Just a partisan hack?

While I usually take little heed of liberals who suffer from what is widely recognized as Trump Derangement Syndrome, Douglas Bloomfield’s blaming of US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson for the debacle that is Syria (“Rex wrecks,” Washington Watch, February 15) is beyond the pale.

The die was cast in Syria in the summer of 2013, when Bloomfield’s lord and savior, then-president Barack Obama, completely abdicated US leadership in the Middle East and failed to either militarily confront Syrian leader Bashar Assad after acts of genocide or even fund the opposition, which at that time had a reasonable chance of deposing him. Instead, Obama let the chaos persist and grow until Russian President Vladimir Putin, sensing complete US weakness and disinterest, leapt into the void. The rest was foreseeable and inevitable, including the Assad- Iranian alliance.

By the time the Trump administration took the reigns, the cancer of Russian-Iranian involvement and control had metastasized, and as with many matters, President Donald Trump inherited a horrendous mess of half a million people slaughtered and an Iran funded by sanctions relief and oil money for use in funding Tehran’s number one goal: destroying Israel.

In short, Trump-Tillerson inherited the Obama-caused catastrophe, and short of a direct military confrontation between the US and Russia, there is little to be done because Russia holds all the high cards.

Could Tillerson and Trump be more supportive of Israel vis a vis Syria at this moment? Yes. But to charge Tillerson with the Obama caused catastrophe and horrible state of Syrian affairs is beyond unreasonable.

I urge Mr. Bloomfield to move past his Trump hatred and analyze events more objectively, rationally and fairly. Otherwise, he is just a partisan hack.

DONALD CHIERT Roslyn, New York