kurds have learned a bitter lesson. YPG was a standard-bearer for Kurdish autonomy/secession. US supported their self-declared autonomy in Kobane, the town where Kurds are the majority. There was a Parliament, a President and a Constitution. All the hallmarks of a state-out-of-box. Turkey made sure US understood that there would be no quasi statehood on their borders, with YPG effectively taking orders from Turkish PKK. They had same leadership, and porous borders resulted in flow of arms and fighters. YPG was smuggling arms to Idlib. across Afrin. It ended with Trump cutting deal with Turkey, removing troops from most of Northeast Syria, resulting in Damascus taking over Kobane, Raqqa, Al-Manbij, electric power plant, and most of territory to Iraq border. Turkey and Russia are patrolling 10 mile border corridor. In Afrin, Kurds tried to cut the deal with Damascus, to let Government take over the region, but YPG refused to allow Syrian government come in and take over border control. YPG bet on US not allowing Turkey to invade. Turkey did, YPG fled and cut deal with Assad to disarm. Kurds are now depending on Damascus to support them and their interests.
Will Biden be able to animate Kurds by promising . SDF support? Not a chance. SDF is not in majority Kurdish area, and they are really nothing more then a prop providing US some locals to justify staying.
But with Iraq on the verge of political change, there will be harder to stay in Iraq, and unsupportable staying on that sliver of land in Syria. With Egypt and Saudi Arabia slipping away into SCO regional integration, and Sudan getting rid of US supported opposition, things are getting complicated. Egypt with the broad support from global players is taking gradually an active role in Gaza reconstruction.
Turkey has repelled a rude attack from 10 countries on a court case. Assuming strength in numbers, they did not expect to be notifies if imminent expulsion. After promising not to intervene again in domestic case — expulsion order was withdrawn.
Any Biden’s encouragement to Kurds will not end well. What remains to be seen is action against HTS. Its internal attempts to buy loyalty from Idlib tribes is not going well.
Should HTS lose power, US and UK will not have a single factor in Syria left under its control.
Weak situation will get untenable.
Always like your in-depth analysis.
Perhaps some context on the possibly most important ulterior motive for US invasions of the Middle East.
There is a theory, which I find entirely consistent with observed actions, that the US is doing ALL of this in order to destroy the countries surrounding Israel so it can easily swoop in with no effort and take control of the areas annihilated by the US military.
This would be the US acting as a battering ram to knock down all resistance to the “Greater Israel Project”.
After the wars of 1960s and 1970s, Israel knew it was going to need far more help than originally planned to take over most of the Middle East as envisioned by Oded Yinon and previous Zionists. Cue the next few decades of US Middle East invasions.
The US is stealing Syria’s oil there, but the illegal occupation of Syria cannot be justified by the rather paltry amounts stolen by the US. No, the real reason could be that the future “Kurdistan” will border the area in Syria that Israel wants as part of “Greater Israel”.
After the complete destruction of Syria, “Kurdistan” would be the new country bordering Israel and would be under complete control of the US and by proxy, Israel.
This plan goes back many decades.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yinon_Plan
“A Clean Break”
Correct. The American Empire is just using the Kurds. The goal is the destruction of Syria.
Like the Brits earlier, the Anglo-Zionist Empire wants to redraw the the map in the whole area; and, install client regimes on the model of Gen. al Sisi .
Israel is clearly never going to voluntarily cut off sugar daddy Uncle Sam and all the free US troops and gear surrounding them.
Israel would be blockaded, starved through BDS or completely overrun by the countries it has attacked within weeks of severing ties with the US.
Unintended consequences of aggression.
The pols are fond of the formulation “No daylight between us.” which is to say they consider the US an integral part of Zionism.
“a philosophy of peace through strength”
This from a state founded on a 19th century colonial racism, an ideology contemporaneous and cognate with Nazism.
None of these types have any use for “peace”, and least of all “truth”.
Both in 1967 and 1973, the attacking Arab nations had to be saved by outsiders.. These countries you talk about are now accepting a defacto peace, or are a mess.
In 1973 Israel had to be saved by Nixon’s airlift.
Duh, the United States is not leaving.
A who? Who was this, a twenty-something straight out of college they could find to parrot the idea they wanted and now it’s supposed to be national policy? What does the freakin’ president say about this??
We (US 0f A) have wanted to overthrow the Syrian government since the Eisenhower administration. He had two targets; Syria and Iran. Iran was a success in 1953. Syria is a work in progress.
You mean Syria is Dream in Progress…!
Syria policy has bipartisan support in Congress?
That means AIPAC is promoting the agenda.
https://tass.com/politics/1354561
NATO is not wanted in Central Asia.
If India is a de facto NATO member by virtue of its inclusion into the US’ Quad economic and defense format, it would seem the countries surrounding India will implement policies that essentially snub contact with New Delhi under all possible means.
When they further realize India’s nuclear weapons become more problematic under US control, I would expect events to snowball in coming days.
Narendra Modi picked the wrong side.
Have the Stans ever been of any benefit to India?
The US can’t leave, because that is an Israeli base. They hide it under the US flag, and many of their agents have US passports. They do the same in Turkey and all over the Gulf, but this one is different in that Israel has no other bases inside Syria.
The United States military is in and will stay in Iraq and Syria for one reason and only one reason: Iran.
Unless, of course, the United States military is driven out of Iraq and Syria … as in Afghanistan.
What you say, think, feel, believe means nothing, or, at most, next to nothing. The only consequence is what you do.
dennis hanna
pretty strong feelings in both parties that we should exercise full leverage, including our military presence” against the Syrian government. “ …and yet you have the gall to complain about others allegedly interfering in your affairs?
Stopping Assad rebuilding the country for the Syria people , JHC what a god forsaken countrythe US is , if there was a god he / she would have turned the US to ash long ago.