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As Turkey launches a military operation to attack Northeastern Syria, targeting many Kurds that fought with the US against ISIS, the US will do nothing. These former allies are seeing no help from American soldiers, despite having previously allied with them. Trump insists upon a hands-off route, keeping American troops out of the area and drawing out of the Middle East entirely.
The area is still dealing with destabilization from prior military action, displacement, and ISIS. Many politicians, Democratic and Republican alike, have criticized Trump for failing to keep the peace, allowing ISIS another opportunity to take over, and for not even negotiating a deal with Turkey before withdrawing troops. Many fear for the future of US alliances and the ongoing fight against ISIS, justifiably so. Even typically staunch allies of Trump are joining in the wave of criticism, calling the situation a “disaster in the making.”
Discussion questions:
- Do you think Trump is right to allow the Turkish attack to happen without much pushback?
- What legislation could be put into place otherwise, if not Trump’s solution?
- Would sanctions accomplish anything?
The only thing that can be said in this case is that Trump is doing this for some ulterior motive. There are many rumors about it, such as being an ally of Russia. Without some kind of incentive, it would be ridiculous to pull out of Syria when the issue that was partially inflamed by the US has not been solved yet. At this point, legislation or sanctions would not do anything, since this is entirely within his power as the president. Likely this would only add fuel to the fire of the impeachment hearings.
ReplyDeleteI'm just going to start by saying that Turkey needs to be kicked out of NATO. Period. Trump is completely wrong to be sucking up to them in any way. It's not just about abandoning our kurdish allies that helped us fight ISIS, it's about the fact that Trump is trying to appease a nation that has done barely anything to assist us in any regard, militarily or economically. In fact, most Turkish citizens actually say they DISTRUST the US, despite draining our resources to protect them from terrorist threats abroad. Now, we're letting them attack the kurds who actually fought by our side, and helped, contributing arguably even more than US troops themselves? It's absolute lunacy. What legislation should have been passed is more gradually easing out -- training and arming kurdish troops who have been proven essential to the fight against ISIS, not trusting Turkey, an unreliable "ally," to do the fighting for us (which they most certainly won't). Sanctions would not accomplish anything. As Victor said, this will probably just push impeachment hearings further, and I'm really hoping that the bipartisan anger over this could be enough to pass the threshold for removal from office in the senate, though it very likely won't.
ReplyDeleteI don’t think it was a good idea for Trump to do nothing because the people getting attacked have helped the US fight against ISIS, so it is only fair for us to do the same. The least he could do to show our support would be to offer aid or send supplies over to prepare them. This way there wouldn’t be any damage done to the US or its troops, and we would still have an alliance with them.
ReplyDeleteTension with Turkey and Syria have lasted so long because political figures won't address the issues with each other. The people in the region are suffering because of the mistrust and greed that has existed for a long time. I think negotiations need to take place about money and freedom and the actual problems, not what the war is thought to be about.
ReplyDeleteThe issue here is that Turkey is an extremely important strategic ally for the USA's middle east policy. It has been consistently demonstrated that the further away a nation is geographically from a conflict, the less influence it can wield. Therefore, if the USA wants to continue to have influence in the middle east, it is essential that it maintains its alliance with Turkey since they are extremely close. However, Trump should not have abandon the Kurds since they were our ally as well. We should have made sure that they can keep peace with the Turks. Abandoning the Kurds like we did will make it difficult for us to form alliances in the future since we don't appear trustworthy.
ReplyDeleteIt was not a good idea to abandon our allies. We abandoned the Kurds and unsurprisingly Turkey moved in. You know it's bad when the GOP and Fox are both criticizing the president's foreign policy. Trump should not have abandoned the Kurds, but we can't move back in time when a Democrat comes into office. The biggest issue is that now our allies know not to trust us.
ReplyDeleteIt was a terrible idea to leave the Kurd's. We have allied with them for so long and we just let turkey walk in in an instant. We have totally ruined our relationship with one of our allies and whats to say that the rest of our allies won't trust us a well.
ReplyDeleteI think it is not a good idea to leave the Kurds under attack because they helped the US against ISIS. Trump's action to leave our allies in danger will only disappoint our allies and create tension between US and other nations. Instead of having all US troops removed from Syria, the US should train Kurds to fight on their own while Americans slowly leave Syria.
ReplyDeleteThis decision is single-handedly the worst foreign policy decision Trump has ever made. Even the Senate Majority leader, Mitch McConnell, dissented against the decision, and he has stuck by almost all of Trump's prior policy decisions. Not only does this decision allow ISIS to regroup after they have just been starting to lose grip on their territory, but it completely betrays our alliance with the Kurdish. They did, in fact, fight with us in WWII (not in accordance with Trump's claims). This decision will have massive repercussions, and even though the U.S. military recently led an attack to kill the leader of ISIS, it will not be enough to counteract the gains ISIS will make because we did not support the Kurdish in holding ISIS members in detention centers. Luckily, Congress passed a measure by 354-60 to rebuke Trump's decision, which showcases the huge bipartisan opposition to his policy. Furthermore, his decision came at a surprise to many in the Pentagon, as he didn't inform them of or collaborate with military experts in the decision. Overall, it was poorly executed, poorly received, and will create thousands of deaths in Syria for the Kurdish militants and Syrian civilians alike.
ReplyDelete