Russia Says it Will Attack U.S. Military if Trump Strikes Syria Again

What part of the United States is Syria in again? The only thing the US is "defending" is a Saudi-backed Islamist militia.

 

RLY? You don't think in any part our presence means to protect defenseless citizens from their ruthless government? I guess I am a sucker. But knowing a few Syrians here in the US, they are glad we are trying to stand up to Assad.

 

For someone so intelligent you have an enormous blind spot when it comes to Russia.

 

Kind of like how the US protected defenseless citizens in Iraq, Afghanistan, or Libya? If you think that not liking another country's leader is reason enough to align yourself with jihadist militant groups to overthrow it, you are in good company. I don't however subscribe to that point of view, especially when you are talking about elements of past and present Al-Nusra, Al-Qaeda, and ISIS.

If the US should be doing anything in Syria, its maybe not throwing it's Kurdish allies under the bus with regard to Turkey.

 

It's an incredible cop out to call all Syrian rebels jihadists. Assad is a scumbag dictator and Russia supports and emboldens his murder of hundreds of thousands to maintain a presence in the Middle East.

 

If you think strawmanning my point of view wins any favors with me, you have some really shitty company on this BBS, LOL. Cheers.

 

I would like to think of it more as incredibly responsible. I understand that war for you is something that other people do in a faraway place, but not everyone experiences it that way. There is not a good reason for the US to be there.

There more than 400 different groups that form the opposition, many of which are Saudi and/or Turkish funded ISIS / Al-Nusra / Al-Qaeda of past and present. ISIS is largely gone because of the Russian Army -- and excepting Saudi Arabia and Turkey, a move that was supported by every other nation in the region including Israel. Even the Kurds welcomed them because they thought that Russia would keep Turkey off their doorstep -- since the US wasn't exactly helping them in that regard.

So what you have is a coalition of Russia/Iran/Iraq supporting Assad's government (and largely done wiping them off the map) vs. a network of hundreds of groups, most of which left are the Saudi-funded fundamentalist Sunnis flying variations of this:


What could possibly go wrong?

 

I'm not accusing you of being Ronald Reagan, but I would like to think Americans have learned their lesson about adventurism in the Middle East and the fallacy of "the enemy of my enemy."

 

Assad has murdered hundreds of thousands of people with the support of Russia. You just throw in the jihadi buzzwords to distract from this fact. You're full of crap.

And you talk about American adventurism in the Middle East, that's rich coming from a Russian apologist. I guess Afghanistan, you know the thing that lit the fuse on Middle East jihadis, is something you've chosen to forget.

 

We've been at war since Bush declared it. The longest run in American history with no clear answers whether to pull out or double down.

Why learn when you can pretend it doesn't exist and get angry at sports players who ruin the purity of the game if they distract from your distraction?

 

I see both sides of this argument. One of the biggest concerns at the beginning of the conflict, when discussions of US intervention came up, were around who exactly would we be supporting? Do we know? If we do know, are they good groups to support? Even if not, is simply opposing Assad reason enough?

 

The reason there was a political vacuum in the first place in Syria were the result of a destabilized Iraq. You may not blame the US directly for ISIS, but Iraqis sure do, and plenty of EU officials blame the US for the refugee crisis. Are you only concerned about the people Assad's forces killed, or do the dead civilians the US has left in the Middle East concern you in the least? How about the $20B arms sale to Saudi Arabia and the US complicity with the blockade in Saudi Arabia's proxy war against Iran in Yemen?

I thought the US was supposed to be stamping out terrorist cells and preventing them from acquiring WMDs -- not deposing one despotic leader in the support of another one. You really support doubling down on endless war in the Middle East.

Assad is not winning any popularity contests with me, but no one except for the Saudis and some very pushy neo-cons want him replaced by a coalition that is largely represented by terrorists. It's a fact -- and giving the opposition weapons means there is a good chance they will be used in the future against someone you don't want to.

I'm extremely sympathetic to the Kurds and I'd much prefer the US were backing their claims to statehood rather than throwing them under the bus.

I'm not the one who forgot Afghanistan. Afghanistan was where the CIA armed people like Bin Laden and his ilk who would parley their Stinger missiles and training into Al Qaeda. That's precisely my point. That's the kind of thing the US was supposed to learn from and not do again.

 

I was all-in on the invasion of Iraq and was completely convinced by the "evidence" the Bush administration gave. I also remember the slander against people that were against it at the time, people claiming that anyone against intervening were supporters of Saddam Hussein. I learned my lesson, but I guess some people expect to do the same thing and achieve different results.

 

this mantra above ~had been delivered to Mr. Obama repeatedly through his Israeli advisers since day one , maybe before Al Nusra was invented, I believe the same message was delivered to Putin hence the Israeli leverage over Russia is strong , that goes well with the Israeli strategy in the region ,if everyone loses ,its an automatic Israeli gain , it's common sense that someone will fill in the blank space in Syria which became a magnet to extremists. The US, Turkey and Saudi had supported the Secular Free Syrian Army (which includes Kurds) since the beginning if your memory doesn’t help you to recall that, but that support was inconsistent & insufficient

Russians intervention in Syria is a dirty job to help Israel that the West would be reluctant to do due to moral restrictions, Israeli Generals were praising the most peaceful front in Julan heights for over 40 years which Assad's regime given credit for , once Syria is stable enough , Russia would ask for the US help to terminate their mercenaries before stepping foot back to Russia

the interesting developments as i see it are these :

Russia is winning , selling billions $ worth of weapons in the region and toying with the West
Turkey and Saudi became enemies/rivals but in the same time are Russian allies (s-400)
Iran feels that Russia stole their trophy in Syria ,and not getting s-400 either
Qatar replaced Israel and Turkey replaced Iran on Saudi/Egypt/UAE list of enemies
and the Syrians are betrayed , forgotten despite some false hopes that were given....just like the Kurds

 

I don't think Israel has that much leverage on Russia. Israel enjoys good relations with Russia, but it's more because for cultural reasons -- Israel has over a million Russian speakers, and has a right-wing Pro-Putin party led by the likes of Avigdor Lieberman and other ex-Soviet immigrants. After Israel flew its last sortie into Syria, the Russians called and told the Israelis to stop -- and they did.

Israel's position on Assad has always been clear: better the devil we know than the devil we don't. Notable exceptions are the small Druze population in the Golan that still revere him and were arrested for trying to jump the border to volunteer and Hadash, the communist party that also always supported him for some reason. Israel prefers Assad to be weak, so they can bomb convoys headed to Lebanon to re-arm Hizbollah at will. They don't want him removed, but they don't like Russia spoiling their party, either.

Syria is a very old ally of Russia's and was protected by the Soviet Union since Hafez came to power in the 60s. Russia has very few bases abroad, but the navy base in Tartus is one of them. It took years before they showed up which was inevitable after years of poor US foreign policy gave them the confidence to do it unabated.

They gained a lot of prestige from it -- especially since Turkey and KSA and to a lesser extent, Israel, are the only nations in the region to be unhappy about it. Russia can claim they brought stability and vanquished ISIS, which is unfortunately true, even if their methods are less discriminating than France or the US when it comes to bombing.

They still got to keep Assad in power and they now have Russia as a deterrent to the US from freedoming them. That's a huge win for them.

I don't think anything will displace the Sunni-Shiite war in importance, of which Syria is still another theater -- the proxy war against Iran in Yemen is still going to plan.

 

I think the remaining wars represent unfinished business from previous era , Iran is moving centered now and reaching to Sunni as well cracking on Shia extremists or uncooperative mullahs


and the Saudi had changed too, they became the Republicans utopia with a long list of enemies like political IslamI movments ,Edoghan,Iran,immegrants,and they became also pro- Israel and fans of Kushner/Trump

Edit:
could be just a seasonal changes with a Republican administration in charge

 

Uh...you wanna go back to the Lebanese Civil War?

But which one?

 

You can always blame the British and the aftermath of WWI for the political problems in the Middle East and you wouldn't be wrong, but in terms of the refugee crisis, the rise of ISIS, the human death toll, and instability in general, it's hard not to attribute that as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq. Christopher Hitchens went to his grave insisting that the world was better for having removed Saddam Hussein, but the further time moves on, the harder it is for me to agree to that knowing what the consequences would be.

It is hard to imagine that in 1985 that the Hizbollah/Iran/Syria coalition from the Lebanese Civil War would still be going strong today, that the Russian army would be a part of that coalition, or that they would be fighting Kurdish anarchists, Saudi Islamists, and Syrian nationalists instead of the Israeli army and Lebanese Christian militias. I still remember when Hizbollah got their worldwide recognition when they bombed the US Marine barracks and that few questioned Reagan's decision to pull out at the time. I remember thinking it was wrong then, but in hindsight, I was probably wrong about that as well.

 

I was against Bush's mad war against Saddam before it happened and said so right here, several times. I don't recall anyone calling me a "supporter of Saddam," unless they were simply a troll, and I went back and forth with a lot of people. The people I argued with were duped, as were a lot of others. Millions. Not everyone knew ahead of time that the 2nd Gulf War was an act of madness. That wars have unintended consequences (something I said numerous times here before the war started, and after), so if a country is going to engage in one, they better have both a damn good reason and have taken a clear eyed look at every possible consequence that could come out of a conflict, as well as an exit strategy.

Even having done so, and Bush and his people did not, there will always be surprises, with the odds being excellent that you won't like the surprises. History has countless lessons about this, if anyone can be bothered with history these days. Those who disagreed were pushed aside, or worse. That didn't happen here. We all just argued until Hell froze over, and some of those here, as well as some people I knew in "real life," got involved in one way or another. If you learned a lesson, you didn't learn it here, in my opinion.

 

I remember Hayestreet doing a good job convincing me at the time. History would've been much kinder if the Bush Admin didn't lie and there really was WMDs. But if they told the truth, there would be no war.

The ME was and is still a Gordian Knot. Nuclearization was a distraction, but to be frank, knowing that 9/11 highjackers didn't come from Afghanistan meant we didn't really solve the root of the problem. Unfortunately, reality over the years was much harsher than lofty goals and ideals. There was a genuine opportunity for regime change with the Arab Spring, but the pragmatists pushed that back.

I've learned my lesson to an extent. I'll still see red and call for blood if we're attacked upon, but I'm not pushing for regime change for places like Iran unless they provoke us first.

What happened to Gaddafi doesn't make me happy even if he was scum because it runs entirely counter to the long term goals of disarmament policy. Trust building takes decades to build and moments to tear down. That was either on Hillary or Barack for catalyzing it.