Getting tough in Syria
One of the things that is going
right with this Trump administration — especially at a time when everything seems to be going wrong — is a more robust policy involving the use of military force in places and under circumstances where that can really make a difference.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis made it clear this week that this nation will not hesitate to protect its own forces and more broadly the mission they are serving in Syria.
“We are not increasing our role in the Syrian civil war, but we will defend our troops,” Mattis said Thursday. “And that is a coalition element made up of more than just U.S. troops, and so we will defend ourselves (if) people take aggressive steps against us.”
Mattis’ comments followed a U.S. airstrike on pro-Assad forces operating near the Jordanian border — which had been considered a “deconflicted” zone under an agreement between the U.S. and Russia. But apparently forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad didn’t get the memo.
The U.S. strike came in an area where U.S.-backed rebels are fighting the forces of the Islamic State and so didn’t need to face what would amount to a two-front war.
Of course, the Russians, ever mindful of their client state Syria, have a very different view of the airstrike.
“Whatever the reason for the U.S. strike was, it was illegitimate and marked another flagrant violation of Syria’s sovereignty,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said yesterday during a trip to Cyprus.
Yes, that was the very same Sergey Lavrov who President Trump was so eager to impress that he gave up valuable Israeli-produced regional “intel” during Lavrov’s recent Oval Office visit.
Clearly that experience in sharing didn’t soften the Russians any on the need to continue to back up Assad.
There is an escalating battle for turf these days as pro-Assad militias — many of them from Iran, some militants attached to Hezbollah — attempt to secure a highway that runs from Damascus to Baghdad and eventually to Tehran. The route would allow for the easy shipment of arms directly from Iran. No good can come of that for the poor beleaguered people of Syria — or for the future of the region and its relationship to the West.
In this long and brutal war, the U.S. moved to defend its troops and its allies. On top of that Tomahawk missile strike last month in central Syria in response to Assad’s forces use of chemical weapons, the message ought to be clear — there’s a new sheriff in town.