U.S. Marines with
SPMAGTF-CR-CC practice company size reinforcement, live fire ranges
in Syria (photo: U.S. Central Command)
By
Bill Van Auken
In
a meandering and at times incoherent White House cabinet meeting held
in front of the media, US President Donald Trump defended his
surprise December 19 announcement of his decision to withdraw all US
troops from Syria, while indicating that there is no set timetable
for doing so.
Initially
there were reports from within the administration that US
forces—officially numbered at 2,000 but possibly consisting of as
many as twice that number—would be brought out of Syria within 30
days. Subsequently, the time frame was put at 60 to 100 days. Since
the beginning of the new year, it has been reported that the deadline
has been extended to 120 days.
The
withdrawal decision provoked the resignation of Defense Secretary
General James Mattis, who penned a letter implicitly criticizing
Trump for abandoning allies and failing to confront Russia, as well
as that of Brett McGurk, the US envoy to the so-called war on the
Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The announcement likewise
provoked a storm of criticism from both Democratic and Republican
members of Congress.
At
Wednesday’s cabinet meeting, Trump answered a reporter’s question
on the timetable for the Syria withdrawal by denying that he had
signed off on a three-month period or that he had ever used the words
“fast or slow.” Instead, he merely reiterated, “I’m getting
out—we’re getting out of Syria.”
CNN
reported that the 120-day framework had been presented by the US
military command, which claimed that it would be impossible to
organize a safe and orderly pullout any sooner. Part of the problem
is the huge amounts of weaponry and ammunition that the US military
has sent into Syria, which cannot be removed as quickly as the troops
themselves and which the Pentagon refuses to leave behind.
Pressed
on how soon US troops would pull out of Syria, Trump responded: “Over
a period of time. I never said I’m getting out tomorrow. I said
we’re pulling our soldiers out, and they will be pulled back in
Syria, and we’re getting out of Syria. Yeah. Absolutely. But we’re
getting out very powerfully.”
He
justified his decision by citing his election campaign pledge to
bring US troops home from “endless wars” as part of his “America
First” agenda.
At
the same time, he stated in virtually the same breath that it was
time to withdraw from Syria because the US had “decimated ISIS”
and that “Syria was lost long ago.”
He
attributed this loss to the failure of the Obama administration—under
which the CIA-backed war for regime change was launched in 2011—to
carry through on its threat to initiate a direct US military
onslaught against Syria over alleged chemical weapons attacks in
2013.
“So
Syria was lost long ago,” Trump said. “It was lost long ago. And
besides that, we’re talking about sand and death. That’s what
we’re talking about. We’re not talking about, you know, vast
wealth. We’re talking about sand and death.”
The
US president’s crude and rambling remarks provide at least a
glimpse into the real thinking within the US ruling class. The
unending wars in the Middle East and Central Asia have not been about
“weapons of mass destruction,” a “war on terror” or “human
rights,” but rather about “vast wealth” in terms of energy
reserves.
Syria’s
oil and natural gas resources are insignificant compared to other
countries in the region. The war that Washington and its allies
provoked, killing hundreds of thousands and turning millions into
refugees, was about denying Russia a foothold in the region and
rolling back the regional influence of Iran.
Trump
suggested that the withdrawal of US troops would serve to undermine
Moscow and Tehran, which would be forced to confront the remnants of
ISIS in Syria. “But you know where else they’re going?” Trump
said in relation to ISIS. “To Iran, who hates ISIS more than we do.
They’re going to Russia, who hates ISIS more than we do.”
Again,
through the bravado and incoherence, a glimmer of truth. The Islamist
militias in Syria, ISIS included, were armed and financed by the US
and its allies for the purpose of toppling the Assad government.
These same forces can and will be turned against US imperialism’s
rivals and regional opponents, including Russia, China and Iran.
Trump
turned to Iran in his rambling monologue, declaring, “Iran is a
much different country than it was when I became President…. I had
a meeting at the Pentagon with lots of generals. They were like from
a movie. Better looking than Tom Cruise, and stronger. And I had more
generals than I’ve ever seen, and we were at the bottom of this
incredible room. And I said, ‘This is the greatest room I’ve ever
seen.’”
The
room apparently included a “big board” showing a map of the
Middle East with Iran advancing on all fronts.
“I
saw more computer boards than I think that they make today,” Trump
said. “And every part of the Middle East, and other places that was
under attack, was under attack because of Iran. And I said to myself,
‘Wow.’ I mean, you look at Yemen, you look at Syria, you look at
every place. Saudi Arabia was under siege.”
What
emerged from Trump’s longwinded and disjointed presentation is that
the Syria troop withdrawal, if it is executed, represents merely a
tactical shift in what will be a continuation of the decades-long
military campaign to assert US hegemony over the Middle East.
“We
are continuing the fight,” Trump said at one point, adding that
“there was a lot of misinterpretation.” He said that the US was
doing “very exciting” things in the Middle East that he did not
want to talk about. “A lot of great people understood it. Lindsey
Graham understood it.”
The
Republican Senator Graham, an influential figure on national security
issues, had condemned the withdrawal decision as “a huge Obama-like
mistake.” After meeting with Trump on December 30, Graham said that
Trump had told him “some things that I didn’t know that make me
feel a lot better about where we’re headed in Syria.”
Meanwhile,
a senior congressional Democrat attacked Trump from the right for
allegedly abandoning a military challenge to Russian and Iranian
forces in Syria. Steny Hoyer, the new House Majority Leader,
responded to Trump’s remarks by describing the withdrawal decision
as “dangerous and reckless” and charging that it “creates a
vacuum for Iran, Russia, and other adversaries to exploit.”
The
essential component of the Democrats’ opposition to Trump is over
imperialist strategy and tactics. Speaking for layers of the military
and intelligence apparatus, they oppose any lessening of the
confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia, particularly in the Middle
East.
Trump
and his supporters within the ruling establishment see domination of
the Asia Pacific region as the key priority. General Mattis’
replacement as acting defense secretary, the 30-year Boeing aircraft
executive Patrick Shanahan, during his first meeting with civilian
leaders at the Pentagon told them to focus on “China, China,
China.”
Meanwhile,
Al Jazeera
reported Thursday that the US military has sharply escalated its
bombing campaign against alleged ISIS targets in eastern Syria,
including villages packed with civilians who have fled other areas
that came under siege.
“The
civilians in these areas have no place to go or hide from the US
bombardment of their villages,” a civilian activist told Al
Jazeera.
The
bombing campaign, dubbed Operation Roundup, has struck numerous
civilian targets, including the Yarmouk Hospital, the last public
health facility treating civilians in the region. Striking such a
facility is a war crime.
According
to the report, the bombing campaign is also targeting internet cafes
used by civilians, on the grounds that ISIS fighters also frequent
them.
“They
[the US] backstabbed all their allies and they’re killing the
people here, and eventually the Islamic State will survive and
spread, or it will fall,” an ISIS fighter interviewed for the
report said. “But there will be people here who will remember what
happened here, and they will carry on this information and it will
spread throughout the Middle East.”
This
article first appeared on World
Socialist Web Site (WSWS)
on
4
January
2019,
and was republished with permission.
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