The strike against Syria that roared, or did it?

The bottom line is Trump temporarily eased the pressure on the various investigations of Trump and Russia.

The strike against Syria had all the trappings of a major political event. Here is Trump, an avowed America firster, key words for isolationist, ordering a 59 missile strike against a Syrian airfield from which the Syrian government’s chemical air strike emanated.

The Syrian strike violated the agreement of 2013, which was to be enforced by the Russians and gave Trump essentially the same deck of cards folded by Obama in 2013. Back in 2013, the red line got crossed and Obama settled for a deal that allegedly took chemical warfare off the playing field.

For a day or two, Trump had made everyone happy except for Steve Bannon and his ilk. He even had John McCain and Lindsey Graham calling him Reagan-esque and there was a lot of talk about the unpredictable Trump and maybe he wasn’t really in bed with the Russian’s after all.

But then it turned out that there was no missile damage to speak of at the targeted airfield. Fifty nine missiles and not much to show for it. The Syrian airfield was back in use 24 hours later and immediately sent planes out to bomb the Syrian target that had fallen victim to the chemical attacks. The Russians were tipped off an hour ahead of the missile strikes and sustained no damage to their planes or personnel located at the targeted airbase.

The bottom line is that Trump temporarily eased the pressure on the various investigations of Trump and Russia, potential violations of the Logan Act and a host of other potential criminal and civil actions.

Could someone be callous enough to order a strike to gain a short respite from the pressure cooker of what kind of deal was struck with the Russians during the election?

I would like to give Trump a pass on this one but a nagging feeling at the pit of my stomach says don’t put any of this by him. In fact could the strike have been a Trump-Putin forward pass? Given any other two people I would say no never, but with this group, Trump, Putin and company I can only come up with a maybe. Only time will tell.

Trump allegedly authorized the strike because of his feelings of personal horror about the plight of the dead and dying children. Yet, Trump is still unwilling to admit Syrian children into this country as refugees. There clearly is something wrong in Trump’s position and it may come down to the fact that he doesn’t really think out any big picture but just shoots from the hip.

The strike will remain, for the moment, one of the many mysteries from Trump’s first 100 days. This whole episode is kind of like the mouse that roared and it leaves me with a nebulous concept of what Trump really stands for and does not give one a sense of security about the future of our country.