PRESIDENT’S SYRIA DEPARTURE UPSETTING
The president of the United States tweeted: “If Turkey does anything that I, in my great and unmatched wisdom, consider to be off limits, I will totally destroy and obliterate the Economy of Turkey.”
Do any of us need any more evidence that we erred in electing a person who is not qualified to serve in the office in which he sits? On this, the Jewish Day of Atonement, I respectfully ask my Republican friends across the aisle to look into their hearts and souls and begin a search to nominate a candidate to run for president who is worthy of the office. Then let’s let the voters decide who shall lead this great nation. Steven Langer, Denver
The alliances in the Middle East are very complicated. They are very tribal, very religious and centuries old. The Turks hate the Kurds, and the Kurds hate ISIS.
President Barack Obama crafted an alliance of many countries, all concerned about ISIS, to “hire” the Kurds to fight on the ground against ISIS. The United States provided tactical and air support. The Kurds suffered thousands of losses by being the front line.
American soldiers were spared and dollars saved through this approach. But maybe more important, ISIS was severely crippled.
Until now. The Kurds have imprisoned thousands of ISIS fighters. They cannot afford to keep or guard them anymore. President Donald Trump’s decision to green light Turkey to attack the Kurds means the Kurds have a new war to fight, for survival of their families.
We have not only turned our backs on a great ally, but ensured genocide of the Kurds. We also will have thousands of ISIS fighters ready to attack us, with no country willing to trust that they should help us again.
Why would Trump make this decision, in the dead of night, after a phone call from the Turkish dictator, with no input from his advisers or the military? What does he owe Turkey and their backers, Russia?
Trump’s foreign policy is to protect Trump, not the American people. Carolyn Medland, Littleton
Mr. President, if I may be permitted, as a retired naval officer, to restate the obvious for your edification: Betraying our allies does NOT make America great again. Leslie Andrew Howitt, Fort Collins
The armed folks that Turkey is attacking are not the Kurds in general but the Kurds affilliated with the PKK, a Kurdish Worker’s Party that has been declared a terrorist organization by both Turkey and the United States.
Why would the United States combine forces with a known terrorist organization? The answer is because they are the enemy of ISIS. (If you go to Turkey, folks will tell you they think ISIS is a U.S. concocted group.)
Turkey is not attacking those Kurds because they are Kurdish; it is because they are terrorists. Keep in mind that Kurds comprise onefifth of the Turkish population. Furthermore, Turkey has accepted millions of refugees, many from Syria. In a time where the United States shuts down borders on refugees, Turkey takes them in. Mike Gallagher, Centennial
Two days after Donald Trump threatened the nation with civil war for Congress daring to investigate him, Sen. Cory Gardner attended a Trump-sponsored “Fall Retreat” fundraiser in New York. Two days after that, Trump sent our fiercest ally against ISIS to the slaughter in Syria, a hit we may never fully recover from. The GOP’S pearl clutching over this betrayal is just more rank hypocrisy.
At every turn, this president and his GOP enablers have proven themselves the best foreign policy Russia ever had. The time for concern in Syria was when Jim Mattis resigned, not after our allies have been fed to the wolves.
Too little too late, Sen. Gardner. Tweets don’t stop bullets. Their blood is on your hands, and the hands of every other Trump apologist who has kept him in power.
How long until Trump and Gardner betray the rest us like they did the Kurds? Wake up, America. Richard Sullivan, Lyons Editor’s note: Sullivan is a retired U.S. Army captain.