At
a moment of widespread acknowledgment that the short-lived Islamic
State (ISIS) is no longer a reality, and as ISIS is about to be
defeated by the Syrian Army in its last urban holdout of Abu Kamal
City in eastern Syria, the US is signaling an open-ended military
presence in Syria. On Monday Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told
reporters at the Pentagon that the US is preparing for a long-term
military commitment in Syria to fight ISIS “as long as they want
to fight.”
Mattis
indicated that even should ISIS lose all of its territory there would
still be a dangerous insurgency that could morph into an “ISIS 2.0”
which he said the US would seek to prevent. “The enemy hasn’t
declared that they’re done with the area yet, so we’ll keep
fighting as long as they want to fight,” Mattis said. “We’re
not just going to walk away right now before the Geneva process has
traction.”
Mattis
was referring to the stalled peace talks in Geneva which some
analysts have described as a complete failure (especially as the
Geneva process unrealistically stipulates the departure of Assad), as
the future of Syria has of late been increasingly decided militarily
on the battlefield, with the Syrian government now controlling the
vast majority of the country’s most populated centers.
Ironically
just as some degree of stability and normalcy has returned to many
parts of the county now under government control, Mattis coupled the
idea of a permanent US military presence with the goal of allowing
Syrians to return to their homes. He said, “You keep broadening
them. Try to (demilitarize) one area then (demilitarize) another and
just keep it going, try to do the things that will allow people to
return to their homes.”
Meanwhile,
Turkey once again reiterated that the US has 13 bases in Syria,
though the US-backed Syrian YPG has previously indicated seven US
military bases in northern Syria. The Pentagon, however, would not
confirm base locations or numbers – though only a year-and-a-half
ago the American public was being assured that there would be “no
boots on the ground” due to mission creep in Syria.
During
the last year of the Obama administration, State Department spokesman
John Kirby was called out multiple times by reporters for tell
obvious and blatant lies concerning “boots on the ground” in
Syria.
Remember
this? “We are not going to be involved in a large scale combat
mission on the ground in Syria. That is what the president [Obama]
has long said.”
Last
summer, in a move that angered the US administration, Turkish state
media leaked the locations of no less than ten small-scale American
military bases in northern Syria alone (revelations of US bases in
southern Syria began surfacing as well). As another recent Pentagon
press conference further acknowledged, these bases – though likely
special forces forward operating bases – require a broad network of
US personnel operating in various logistical roles inside Syria and
likely now includes thousands of US troops deployed on the ground,
instead of the Pentagon’s official (and highly dubious)
“approximately 500 troops in Syria” number.
BBC
bombshell
What
makes even the timing of Mattis’ declaration of an open-ended
military commitment in to supposedly fight ISIS is that it came the
same day that the BBC confirmed that the US and its Kurdish SDF proxy
(Syrian Democratic Forces) cut a deal with ISIS which allowed for the
evacuation of possibly thousands of ISIS members and their families
from Raqqa.
According
to yesterday’s bombshell BBC report:
The
BBC has uncovered details of a secret deal that let hundreds of
Islamic State fighters and their families escape from Raqqa, under
the gaze of the US and British-led coalition and Kurdish-led forces
who control the city. A convoy included some of IS’s most notorious
members and – despite reassurances – dozens of foreign fighters.
Some of those have spread out across Syria, even making it as far as
Turkey.
Though
it’s always good when the mainstream media belatedly gives
confirmation to stories that actually broke months prior, the BBC was
very late to the story. ISIS terrorists being given free passage by
coalition forces to leave Raqqa was a story which we and other
outlets began to report last June, and which Moon of Alabama and
Al-Masdar News exposed in detail a full month prior to the BBC
report.
And
astoundingly, even foreign fighters who had long vowed to carry out
attacks in Europe and elsewhere were part of the deal brokered under
the sponsorship of the US coalition in Syria. According to the BBC
report:
Disillusioned,
weary of the constant fighting and fearing for his life, Abu Basir
decided to leave for the safety of Idlib. He now lives in the city.
He was part of an almost exclusively French group within IS, and
before he left some of his fellow fighters were given a new mission.
There are some French brothers from our group who left for France to
carry out attacks in what would be called a ‘day of reckoning.’
Much is hidden beneath the rubble of Raqqa and the lies around this
deal might easily have stayed buried there too. The numbers leaving
were much higher than local tribal elders admitted. At first the
coalition refused to admit the extent of the deal.
So
it appears that the US allowed ISIS terrorists to freely leave areas
under coalition control, according to no less than the BBC, while at
the same time attempting to make the case before the public that a
permanent Pentagon presence is needed in case of ISIS’ return. But
it’s a familiar pattern by now: yesterday’s proxies become
today’s terrorists, which return to being proxies again, all as
part of justifying permanent US military presence on another nation’s
sovereign territory.
America’s
Syrian adventure went from public declarations of “we’re staying
out” to “just some logistical aid to rebels” to “okay, some
mere light arms to fight the evil dictator” to “well, a few
anti-tank missiles wouldn’t hurt” to “we gotta bomb the new
super-bad terror group that emerged!” to “ah but no boots on the
ground!” to “alright kinetic strikes as a deterrent” to “but
special forces aren’t really boots on the ground per se, right?”
to yesterday’s Mattis declaration of an open-ended commitment. And
on and on it goes.
Source,
links:
Comments
Post a Comment