dagblog - Comments for "Info. on Senate Foreign Relations Hearing on U.S. Policy in Syria Post ISIS"

A Syria Plan That Breaks the

artappraiser — Wed, 24 Jan 2018 11:43:07 +0000

In reply to Info. on Senate Foreign Relations Hearing on U.S. Policy in Syria Post ISIS

Guest op-ed by (Senator) CORY A. BOOKER and OONA A. HATHAWAY @ NYTimes.com, Jan. 23

Cory A. Booker, Democrat of New Jersey, is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Oona A. Hathaway is a professor at Yale Law School and the author of “The Internationalists.”

Last two paragraphs:

For several decades now, Congress has gradually ceded its war authority to the executive branch. If it does not act now, it may lose what authority remains. Congress has to attend to its constitutional duties: Our troops and their families deserve a public debate over the precise scope of their mission if we’re asking them to put their lives on the line.

Congress must tell the president he cannot engage our troops in an illegal war in Syria. To allow this blatantly illegal action would spell the end of congressional authority over war. And it would offer incontrovertible evidence that the United States under President Trump is no longer a champion of the world order, but is ready and willing to tear it down.

The oracle finally speaks,

artappraiser — Thu, 18 Jan 2018 00:49:01 +0000

In reply to U.S.-led coalition helps to

The oracle finally speaks, serious talk @ Hoover Institution:

Tillerson: U.S. 'will maintain a military presence in Syria'

By Carla Marinucci & Nahal Toosi @ Politico.com, Updated 01/17/2018 05:30 pm

PALO ALTO — Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Wednesday indicated that America will maintain an indefinite military presence in Syria to fight terrorist groups, stand up to Iran’s growing influence and pave the way for an end to the regime of Syrian leader Bashar Assad.

Tillerson’s remarks were the clearest enunciation yet by a Trump administration official of U.S. plans in Syria. They were especially striking in their open-ended commitment given that President Donald Trump campaigned on a desire to extricate the U.S. from messy wars in the Muslim world.

Tillerson, speaking in California at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, said the Trump administration won’t repeat the error former President Barack Obama made in withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq, only to have to send them back later to help fight the Islamic State terrorist network.

“We cannot make the same mistakes that were made in 2011,” Tillerson said to an audience that included former Secretaries of State Condoleezza Rice and George Shultz, noting that the Islamic State and other terrorist groups were able to “wreak havoc” after the U.S. withdrawal.

Tillerson defended Trump’s policies in the Middle East, arguing that the still-young administration had delivered serious blows to the Islamic State, which has lost much of the territory it controlled in Iraq and Syria [.....]

Yeah, it's a Wonderwall.

PeraclesPlease — Wed, 17 Jan 2018 03:44:39 +0000

In reply to Hopeless: If someone like

Yeah, it's a Wonderwall.

Hopeless: If someone like

artappraiser — Tue, 16 Jan 2018 23:34:58 +0000

In reply to What I'd like to figure out

Hopeless: If someone like Samantha Power has no idea, what hope is there for ordinary news junkies to figure out what Trump admin foreign policy is?

She also has a few tough words for Trump’s embattled secretary of state, Rex Tillerson. “Can anybody articulate what our current secretary of state is trying to achieve in the world, beyond the number of jobs he’s trying to cut at the State Department?” Power told me. “I have no idea.”

from Susan B. Glasser @ Global Politico, Jan. 15

How Does Obama’s Foreign Policy Look a Year Into Trump?

A frank conversation with Samantha Power and Ben Rhodes

What I'd like to figure out

artappraiser — Mon, 15 Jan 2018 20:42:47 +0000

In reply to Surprised? Erdogan was a

What I'd like to figure out is who is plotting this "foreign policy". Surely not Trump. All I have seen so far on the GOP Congressionals with some power to effect is an obsession with Iran, no doubt to appease AIPAC types.

But who in the cabinet is approving this kind of stuff?

Congress is supposed to as well? Maybe it would have helped if the DOD had shown up at the Committee hearing, mysterious that they didn't.

I feel like I can't even begin to disagree or approve with any of this kind of thing as we don't really know who is running the foreign policy nor what their big picture goals are! I imagine them just taking Trump's anti-ISIS, anti-terror stance as their guiding principle and just running with that, but we don't know the rhyme or reason because we don't even know who's giving the orders. Again: surely not Trump, surely he just rubber stamps what those people decide to put in his picture book briefings, if he has time to do even that inbetween watching Fox News, trying to manipulate the national discourse and other politicians and the media and the culture with tweet storms, golfing, catching up on what Bannon and Mueller are up to, and campaigning for his post presidential TV show.

Surprised? Erdogan was a

PeraclesPlease — Mon, 15 Jan 2018 16:13:58 +0000

In reply to U.S.-led coalition helps to

Surprised? Erdogan was a convenience, a fling. With Putin and Assad we're going steady.

U.S.-led coalition helps to

artappraiser — Mon, 15 Jan 2018 04:20:09 +0000

In reply to Info. on Senate Foreign Relations Hearing on U.S. Policy in Syria Post ISIS

U.S.-led coalition helps to build new Syrian force, angering Turkey

By Tom Perry & Orhan Coskun @ Reuters, Jan. 14

BEIRUT/ISTANBUL (Reuters) - The U.S.-led coalition is working with its Syrian militia allies to set up a new border force of 30,000 personnel, the coalition said on Sunday, a move that has added to Turkish anger over U.S. support for Kurdish-dominated forces in Syria.

A senior Turkish official told Reuters the U.S. training of the new “Border Security Force” was the reason that the U.S. charge d‘affaires was summoned in Ankara last week, and President Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman said the development was worrying and unacceptable.

The force, whose inaugural class is currently being trained, will be deployed at the borders of the area controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) - an alliance of militias in northern and eastern Syria dominated by the Kurdish YPG.

In an email to Reuters, the coalition’s Public Affairs Office confirmed details of the new force reported by The Defense Post. About half the force will be SDF veterans, and recruiting for the other half is under way, the Public Affairs Office said [....]