Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

flpoljunkie

(26,184 posts)
Mon Sep 1, 2014, 04:56 PM Sep 2014

Slate's Fred Kaplan: Obama Shouldn’t Bomb ISIS in Syria

Obama Shouldn’t Bomb ISIS in Syria
We have no strategy for intervening there, and no reason to think it will work.

By Fred Kaplan


President Barack Obama addresses the nation from the State Dining Room of the White House on Aug. 7, 2014.
Photo by Mike Theiler/Getty Images

Let’s hope that President Obama does not bomb ISIS inside Syria—unless, maybe, the airstrikes are coordinated with some other country’s troops on the ground. That’s what happened in northern Iraq last week, when U.S. airstrikes paved the way for a mix of Iraqi special forces, Shiite militias, and Kurdish peshmerga fighters to push ISIS away from the Mosul Dam. But that’s not likely to happen in Syria.

It’s not likely to happen for two reasons, both lamentable. First, there are no ground forces inside Syria that can both repel ISIS and serve as palatable American allies. Second, the Obama administration and the neighboring Middle Eastern countries appear to have no strategy of what an intervention in Syria might look like or of what Syrian politics should look like in its aftermath.

That is a particular shame, since the United States and just about every country in the region could form a very potent alliance against ISIS. They all hate and fear the al-Qaida offshoot that calls itself the Islamic State. They all share an interest in seeing the group pummeled. But in many of these countries, domestic politics or conflicting interests on other matters impede such an alliance from forming.

A strange alliance—which could include the United States, Iran, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Israel, and Saudi Arabia—is at least conceptually feasible in Iraq, assuming its new prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, forms a government that seems inclusive and responsive to Shiite and Sunni leaders. If Abadi manages this feat (and the bloody sectarian violence in recent days dampens its prospects), this hypothetical alliance—which includes Sunni and Shiite nations, among others—would be fighting not just against ISIS but also for a stable and potentially amenable Iraq.

more...

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2014/08/president_obama_shouldn_t_bomb_isis_in_syria_u_s_airstrikes_will_not_be.html
Latest Discussions»Retired Forums»2016 Postmortem»Slate's Fred Kaplan: Oba...