And you can add that the Russian people don't like seeing their sons die in wars that are not directly protecting Mother Russia. They even objected, as the bodies got sent home, to suppressing the murderous Islamists of Chechniya, who blew up children in Moscow. So, eventually, Mr. Putin will lose interest, as long as he can keep his Warm Water Port (plus an air base). It's time American realized that being a superpower has its perks, but a lot of the world will, indeed, kick you in the teeth for promoting freedom and democracy . Heck, my parents said that 10 minutes after liberating a French city the grateful citizens were queuing up to demand compensation for American bombs that knocked their radio off the shelf.
1
Here I thought it was a "Grand slam"- with Syria, Turkey, Iran and Russia scoring.
1
I'm guessing Russia, Syria, Turkey and Iran will try to get ISIS to join their club as muscle to help keep the loser Assad in power while also harassing the Kurds on behalf of Turkey and Israel on behalf of the Iranians.
2
“Americans want a break.”
A nice mantra.
Which Americans?
The one’s whom you just homogenized to make a point?
What kind of a break?
In a divided, perhaps even fractured, nation of diverse Peoples. Those whose dreams and aspirations have been injured, if not broken? The all too many?
Will this posited “break,” temporary or more permanent, also somehow chisel away at the anchored, ongoing, human-barriered ME-THEY legacy, traditions and revisionist-remembered-history of an enabled violating culture?
What are the unimpeachable FACTs, in our twittering- “alt-fact(ed)” -irreality? About the incidence and prevalence of active choices for a daily lifestyle of complacency about and complicity in words and acts of ummenschlichkeit?
Both at home and abroad?
What will/can/may enable diverse Americans, MAGAed or not, to become personally more accountable, in their desired “time-out”as incivility grows? Spreads?
As mutual mistrust infects; family, friends, neighbors, fellow students, workers, amongst those still praying to...who have not yet begun to prey on...?
A “break?”
Yup, there is a lot of self-policing and cleaning-up to do at home.
For those of US still prepared to contribute to making a difference that achieves, in some ways, needed, sustainable differences for menschlichkeit.
And as we prepare to take this “BRAKE,” Give ALL of US a break from semantic surrealism during these dark-dirty-violating times with its enabled, fostered, EVIL people and ideas!
1
Thank you for that!
The answer is very simple:
If you are a Republican after today’s collective obstruction of justice in Congress..... you are a traitor to the country and the people of the United States, and should be dealt with as such.
4
pure genius that Putin's has a puppet in the Whitehouse?
1
Today Trump completely capitulated to the demands of the Turkish President and to Mr. Putin. He has handed our allies over to the enemy, and turned his back. Chamberlain did much the same when Hitler demanded expansion. Weak men do weak things.
3
what makes you think trump wouldn't take the money and renege on his promise?
2
We get immersed in Trump. Let's be honest he is not a stable or a genius. But he time will pass. A new administration will be a joiner not a quitter; decent not profane and amoral; respect the institutions of government; separation of powers; rule of law. A universe so unlike Trump you must rub your eyes to see it clearly. In the moment a careening pinball running the country remains unnerving. Brighter days ahead.
2
There is a sad fact running through this whole mess and that is nobody (pro Trump/anti Trump) can honestly say that they know 100% that Trump did this on behalf of the country or on behalf of himself.
It has been debated that W. And Obama made rookie/elitist/dumb mistakes but it has never been debated that they did anything policy-wise solely to put money in their pocket or payback a foreign government for political gain/advantage.
It is possible that everyone on this comment page has an opinion about the choices the two, three, four, five prior presidents have made but never in my life of 1/2 a century have I ever questioned if they made a decision based on greed, blackmail or ego.
I keep telling my teen to pay close attention because this isn’t a normal state for our country and my wish is that it is an anomaly for all of us and they will continue to experience democracy.
1
I find it strange that as Tom separates the genocidal and homicidal from the good guys, even remarking on the treatment the Kurds afford women, he doesn't mention the head choppers of al-Qaeda and HTS that the US and the Gulf States armed and financed in an effort to bring about regime change in Syria.
As much as I hate to say it, maybe Trump was right in pulling troops out of Syria. Over 800 bases around the world? And we have a mounting homeless problem, student debt that’s unconscionable, healthcare, and housing? Time to fold up the military and come home!
4
Trump has made us all complicit in the genocide of the Kurds. He cannot expect forgiveness.
2
Now, every time I hear Americans sing about being the "home of brave", I cringe.
2
How about unpacking this a bit more?
'Washington felt guilty having removed all combat troops from Iraq before it was really stabilized and ISIS had brutally murdered American journalists.'
Not everyone in Washington felt guilty. Not everyone cared.
You have to give Putin credit. His KGB training really came in handy. Here we spend hundreds of billions of dollars to bring down the USSR and Putin spends a few million on Facebook and other media ads, gets his stooge elected and all he has to do is sit back and have some tea while we destroy ourselves. Putin can have the Mideast if he wants it though. Let him try messing with Israel through his proxies, Iran or Syria and watch Israel destroy a lot of expensive Russian machines. You bought it Vladi, it's all yours.
3
Does anyone SERIOUSLY believe that a) Trump could locate any of these places on a detailed political map, and b) that he could write out a list composed of five affected parties?
7
Seems to me that another consequence of walking away from our relationships in the way Tom describes is that countries we leave bereft of our support then turn around and demand nuclear weapons. Witness, now, Turkey. Have we really made our world safer and saner?
6
It's not unreasonable to assume that Trump knows he won't have a second term and doesn't want one, and that he's laying the groundwork for expanding his hotel empire in Russia, Turkey, etc. Anyone have a better explanation of why he's going against the advice of his generals and diplomats to help these countries expand their power in contested areas at the expense of our allies?
14
Seems pretty clear to me that Trump was talking about the First Gulf War yesterday, not the second. Does no one care that those were very, very different?
2
Politicians understand leverage, especially IF it's economic.
Safer than bullets with enormous spill over
Imagine IF we had a President that could leverage the support of ALL the NATO countries and with the use of SWIFT "bankrupt" Russia. The Russian currency would no longer be acceptable for transactions and none of the NATO countries would trade with Russia.
YES..it would be a struggle/challenge.
After a few weeks of no money coming in Russia would accept what it already knows....it's ALL about the money
Trump is our current president. Hopefully he will be gone soon. Given the reaction to this move, it's a good bet that a saner president, less impulsive and one that listens to advisors of all sides, would not damage, betray, us and our allies like this. These are painful times. No question we will have to rebuild trust and gain deeper knowledge and wisdom in the process. It's beyond sad that so many will have to suffer. In the meantime Trump has a good line to make to his public about getting us out or forever wars. It's very appealing because people don't really seem pay attention or care.
4
@Potter That said, that we have elected such a president will be hard to overcome in the future because we might do it again or worse.
3
'Destiny' did not put us in this place in history.
The United States has willfully and deliberately interfered in this region, overthrowing governments and seeking to impose its will on this part of the world by force. The neocons are following a carefully thought out blueprint and deliberately CAUSING the tsunami engulfing the region.
Trump is making a mess of things but one has to wonder why there was not vocal opposition to W's wars before we even got involved in the most recent round of regime overthrows?
5
Oh, is "Sustainable Engagement" the latest theory for keeping our troops in endless combat around the world, killing, maiming and turning into refugees countless human beings?
Friedman is becoming a caricature of himself. I imagine him, circa 1963, writing the same type of column explaining how with just the right mix of violence, soft power, economics, technology and diplomacy, things will work out swimmingly in Vietnam.
He states Americans can't afford to take a "break" from our control freak habit of the past 70+ years. Because, you see, if we don't stay in constant war and conflict, wars and conflicts will break out! America will lose influence, power and prestige!
We are addicted to "doing something!" like some neurotic middle aged man trying to prove to himself that he's not over the hill.
5
No matter how much Brasso Trump uses on his lapel flag pin, he can't get the tarnish out. Hopefully, as a country, we can work through the stain he has put on everything of value he touches.
69
Friedman writes: "After some four decades of a foreign policy built around “containment”...and then two decades of foreign policy built around “enlargement” — enlarging the sphere of democracy around the world..."
That's an inaccurate characterization. The "Washington Consensus," that is, freer trade, freer migration, and slashing social safety nets, is more about reducing democracy by using non-majoritarian features of Western political systems, e.g. judicial review, to thwart popular will in the service of capital. We the People did not clamor for large cuts for high earners and corporations and for deregulation of polluting industries. We the People did not clamor for reductions in infrastructure spending. In the U.S., salutary law after law was struck down, frequently 5-4, on the narrowest technical grounds, usually in the cause of removing limits on the power of the moneyed.
Democracy gave us the New Deal and affordable university education paid for with progressive taxation. Democracy gave us shared prosperity and stability. What the Washington Consensus did was thwart democracy to undermine the financial base of the superpower and social solidarity. In their blind arrogance, they never imagined they would undermine the superpower that rested on those things.
We'll see if they're capable of changing their minds in time. I'm not hopeful.
11
If I’m following this piece correctly, the geopolitical rationale for US involvement in Syria should have been “The enemy (ISIS) of my enemy (Assad) is my friend?” So do nothing but the Kurds have “islands of decency” and since we supported their effort to defeat ISIS (in part of Kurdistan, no less) what Trump did was wrong?
According to Mr. Friedman, ISIS also apparently emerged de novo in 2014 (when Obama was president, of course). No admission that this group emerged more or less in a straight line following the American invasion of Iraq, a policy of de-Baathification, the failed governance of Bremer et al. and the Bush administration’s failure to confront the counter insurgency before it was too late.
Finally, Friedman, who thinks deeply about the Middle East no doubt, lost me with the preamble about American righteousness in our foreign policy decisions that promote “democracy” and our values. If I look over the last 70 years of American military interventions or American-backed operations (Cuba, Nicaragua, Chile, El Salvador, The Dominican Republic, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, the Congo, Libya, Lebanon, etc) one could say we took the correct action perhaps by mistake a few times.
We have to rethink our interventionist mindset to be sure but also our misreading of history and our place in it.
6
Mr. Friedman praises the moral virtue of the United States and then in the very next paragraph suggests we should have tolerated ISIS's genocidal existence just to weaken Russia and Assad.
3
The biggest loser here is America and our sense of honor and decency. We shamefully betrayed a loyal, courageous ally, the Kurds. Where is America’s honor today?
5
It’s a fact that the USA worked with Turkey for years to promote the Sunni insurgency in Syria to undermine Assad. Then the Syria civil war got going and along came ISIS. ISIS is a Saudi creation and everything was going good with the USA until the caliphate was going to include Iraq. Then suddenly ISIS is a problem, a problem America helped create. I agree that the USA should get the troops home. Bring back the CIA too. Maybe even let Israel fight their own wars. If they had thousands of casualties rather than Americans they might just be a little less rammy and mind their own business. Right now Israel, Saudi Arabia and the USA are destabilizing Iran with the intention to overthrow the regime. Except the Saudis saw how the USA stands for allies in the Middle East and is now in discussion with Iran and Putin. Iran will not roll over and I fully expect that Saudi Arabian oil fields will be on fire before this is over. So good luck to Americans there. To stop endless wars try to not start them!
8
Under normal circumstances, the task of a president, whose legitimacy is beyond doubt, and who is elected for his competence and judiciousness, apart from probity, is "to balance the understandable desire of Americans to no longer bear every burden and oppose any foe to ensure the survival of freedom with the fact that U.S. interests and values still require us to remain engaged around the world in a sustainable way."
But Trump is no normal president. I wouldn't say he is a Russian stooge, because it would be an insult to many decent Russians. He is simply Putin's lapdog, doing his master's bidding.
4
What is Trump proving? He’s proving 63 million Americans have serious problems.
6
As noted by Mr. Friedman; "if Russia, China or Iran decides to come after you or bully you, America does not have your back — unless you’ve paid cash in advance.”
First off, America's values shouldn't be based on cash advances.
It appears, since Saudi Arabia is paying for recent USA troop deployment, American soldiers should now classified as "mercenary".
To the T, most Americans have a grasp about honor in a war zone, especially involving allies.
Trump recently invoked WW2 Normandy as evidence of Kurdish non-participation toward American efforts, and thus, unworthiness.
However, since about ~90 percent of the world also weren't involved in the invasion, ), the Kurds alone are unworthy of allegiance?
Obviously, that is a stretch that can only appeal to the absurd.
Trump succeeded in giving over the Syrian Kurdish theater to several of his "supposed" adversaries, quite lamb like.
Now Assad, Putin and Erdoğan gleefully split the spoils of war, with the USA sidelined via an incompetent President.
Sad
4
This the problem with outsider president.
2
Unfortunately, America is not better than that. A country’s democratically elected officials reflect their citizens’ own values, their hopes for the future and their moral attitudes. Much of this country, including most of the president’s base, has a very low interest level when it comes to making sure America is good to people like the Kurds. We are so polarized and fractured that one half our country watches completely different news stories than the other half, shares different belief systems and views their life experiences as quite the opposite of the other half. Of course it was bound to come to complete chaos with world events spiraling out of control, because our leaders just don’t care enough. It will get worse before it gets better. If we are more careful over the next half century, we might be able to repair some of the damage our country has done.
3
Maybe I’ve watched too many Rory Stewart videos on YouTube. Inter alia, Rory walked across Afghanistan to try and figure the place out, Rory served as the Coalition representative in Mosul after we invaded in 2003.
At the end of Rory’s speeches, he always labors the point that the West doesn’t understand the Near East and Western Asia, that the history of Western intervention is always failure, that the places of intervention are always worse as the result of our interventions.
The most notable aspect of Trump’s announced withdrawal last week is that, apparently, no one in the West understood what the consequences would be. I didn’t see one “Expert” predict that Assad and the Russians would take control---not one, certainly none of the commenters on the NYT articles. I consider people reading the NYT and commenting therein to be extremely well informed—they didn’t have a clue. I bet plenty of the people living in Syria understood what was going to happen.
As we don’t understand the region, as we ruin every place we intervene, let’s abandon the region—forthwith, if not sooner.
I think we have done enough damage. Let’s spend the money on free breakfasts and lunches for poor kids here in the United States.
1
"....in hopes that the islands of decency there might one day connect up and flower into democracy."
It struck me, after reading this, that this is what I am hoping will happen in the Gerrymandered States of America!
5
Would reporters please look deeper into what Speaker Pelosi meant when she asked,"do all roads lead to Putin?"
What does she know that we don't about all of this?
- Was there suggestion or direction from Putin that Trump should withhold the defense aid?
- Did the President pull out of Syria to allow Putin to allow advance his interests there?
Just seems like there's more to that question that is not being dug into yet..
3
Today's article By Rania Abouzeid, "It Always Comes Back to Syria," contains far more of the truth than does this special pleading by Friedman.
I wish comments were open on Abouzeid's article, because its many new admissions need to be highlighted, and the partial truths unpacked. Still, it is a far better picture of Syria than here.
Kurdistan is not co-extensive with the caliphate of the Islamic State. The Kurds always had their own territory, and part of ISIS was conquered by people other than Kurds, Assad, Iran, and Turkey's Arab forces.
The Arab Spring of 8 years ago did not become the present war. Those protesters mostly went back to Assad, because they were mostly secular and more afraid of ISIS and al Qaeda and the Saudis than they were of Assad -- a very hard choice, but real nonetheless.
Instead, the present war seized the opportunity of chaos. What exploded was a foreign based and foreign funded religious fundamentalist war. It was run out of Turkey, Northern Lebanon, Jordan, and across the Iraq border, all around Syria. The openly expressed model was Afghanistan against the Soviets.
The remaining American bases are those put in place against Iran. The bases against ISIS moved on as victory left them redundant.
It was always a new bad idea to set up Kurds next to Turkey. That could only end this way.
Russia and Iran already had what they wanted, and probably gain more from a continuing war than they could from settling final peace terms with Assad.
2
I was in the US last week when an American friend floored me with this.
"The last real president America had was Lincoln".
Something to ponder about.
The primary force behind American action abroad has always been the enlargement of corporate profits, not enlarging the sphere of democracy. This bit of propaganda is easily and obviously rebutted by numerous efforts to shore up ruthless dictators and undermine (or replace) democratically elected leaders.
3
@casual observer (who thinks our policies over the past half century worked, forgetting Vietnam, Iran, Chile, Iraq etc)
No it did not work for half a century. We allied ourselves with the Shah against Mossadegh, an elected decent man whom we got rid of and installed back the tyrant whom we then ditched as he was dying of cancer. Hommeini and the mullahs came back with a vengeance. We backed Saddam against the Iranian Mullahs and we know how he ended up, and how much the two Iraq wars cost us. Afghanistan a disaster: the Russians got out we got in. Like Vietnam and the French who dumped it on us. Chile, another disaster. Wherever we touched we messed it up.
Why? Because we really don’t know the places we get involved in at all. I remember sitting at Harvard’s Middle Eastern Studies department, in lectures for the general student body and scratching my head whenever the so called experts were discussing policy implications. That was 1979 just after the Iranian “revolution.”
Not much changed. Still bungling it up. Friedman here is the epitome of that ignorant chutzpah. Sorry but there is a difference between isolationism and stupidity.
6
GOP broke US Democracy and now their leader broke Middle-east.. I just can't imagine next 9/11 or worse..
Hope that our good patriotic administrative servants have courage to really do their job in all these negative GOP nonsense..
God help us by giving true patriot a support.
1
With one stupidly bad move --the sudden withdrawal of American troops out of northern Syria, the following has happened:
1) Flagrant betrayal of an ally;
2) The Revival of ISIS;
3) Loss of our accumulated intelligence for that area;
4) Some of that accumulated intelligence now in Russian hands;
5) The ransoming of our Nuclear material at Incirlik Air Force Base by Turkish President Erdogan, and his plan to leave the Nonproliferation treaty;
6) The loss of Turkey as a NATO ally;
7) Stronger alliances between Iran & Russia and Syria & Russia;
8) Control of northern Syrian oil by Russian oil firm Rosneft.
All this began with Trump's phone call with Erdogan. And Trump did not bother to even consult either the State or Defense Departments, nor the NSC.
From Trump's One Stupidly Bad Move, Putin scores 5 victories , and the Turkish despot has vastly increased imperial ambitions (Items 4 through 8).
Impeachment-wise, we should make the case for Trump's Gross Negligence of his Powers & Duties (not consulting nor taking a briefing from any career foreign policy expert) as President; and his Reckless Endangerment of our troops, of our Kurdish (former) allies to genocide, and of our National Security --all of this from One. Stupidly. Bad. Move!
9
Perhaps Putin and the Russian military police there should be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize,
Gee the Bots are out today! The comments supporting Trump’s disastrous and brutal abandonment of our Kurdish allies are many! The small amount of territory the Kurds had, has now been given to Turkey by the Republican president, a man who has never even been to a battle field! The Times has an article about how our Troops are upset about abandoning their allies. Women and children are been killed, for what?! To appease a brutal, totalitarian dictator?!
How about Putin?! He’s thrilled to finally get a base in the eastern Mediterranean and a foothold in the Middle East!
Putin’s puppet, the Republican president has done exactly what Putin has wanted!
7
Joe Six-pack Red State Trumper don't care what goes on outside the USA. Joe holds the cards who gets re-elected in 2020. This matters more than anything else.
Second prize? A set of steak knives straight to the heart of the Kurds. All this winning has me spinning.
3
Is there any wonder why Putin wants him re-elected?
5
Mr.Friedman would you ever had thought in the 21st century a Nation would be in turmoil over the words and deeds of an American President, Throughout the world there is chaos, usually, Democracies can overcome challenges but what has happened to the US, Brits, Germany even Canada with uncertain Governing is benefitting the tyrants and authoritarian Republics of Communism, illegal electorals
terrorists those that have been considered repugnant for the way they manage and mismanage there countries and charges, how does an irrational out of control President who knew ahead of time that he stood a chance of helping with genocide exist, I go back to the weekend when on youtube there were two views that remains, one "Fighting soldiers from the sky, fearless men who fought and died, men who mean just what they say, the brave men of the Green Beret, well this may need to be tweaked for the righteous people the Kurds who stood side by side with Americans, who died, who became mamed, the second was the solemn bagpipes being played while caskets of brave men, draped with their appropriate flags were brought to their final resting place in their countries, US, Canada, Netherlands, Middle East, are we to think now that their blood and life is worthless due to actions of an out of control Trump, cant call him President, not someone who demeans and degrades his people in front of the world, Pelosi hates America? Boy, he is setting it on fire and the Republicans have given him permission,
4
It reeks of having the political blinders on when one thinks that the actions of their government is inherently good. It’s all good to condemn Russian aggression and intrusion into other countries affairs, but as an American a bit of self reflection and awareness should also be applied to the US government. It’s like any other government, including Russia. Its goal is to achieve its geopolitical aims. Sometimes it could mean supporting the democracy movement in Iran against the mullahs, other times it’s to aid the Saudi genocide in Yemen.
We saw this movie. Didn't end well for Lawrence Harvey. We may not have similar luck with our own Manchurian Candidate.
tRump is clearly beholden to Putin in his surprisingly-demonstrative actions to-date. Apparently either Putin or tRump has also mesmerized the Republican Senate who may "talk the Talk" but willfully avoid protecting our Republic from external enemies.
Isn't this is a working definition of treason?
4
The comment by Mr. Mandelbaum about Germans getting nukes if it no longer has American security guarantees is a perfect snapshot into how out of touch most (not all) of the American foreign policy establishment is. They just cannot escape this hyper-hard power post ww2 mindset that keeps getting them into trouble. This mindset has played a large role in what brought about most of the problems presented in this article. The fact that Friedman presents this comment as a defense of what America should be/do is blackly comical and it shows that many US foreign policy thinkers/ commentators have learned nothing and have only one tool in the tool kit. Both are unfortunate for the US and the world. By definition you can't export a human rights, values based foreign policy through the barrel of a rifle. If everyone in the neighborhood has a gun but the man with the biggest gun, who is supposed to be guarding everyone, is drunk then maybe its time to rethink guns in the neighborhood. Especially for the guardian...
1
Again, another proof that Putin has in Trump a perfect weapon to damage USA: our reputation, strength, morale, progress. All that he needed was to support Trump's nomination by electoral votes (he would have lost if popular votes were counted). God help USA in 2020!
5
Tom Friedman, you, Tony Blair, the Foreign Policy Establishment, and the Military Industrial Complex are like "the best and the brightest" who would still be fighting the Vietnam War, given a choice.
"interests and values still require us to remain engaged around the world in a sustainable way."
Those values have the US responsible for the deaths of millions killed directly or indirectly in military action since 9/11, taken in revenge for the actions of nineteen men with boxcutters who could not bear having the infidels stationed on their holy ground of Saudi Arabia.
Hilarious to have you, Mr Friedman, mention sustainability.
What do you suppose the carbon footprint is of US military action since 9/11?
I doubt that your children will thank you for the future you have created by cheering Forever Wars.
3
Every four years we have a different foreign policy. It's marketed and managed and performed for the American public which could not give two hoots about Mozambique, Chile, Sri Lanka, Saudi Arabia or Finland unless those nations somehow interrupted the supply of Netflix to Kansas.
The reason we have interfered in many nations, especially since the end of WWII is to keep up spending trillions in military dollars which empowers our military-industrial complex. Our cities goes hollow, our countrymen are sick and without health insurance or secure jobs, but we have four trillion on a credit card to spread over Afghanistan and Iraq.
I hate Trump. But if he could stop the endless wars that enfeeble us, I might actually vote for him.
The problem : American leadership is a sham conducted by ignoramuses and accomplishes nothing but getting us into trouble all the time whether we lead or not.
1
It upsets me to give tRump any kind of credit at all, but, the Middle east is a quagmire that makes Vietnam look like a puddle. While I deplore his abandonment of the Kurds, the very fact that the Kurds are among the many groups with no effective voice in the world is symptomatic of life in the Middle East. For example the Yazidi or Iraq, the Copts of Egypt, Palestinians in the occupied territories, the Shi in Saudi Arabi, etc, etc, etc are but a few of the dispossessed groups in that region. We are not going to solve their problems. Now it appears to be Russia's problem to solve. Good luck to them.
1
@John Locke
Russia wants military bases, permanent ones, in the Eastern Mediterranean. It has no concern about stability in the world, it actually considers stability against it's national interests. In fact, it's a poor country which wants to make money not by peaceful trading but by forced trading with dependent states under the coercive power of military force.
6
@John Locke
What happens when one flees from an aggressive dog? What happens when troops run from a foe in battle? The same thing, the dog or the enemy cannot help but pursue and try to attack, it's an instinctive response. Trump cut and ran, which precipitated a very dangerous result, besides leaving a friend to be murdered by another friend. Rationalizing Trump's behavior is just refusing to face facts. If he was determined to leave, he was obliged to make it an orderly retreat.
7
Way past time to stop the senseless occupation and military presence around the world. I could not support President Trump's decision more. I am growing tired of those whom have not served or have special interests tied to arms and armaments crying afoul.
3
He hasn’t pulled out our Troops from the Middle East, he simply shifted them to help protect Saudi Arabia’s oil fields! Leaving the Kurds who have been our allies and who do not have much land of their own to be slaughtered by Turkey!
I want the endless wars to end, but this is not how to do it!
4
@nature, so why did he send 3,000 troops to Saudi Arabia?
4
Islands of decency. While I don't support how the withdrawal was conducted, keeping troops there is no the answer unless were are wiling to use that force to rule the area. This has fallen out of favor many times over. Instead, we pretend we are helping local rulers maintain control. Corruption follows, the people are unhappy, we take casualtes, rinse, repeat. Yet, where was the island of decency when Obama had the opportunity for regime change in Syria? He chose to avoid decency and keep an autocrat in power to prevent sectarian conflict. He allowed the use of chemical weapons with no consequence. Yet, his foreign policy was considered sensible. I was in Iraq in 2010 when the last combat brigade left. We knew the Iraqi army was untrainable due sectarian and political appointees. We knew they would fail to defend the nation. Obama used a failed status of forces agreeement to withdrawal all troops. Yet, no island of decency there. What is Mr Friedman's plan? Pressure turkey, an ally, under threat of airstrikes not to invade? Send more troops as a buffer? What is the end state here? I keep hearing how we are leaving the Kurds, but I hear nothing about what is required to support them. I am personally tired of middle east wars and trying to referee these ancient conflicts. The Kurds are not "democratic" like our system, but more so than others in the region. Turkey is autocratic, but we seem to keep supporting them.
4
FYI: Trump didn’t withdraw Troops from the Middle East, he simply shifted them to Saudi Arabia “they pay cash” he said! And left our Kurdish allies to be slaughtered by Turkey! Giving Putin what he’s wanted, a foothold in the Middle East!
4
I am no fan of the Syrian Baath party or the al-Assad dynasty there, but your decision to label the government of Syria as the "Shiite-Alawite Bashar al-Assad" regime is, at very best, a grotesque equivalency between the religious identity of a foreign leader and his government. At worst, it's an example of the sort of vicious, racist, sectarian name-calling that dominates politics in the middle east (and I advisedly do not except Israel here). Yes, the Assads come from Syria's clannish and little-understood Alawite community and yes, so does much of the broader leadership of the country. But the Baath movement is a pan-Arab socialist movement that largely rejects the influence of sectarian communities in favor of an official policy of secularism. And considering the high stakes of middle east politics, is it any wonder that autocrats such as Assad, pere et fils, would fill the ranks of government with known quantities from their own communities? Calling the government of Syria the "Shiite-Alawite Assad regime" is a dog whistle easily recognized by players from the region. I would hope (assume?) your description here was mainly a vanity move designed to show off your very sophisticated understanding of this region, but I suspect you are indeed a bit too sophisticated for such an argument to hold water.
1
Trump Unmasked...the most profitable aspect of his career was helping Russian oligarchs and their cronies to launder money through NY real estate. Now it is payback time.
5
Putting Kurds on the same par as Germany or Japan in the scheme of alliances is disingenuous at best.
1
Has anyone noticed that since Trump has become president, Putin always wins.
9
Bible, Galatians 6:7: “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap.”
1
Pure Genius?
Evil Genius,
Degenerate Genius,
or
evil degenerate.
3
Friedman and his American Idealism as a pretext for waging war upon the Middle East is ridiculous. We are in the Middle East to shore up Israel. All the abstract virtues discussed in the media is bunk. I’ve read Friedman for many years and he is always wrong. Our foreign policy has made a wreck or the Middle East and displaced millions. All of this has been to establish military bases in the defense of Israel. How many children or grandchildren do the editors at the Times have fighting these endless wars.
6
Nope! We are in the Middle East to protect Big Oil! Trump took the Troops and simply shifted them to Saudi Arabia to protect their oil fields!
It’s about oil, always has been!
2
@thomas jordon " How many children or grandchildren do the editors at the Times have fighting these endless wars."
Actually several. While not actually fighting. Enlisted in the IDF.
Shame on Mr. Trump and hope for his eventual forgiveness from God after his actions have resulted in unneeded deaths and have upset a focused effort to keep ISIS under wraps by the Kurds. People have been killed as a direct effect of his ignorant phone call to Turkey's dictator, and it appears that he doesn't value human lives unless it is his own family. In future we will have a major obstacle to forming allies against what certainly will come again somewhere in the future. Trump's betrayal of our effective Kurdish alley is disgraceful and seems to have come as yet another evidence that ignorance and unthinking impulse is king in Trump's thought patterns.
2
Mr Friedman,
The USA has no "business" in the middle-east. it borders no country there and has nothing to do historically with any of the ethnic conflicts there. On the other hand the USA has business in the middle-east. It is called Oil. Unfortunately we will sell our mothers to keep it flowing as cheaply as possible. Even it means letting Saudi butchers (literally) a journalist like yourself (imagine) in broad daylight using meat cleavers and bone saws, to get away with it.
The Sykes-Picot-Sazanov accord ended all peace for good in the region. The brilliant book by David Fromkin is a must-read for anyone interested in the mess down there.
Trump is a fool and I hate his guts with passion. Still, getting out of Syria is a good thing. Getting out of Afghanistan is a good thing.
You are a hawk and were all in favor if the Iraqi wars. You thought the world was flat and it came biting you back with all its might: globalization is an utter fail. Read Professor Rodrik or Stiglitz. More informed and agile minds than yours,I would venture to say.
So, the title and subtitle of your article are totally flawed. Our allies today are our enemies tomorrow. Taliban was established, in so many words, by our guys to counter the Soviets in Afghanistan. Remember? Or maybe they were called something else then? Same with the Kurdish Peshmergas. Now they have a new acronym as a name. They are/were our friends. Soon they will be Putin and Bashar al-Assad's friends.
4
@Blunt
We tried isolationism, before. Then we found that other countries would not leave us alone because of our strategic significance in the world. So we made alliances and built up our military capabilities to make characters like Putin, Assad, and the other violent dictators unwilling to attack us or our friends, and it worked for half a century.
2
You broke the Middle East. You own it.
93
@Hamid Varzi
The US would love any excuse/reason to think it owns the Middle East.
Actually, the US owes Iraq, Libya and Syria reparations for damage done.
Has anyone noticed that Iraq, Libya and Syria were were Baathist countries?
Baathism is based on secular Arab nationalism, socialism, and is anti-imperialist... all ideas that the US would like to obliterate.
Any country choosing socialism as a governing philosophy is in danger of regime change by the US.
The US has never been concerned about democracy, it spreads capitalism at gunpoint with religious fervor.
Countries may need their own nuclear weapons to protect themselves from the US... or protection from Russia.
17
@Hamid Varzi
We haven't helped, but the Middle East has been broken since around the time the Ottoman Empire collapsed into decadence. I will suggest that the people who actually build their civilization are the ones who "own" it.
9
@Hamid Varzi -- Yes, poorly considered use of American power did break a lot of the Middle East.
America never owned it, and hasn't got the reach to hold what it had the club to smash.
It was far too much big stick, plus big talk, and far beyond any ability of America to benefit from swinging that stick.
Why was it done? Read Wolfowitz about assenbly of conflicting interests around a common policy.
Neocon interests, hawkish interests, oil interests, and more, all combined but none fully explain.
11
I am more concerned about climate change, health care, education, income inequality, and creating jobs in the age of automation than creating "islands of decency" in the Middle East. An island of decency for who? Special interests?
I do agree foreign policy requires forming diplomacy and allegiances. The United States is a NATO member, and did not respect the border security of Turkey, another NATO member. How can we claim to be decent if we do not respect the international agreements we are party to? Trying to manage a complicated region like the Middle East with 50 troops, drones and spies is not sustainable.
You are okay with the slaughter of Kurds? Turkey May be a NATO member but Erdogan is very cozy with Putin! Trump gave Putin what he’s always wanted a foothold in the Middle East! And have Erdogan the green light to slaughter Kurds and take the little land they had!
1
Apparently, Trump's historical role is to take the USA from being the World Power to being a regional power -- what it was prior to World War II.
Maybe this is what he meant by "Making America Great Again."
Perhaps he and his fans think it's "great" for America to not be the World Power.
5
@Alex Cody
The global system will not go away. So his efforts just let other countries decide what we may do.
1
We were foolish to invade and occupy Afghanistan and Iraq. We were foolish to send troops into Syria against the wishes of the Syrian government. We should not be fighting battles against countries which have not attacked us or our allies.
We gave assistance to the Kurds in their fight against ISIS because it was a common enemy. The Kurds did most of the work, but they did it for themselves, not for us. Going forward we have no obligation to them nor they to us.
Turkey has long fought against Kurd militants. This is nothing new. Turkey wants to stop Kurds from launching attacks from Syria into Turkey and then retreating back. Turkey wants to send millions of Syrian refugees back into this border area after it is demilitarized.
We are allies of Turkey, one of the founding members of NATO. While Turkey has taken an unfortunate authoritarian turn, allying with the Kurds against Turkey serves no good purpose. We are well out of Syria, and the sooner we get out of the region altogether, the better.
5
@John Smithson
We invaded Afghanistan because the Taliban refused to turn over Bin Laden.
We did not have good reason to invade Iraq, that was a dumb move.
Assad was committing genocide in Syria. He was attempting to suppress people not part of his tribe by destroying them like Hitler was doing in Eastern Europe. Allowing him a free hand promises generations of conflicts in the future.
Isis was a real immediate threat with it's control of a region as a state. It needed to be eliminated.
Trump is a fool. He thinks that political power is just fear, because he has no ability to collaborate with others nor to lead others in common interests. He sees paranoid and predatory humans in positions of leadership as the true elite of humanity. He's a chump. His foreign affairs understanding is nil, he will let other countries do as they wish in the stupid belief that they will have no effect upon him nor us.
3
I'm wondering what the Taiwanese are thinking now?
3
"I feel terrible for the Kurds, but at least America might get the last laugh on Putin."
OK, this is doubtful because (a) Russia, and the USSR before it, has a long history of propping up genocidal regimes. They are actually quite good at it. (b) Russia couldn't care less about managing Iran’s attempts to use Syria as a platform to attack Israel.
What Putin did win is that American influence in the Middle East has been reduced even further, our allies now know that they cannot trust us, and our enemies know that if they hang on long enough we'll get tired and go home.
Regardless of who the next president is, or the one after that, it's going to take a long time for the US to recover its standing in the world, if it ever can.
5
I am awash in all the qualifiers and interpretations; somewhere between the first and last paragraph he lost me. His position requires any reader to stand at point a, move to point b, thus to point c, etc.
I crawled out from under this load of reasoning and took shelter in the lawn I saved from being gullied away. No mean feat for a 72 year old Gramma. From this safe distance, I offer my own two cents worth: The US reliance on its reputation grown from the ruins of WWWII is now gone, and total phoniness supplants it. We were in IRAQ to control, the same as in Vietnam. We got rid of one group that was in power and didn't want us, and substituted one who went along, the tried and true way to a country's power. This meant we got the Autonomous Kurdistan oil while we shooed them off to war. Not too late to do the right thing, support independence for Autonomous Kurdistan in IRAQ. IF we are serious about helping the Kurds . what could be better than their own country they themselves have advocated for?
And before this stunning mess turns into Vietnam, we should stop sniper culling of anti-American protesters in Baghdad.
2
It’s not genius, it’s unmatched wisdom.
When Trump announced the sanctions, I was sure they would soon be rescinded. I wasn't wrong. This is all just for show. The Syria scenario has all been pre-planned with Putin & Erdogan. I think we can all recognize that Trump is the greatest ambassador the Russians have ever installed in Washington. The question is: when do we stop investigating impeachment and start to think about criminal charges. We know that Trump likes to make accusations that apply most obviously to himself. What is it he has accused Schiff of, "treason"?
5
&, of course, Trump will push through an increase in "defense" spending even though there are, supposedly, fewer troops to support.
5
Interesting that Friedman leaves the Sunni-Shiite religious war out of consideration. ISIS is an extremist Sunni movement descended from the Saudi Wahaabi version of Islam.so Iran is against it and supported the fight against it by Shiite Iraqis and Iraqi Kurds, also Shiite. Iran gets no credit but without the Sunni-Shiite component we would have had far fewer Iraqis on our side. The Sunni Shiite religious war also has a lot to do with the war crimes in Yemen.
Mr. Friedman,
In an otherwise good column, you fail to discuss the real issue that will now develop for Israel. Russia cares nothing about decency or democracy.
So when its partner in taking control of Syria, Iran, wants to use Syria as a place to launch attacks on Israel, it will not hold Iran back based on decency. That will be bad news for Israel. Very bad news.
Russia may hold back Iran if in return it is able to secure concessions from the US on other strategic priorities not involving Israel. That is bad for the US and slightly less bad for Israel. But even in that scenario, Israel will depend on the the whims and negotiations of a US administration, present and future, and Russia.
For instance, imagine Iran commencing an offensive to push Israel back from the West Bank. The US is far more inclined to support a two state solution, which involves wresting control of the West Bank occupied territories from Israel, than get engaged in a boots on the ground fight along side of Israel to maintain control of the West Bank. The reason Israel might face such a prospect is because Iran partnered with Russia and Trump handed Syria to Russia and thus in effect to Iran.
Many more scenarios can follow. But one thing is certain,: Russia will not act with decency regarding any scenarios with Israel.
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"Why me, and why us, and why America?’ And the only answer is, ‘Because destiny put you in this place in history, in this moment in time, and the task is yours to do.’”
Rubbish. RUBBISH! This only illustrates time and again the perennial and disturbing interest and wish of the liberals to wage the war and maintain the military presence in every single part of the world, bloodthirsty peacekeepers, which the said Blair is the most disgusting example of, and who will be hard to dethrone in all his filth.
And don't give me the Kurds every single day on every single occasion, NYT and its rubble-rousing 'opinion writers' only want to harm Trump, they do not care for the unfortunate Kurds an ounce in reality, but they do come in very handy in this case.
5
@ss
The only thing that harms Trump is the truth.
He has no moral compass and truth eludes him.
When confronted with the truth, he is shown to be the despicable person that he is.
1
The Kurds didn't lose that much, and they are almost rid of ISIS. They should use the time to shore up the territory they hold, they know not to trust Assad. Putin didn't win much more than the spotlight. His mercenaries are in a precarious position in an unstable region where his sponsors are running low on cash along with his loyalty. Vladimir was talking tourism and Rubles at the press release, maybe they will put in a water park with a wave pool!
1
He deserves a statue in Moscow Square. Trump.
3
Island of decency?
Human Rights Watch
Syria: Abuses in Kurdish-run Enclaves
Arbitrary Arrests, Unfair Trials; Use of Child Soldiers
https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/06/18/syria-abuses-kurdish-run-enclaves
1
i just wish you hadn't started with the doublespeaking Tony Blair, who made his fortune peddling a false Palestinian-Israeli peace and now seeks rehabilitation as a statesman.
2
@Ivehadit. Agreed. That Blair quote has not aged well. But maybe he can make friends with Ellen.
1
Pleas explain why democracy is good for the Middle East. I’m not convinced. Take Egypt for example. (Please, take Egypt!) There, democracy meant leaders appealing to the prejudices of the masses and the Muslim Brotherhood. Was that good for America? Ask the journalist Lara Spencer, who was raped by the democratic mob. No, democracy is Syria will lead to leaders who must use conflict and war with other nations in order to win elections. Those places are probably better off with dictators. Because better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know.
3
It's rare we had an ally as reliable and capable as the Kurds. Now ISIS and Al Queda can plan their next moves against us. Our troops are not coming home, they are going to Saudi Arabia to guard a dictator's throne. Is the Saudi king worth American lives?
4
"America does not have your back — unless you’ve paid cash in advance."
You mean: "unless there is a Trump Tower in your capitol."
4
All the facts tell us that Trump should not only be impeached but also held responsible for crimes against humanity.
3
Russia, Syria and Iran are welcome to take on radical Islam, barbarity and anarchy. (The next time we’re putting boots on the ground in the war zone of an undeclared war, call me when you’re driving your son or granddaughter to the enlistment office to join up.)
Yet we put ourselves in the position to be the craven betrayers of the Kurds. What a mess and certainly not one where it helps to have the worst president in modern history, perhaps ever, bumbling his way through it.
Maybe it is pure genius?
Imagine the following scenario: (1) Trump meets with Russian foreign officials in the White House in a closed door session (already happened). (2) Trump talks about his desire to build towers in Russia. (3) Russians talk about their desire to work with Trump during and after his presidency. (4) Russians outline their geopolitical plans.
Pure genius! No quid pro quo: after all (2) was just small talk. And Moscow may get a new tower in a couple of years...
1
America is not really better than the quagmire of the Middle East. In so many American communities ensnared in fundamentalism and violence, which are, unsurprisingly, led and represented by racist conmen like Trump and his ilk, oppressed women and minorities seek a better life. Friedman should get out more when he's in town.
1
Betraying the Kurds is as American as apple pie. Syrians like myself expected America to throw the Kurds under the bus under Obama, why? Because we remember what the CIA did to mobilize the Kurds on behalf of Iran against Saddam Hussein in the early 70s, and how the world turned their back on Kurds as they were slaughtered in 1974. Now America is assisting in the ethnic cleansing of Kurds (and Christians) from Northern Syria, a place they have lived for as long as anyone remembers. Rojava, the only place where a secular, democratic government emerged since the war on terror (sorry Tom, Iraq doesn't cut it!). So, please spare me, and other Syrians, your crocodile tears Mr. Friedman! The Kurds aren't crying because first, they aren't snowflakes, and second, they know they have always known they have "no friend but the mountains."
6
In addition to these comments, one might opine that freedom & democracy are fragile things that cannot be imposed on anyone. The point of a gun isn’t an effective tool to force revolution upon others. Revolution must come from within.
Knowingly or unknowingly Trump has become a Russian agent, the best coup of the Russians since WW2.
2
I strongly suggest it is deliberate...agreed on on Helinski
4
We should al be asking the "Why" questions, and then the "what" and "how". Why does donald trump hand vladmir putin wins around the world while America and democracy loses, every time. Syria, Ukraine, 2016 U.S. election, Turkey, trump believing Putin over 100% of our national security teams. This is more than extraordinary.
Tom Friedman - I think you are the right journalist to open the "box" on the "why" trump appears to be putin's lap dog; could this be treason? Could trump be a traitor to how own country? Could he be so immoral as to do anything for a money? Someone needs to follow this trail. There's lots of smoke. It's time that we show the courage and love of country to find the real truth about the putin-trump love affair. Putin is playing trump for the fool that trump obviously is. So is Erdogan, Kim, Xi, Saudis, Coban, and all other international thugs. We have a fool squatting in our White House and the world knows this. Why trump's base refuses to see the light of truth is stunning. Why Senate and House Repubs refuse to show any profile in courage is extraordinary.
2
Certainly we have had to many wars created by Presidents and politicians who never served and observed the destruction and death war creates. However, we cannot abandon the rest of the planet and leave the spoils to the likes of Russia, Iran, Syria, North Korea or other dictatorships. We were late to WW2 while watching Hitler and the Nazis march across Europe. That can never be allowed to happen again.
We must be vigilant in our desire not to allow any more nuclear weapons in a world which has too many currently. But we can do nothing alone. We must have allies across the world who hold the same tried and true values democracy brings with it. Sometimes it gets a bit messy, but the alternative is so much worse.
2
Assume aiding and abetting Putin was always the plan,
unless there is proof otherwise.
All evidence points that way, over and over again, from campaign rhetoric to secret--no transcript--meetings and, for that matter, why we have Trump in the first place.
2
Unmentioned in many NYT articles is their skillful use of accompanying photos of Trump where he either looks angry or confused or petulant or bored. The photo accompanying this article displays his uncertainty as he deals with world shaking events and is way out of his league.
1
“The United States was the closest ally of the Kurds over the past few years. But in the end, the U.S. abandoned the Kurds, actually betraying them,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, Tass reported.
I want to know what trump thinks of being called a betrayer by his own boss.
3
Trump does not care what happens to other people and he does not care about anything which he thinks his money and backers can resolve. He promised to withdrawn troops from the Middle East. His conversations with Putin, Erdogan, Orban, and his belief that withdrawing troops will help him win re-election all led him to act as he did.
Trump made no preparations to withdraw troops and it was effectively a cut and run affair. In history, these are like a rout, a disorderly flight where self defense is nearly impossible and during which most battlefield deaths occur. Trump created a potential for catastrophe from shear stupidity that reflects inane behavior.
The United States is still seen as powerful but adversaries see a boob in charge and allies see an unreliable self centered personality in charge.
3
Trump doesn't know the meaning of "allies." He only knows about making deals; you're either a winner or you're a loser, and everything is a zero sum game. So of course he understands and relates to countries like Russia and China, who "have only client states...and customers." He can't understand any person, or any country, doing something for a friend because it's the right thing to do. He thinks you do something only because you're paid for it. When he complains about our allies not paying their fair share, he is showing us all that he doesn't know what the word "ally" means.
3
I don't think Americans are weary of this role we've assumed but are frustrated by the intractability of the missions it involves. But we never seem to weary of--we just fight over--analagous domestic missions.
1
All throughout college in the late 1970's, my professors in European History, US History, and Political Science addressed application of the Truman Doctrine to contain the spread of communism into Europe. Ironically, the Truman Doctrine began largely to keep the Russian Bear's mitts off of Turkey and Greece.
The scholars at the Hoover Institution would often present lectures and seminars on why foreign policy must remain robust and aggressive with respect to the USSR.
The Point: Back then, the crazy far left radical was the one who embraced the Soviet Union and was weak in those relations.
The Irony: Trump calls those "lynching" him far left radicals.
Confusion: Mr. Trump, your caving to Putin makes you the far left radical from the 1970s.
Conclusion: Your name calling is a means to confuse the public and escape responsibility for your treacherous betrayal of US foreign policy that has consistently opposed the Russians for decades.
2
"...we have allies who share our interests and values..."
Sorry, gotcha. The Syrian Kurds you're celebrating were on the State Department's list of designated terrorist organizations for years before the US decided to partner with them to take on ISIS.
Turkey didn't like it and made it clear they didn't like it to their NATO ally, the USA.
So ISIS was defeated and the world reverted back to how it had always been.
And now Syria and what's left of ISIS are Russia's problem. What's not to like?!
3
@AACNY The Kurds routed ISIS.
Trump and his Party have shown nothing but contempt toward the global alliances and the liberal world order that America has worked so assiduously to build and maintain since the end of World War II. His surrender and abandonment of the Kurds in Syria is one of the more dramatic and disastrous examples, amplifying the resurgent power of Russia in the region and making way for a budding alliance between Russia and Turkey, heretofore America's NATO ally. Putin's Russia is the big winner, now firmly in control of the Middle East through its "client" states. American weakness is on full display as its withdrawing forces are pelted with potatoes and rotten vegetables and told by Russian and Iraqi ministers to get out town by sundown. Shameful.
1
Why should we care? The Islamic State will surely profit from the instability created by Trump's reckless decision, since Kurdish-led fighters no longer have the manpower to root out remaining militant cells or to guard roughly 11,000 captured ISIS fighters detained on Kurdish-held territory. The Kurds also operate more than a dozen camps for displaced families, in all holding tens of thousands of people, many of them the wives and children of Islamic State fighters. The distrust of America generated by this weak, easily-manipulated, and feckless American president is a huge score for Putin. And when the escaped ISIS terrorists attack us again, perhaps Russia will come to our aid... for a price. Florida, maybe?
1
Putin has managed to scare a series of US presidents including Obama and Trump. Russia is not so scary. It’s military is much smaller than ours and its economy is smaller than Italy’s. It’s time to stand up to Russia, if necessary, militarily. Ukraine should be made safe from Russia and,
we should force Russia to give Crimea back to Ukraine. Putin is one of those bullies who needs to have his bluff called. Bullies crumble when they are challenged.
Just in a day's work (literally) for our "stable genius". Who could expect anything less from such an esteemed leader. If only the rest of the world were as lucky as 'We the people, of The United States of America...".
2
Let's be real. Germany and Japan aren't getting nukes, but maybe they'd start ponying up more for their own defense, so while this was poorly managed, if our allies start thinking they need to be able to defend themselves that'd be very worthwhile.
A win for Putin? DEFINITELY. This is why Putin worked to put Trump in the White House
A loss for the Kurds? Definitely. They helped us (almost) defeat ISIS with a great loss of life only to be betrayed by Trump.
Uncertainty for Our Allies? NOT AT ALL. They already knew that Trump was Putin's puppet and could not be trusted.
1
It’s always been just about real estate, right?
Trump has made us more than the "ugly Americans" we once were - we have been promoted to "evil AND ugly Americans." Revenge? The past has shown us that - really - only those of us who work in tall buildings, who use our subways, who drive vehicles, who live in cities, who live near cities, who live in the country, who walk around in broad daylight, who walk around at night - will be targeted (thank you, NRA, for making it so easy for ANYONE to purchase an AK-47!). I wonder if Trump realizes how he has even put his own children and grandchildren at much greater risk of retaliation, let alone our children, our grandchildren.
2
When has the US ever “gotten it right” in the mid-east since WWII. And after 14 centuries of Muslim conflict both internally and with the West do we ever expect “peaceful times” in the mid-east. Or adoption of western democratic and cultural norms. So the President stumbled with the Kurds. But so did our previous Presidents - Obama, Bush I & II. And others before them. Maybe its our destiny to spend blood and treasure in the mid-east without much to show for our “devotion”. Someday maybe we’ll have a President and Congress committed to let the billion mid-east inhabitants work their own magic. But not with nuclear weapons.
Those of us who lived and worked in Las Vegas on Sept 11-2001 learned quickly that LV had been a target and those who committed the event had been in LV only months before. Within a short time we watched business come to a halt and friends laid off as other friends worked to help them out. The hospitality community worked on edge with two sets of eyes through at least Jan 1-2003 because the safety of guests is valued more than anything else. For Trump to turn American support from the Kurds who fought ISIS and enact policy which weakens US influence for good and good people and leadership in the region resulting in ISIS and ISIS sympathizers and family members to be freed from Kurdish detainment is appalling and totally unacceptable. Donald Trump is a COWARD, and if he is a traitor to our allies he is traitor to Americans. We will never forget.
1
Tony Blair's quote shows his silver tongue in the pursuit of evil. Blair and George W. Bush committed a holocaust and destroyed a country. Ignoring that Bush and Blair were rulers of mature democracies when they perpetrated their evil in the Middle East, Thomas L. Friedman talks about democracy as if it were something ethically acceptable, and attempts to "justify" their destruction of people by the supposed U.S. government policy of spreading democracy. (Other governments, including democracies, also helped with the destruction.)
Consider the dictatorship in Egypt which the U.S. Government has been funding for decades, giving it maybe $80 billion. While initially supporting the overthrow of Mubarak, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/us-officials-backed-rebels-planning-egyptian-uprising-in-2008-wikileaks/article564010/ the U.S. government eventually agreed with Gen. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi's coup d'etat against the democracy of Mohamed Morsi. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/27/sunday-review/obama-egypt-coup-trump.html
While trying to rationalize the U.S. government's foreign policies as promoting democracy doesn't quite fit the facts, it's ethically misguided. The ends do not justify the means. The fact that the current rulers in Washington, D.C., face a lot of bad choices and are choosing to do more evil, should clue us in to the fact that the government's ethics differ from those of most Americans.
2
Actually this is a win for Syrian refugees thus for Turkey and Europe, a win for Syria which will be at peace, a win for peace generically, and a win for the US people like myself who opposed the regime change war the US was trying to push vs Assad. (Not a win though for the Israeli/Saudi Neocon Neoliberal Axis of constant war.)
That the Russians and Turkey can enforce the peace here while we could not simply demonstrates we did not want to, we wanted Syria to bleed until Assad was somehow forced out. The Kurds in Syria are btw Syrian, just as the Irish or even Kurds in America are American. They can take off the uniforms & go back to being Syrian. It is no coincidence that the particular part of Syria that the US is disposed to allow the Kurds to keep is also the Syrian oil assets lands. Last thing the US wishes is for Assad to be able to pay to rebuild the land the US just caused to be destroyed.
I encourage the multi-millionaire Friedman and his Davos set Neoliberal buddies to invite 15 million Kurds to upstate NY, where they would in short order start a separatist insurrection for a homeland, then he could support the division of NY instead of Syria.
2
@CK -- Perhaps you missed the memo. " a win for Syria which will be at peace...." Nothing could be further from the truth. Russia will repair and control the oil field in N.E. Syria, not Syria.
Assad expects the Syrian army ti expel the Turks from Northern Syria. No love lost there.
A win for Iran also. I wonder what Trump and Pompeo will do now with regard to Iran and regime change there.
It never ceases to amaze me how Trump can con people so easily.
@cec - Perhaps you've not read one serious book on the geopolitics of the area? I have read many and my view of the region stands before and without this administration's work. For the record though, Obama blew up Syria, for various interests including the Saudis hate of Iran and Israel's general wish to dominate the region.
Russia is as close an ally to Syria as England is to the US, do you not know that? That is why Russian soldiers are there fighting/dying for Syria, while we are there trying to overthrow it and support the Kurds who are trying to steal a piece of that land. WE are trying to deny Syria it's oil, because WE know it will stabilize that nation if it can develop it's wealth for it's citizens.
For the record not that it should matter but you seem to need to know sides; I voted for Clinton with a clothespin on my nose and do not support Trump. I am now glad she lost. People who never read actual histories of the Mideast tend to think like you do, that we decide who we wish to have run the place. Not happening now and it's a great thing.
2
What I said is happening now. The Russians are in Syria because of the warm water ports. All of the rest is hokum.
Trump is fulfilling one of his campaign promises: Make Russia Great Again!
1
Putin/Russia Win, Win, Win:
The facts show that Giuliani, with the help of 2 indicted criminals and with trump’s blessing, orchestrated a smear campaign against Biden. Giuliani used previously disproven conspiracy theories to justify the smears. The plan was to extort Ukraine by threatening to hold the funds desperately needed to hold off Russia’s invasion.
The goal was to have Zelensky make FALSE statements, in front of the world, to smear Biden and to lay doubt to the Mueller Report relating to Russia’s interference into the 2016 election. Before Bill Taylor’s testimony all they needed was a true Quid Pro Quo to condemn trump, after the testimony, which exposed a clear Quid Pro Quo, the bar moved back to withholding the funds because of the corruption (disproven conspiracy theories).
Then, in a “Wag-the-Dog” moment, he pulls our troops out of Kurd controlled Syria.
Mission accomplished; Russia now controls this part Syria, Russia is now partnering with Turkey to expel the Kurd’s, relinquish any control the USA had the area including freeing ISIS prisoners, sowing doubt that Russia is our enemy so they can easily interfere in our 2020 election, aiding Putin’s end goal of destroying the NATO alliance.
“All Roads Lead To Putin”
1
So your solution is a permanent US peacekeeping presence between the Kurds and the Turks in northers Syria ?
OK.
Suit up.
Let me know how that goes.
1
Since when do leaders of a country have to act "decent" in international relations. You do good what is best for your country. In this case i agree with president Trump. Maybe he secretly read Machiavelli.
At this point in his presidency it seems painfully clear that one of Donald Trump’s goals is to throw a monkey wrench into the Western Alliance. The principal remaining question is whether his main agenda is to promote the interests of Putin and Russia, or whether everything redounding to Putin’s benefit has been naive and unintentional. At this point it is no longer clear which it is.
136
@Peter Thom And, it doesn't matter if naive or for Russia's interests, the result is the same.
18
@Peter Thom No disagree. It's not in question. ALL roads/paths from trump lead to Putin.
15
@Peter Thom
It will become clear once we see the tax returns and the info from Deutsche Bank.
18
I can't help think that Trump's decision -- and Lindsey Graham's flip-flop to now support Trump's decision -- has more to do with oil and oil fields in Syria than it does about anything else.
With Trump, it's ALWAYS about money and about his ego. He will sell anyone if it makes him or his friends money or it feeds his ego. In this case, I have so doubt that there are some rich winners related to Syria's oil fields.
Now, let's see how Russia responds to that, since Putin shares the same motivations that Trump does.
With one phone call with the Turkish leader Donald Trump has destroyed American credibility. A gut decision, from our self-proclaimed genius, that he is incredibly proud of. And America's enemies and adversaries are certainly proud of our self-proclaimed genius also, as they now realize how much easier their planning and actions will be due to this mindset of our Commander in Chief. I fear that it will not be too long before we see an attack against us from a group such as ISIS, an Iranian sponsored organization or even a group that North Korea supports. And then President Trump, the Republican Party leadership and their supporters will blame the attack on either President Obama , Nancy Pelosi or even Joe Biden. We have a clear and present danger occupying the Oval Office that the Republican Party leadership will not confront. We will unfortunately have to wait until Election Day 2020 to restore sanity and order to the Oval Office.
2
Mr Friedman: More than a trifecta. We are BOMBING our own bases as we retreat. This ensures we probably won't be back in any strength if needed. How happy must ISIL be is icing on their cake. So MILLIONS in taxpayer funded equipment was destroyed. This will make the arms manufacturers jollier as well.
1
@Happy Republican. You do realize that trump essentially released ISIS from confinement? And that they are now free, and newly re-incentivized, to create mayhem around the world, including in the USA? The Kurds were doing the fighting for us; we were merely providing support.
2
In 2017 we had some comfort that Mattis , McMasters and Kelly we’re there for the sake of sanity. Now Trump policy is based on his gut and Fox News. The handling of the pullout is a warning. If we keep him there for 4 more years his gut is likely to stumble into a major war with no one to restrain him. God help us out of that
2
Tom, I remember a commentary you wrote around the time President Obama debated what America's response should be to Assad's dropping barrel bombs on his own people. You pointed out all the Ethnic peoples in Syria and their mutual mistrust with one another and all the outside nations and their interests. In addition, the USA and Syria had no treaty relationships. Syria being a powder keg, our entry would likely create an explosion greater than imagined. Must we accept a foreign policy set by a capricious cowardly and indecent man-child ignorant about history and unable to make fine distinctions, angers allies and falls in love with tyrants, and has no appreciation for islands or nations of decency? If not our President, then who, which Americans will amplify islands of decency, Congress? Foreign Aid programs that confront corruption 45 requests only 1/10th what Congress budgets. Is this all there is?
1
It does not appear that Mr. Friedman is in any position to criticize President Trump, as Friednman's worldview is just another form of the unethical Pax Americana that holds that U.S military swagger can be used aggressively to be deployed whereever we want.
Some Ethics 101: The Syrian government/military has not attacked us nor threatened us. Therefore we have no business sending forces to enter Syria without that government's permission.
While terrorism could be a plausible legitimate basis for intervention, the Syrian government and its allies are fundamentally opposed to ISIS/Al Qaeda as we are. The U.S. could be working with Syria to deal with that extreme Salafist terrorist threat - were we not busy trying to exploit the situation to undermine the Syrian government. We don't unilaterally intervene in places like France because they have an ISIS problem.
The Syrian government, as awful as its conduct some times is, does not deserve ISIS any more than the Iraqi government does - an appalling, immoral statement from Friedman, maybe one of the worst he has ever made. The Syrian government doesn't have to stand by as a gaggle of rebels, terrorists, and Kurdish nationalists seek to shred the country.
Russia, Iran, Hezbollah: they are in Syria at the Assad government's invitation, more than can be said for the U.S.
Enough already with this American imperialist arrogance. We seem to have learned nothing from Iraq.
2
Mr. Friedman makes many valid points here relating to America's current feckless leader who has dishonored our nation in his betrayal of our Kurdish allies. But let's also acknowledge that the ISIS invasion of Syria was enabled by Pres. Obama's fatal decision to neglect the Sunni Arab majority that rose up against Bashar the Butcher with nonviolent protests during the so-called Arab Spring. When their unelected ruler sent his troops out to massacre the protestors the U.S. did nothing (not even establish a no-fly zone of the type we had implemented against Saddam Hussein following the First Gulf War). It was only a matter of time before ISIS responded to the void we had left in Syria and marched in with their army of jihadists (ostensibly to protect their fellow Sunnis). The rest is misery.
In the meantime, we should have been advocating all along for an independent state in contiguous Kurdish-dominated areas in Iraq and Syria- and taking on Turkey's paranoid leader if he had continued to object, despite the fact that no Turkish territory would be surrendered in the bargain. If anything, that idea has acquired even greater currency at this juncture. If Palestinian Arabs deserve their own state (and they do) why not the Kurds who greatly outnumber them and whose loyalty to our own nation has never been questioned?
2
Yes.
It may be that we shouldn’t have done anything in Syria, or at any rate should have done much less, as Mr Friedman argues.
What we certainly shouldn’t have done (while delivering Putin a win that Russia has sought for decades: a client-state port on the Mediterranean) is to so cruelly and capriciously abandon our allies, the Syrian Kurds, that all the rest of our allies are shocked. And they are shocked.
Though it seems like an entirely different and vanished world now, once upon a time, the American word meant something.
1
If Tom Friedman is correct about the Putin and the trifecta effect, then can he please explain why Ronald Lauder, President of the WJC is supporting Trump’s re-election? Is Lauder redefining morality? Or, is he saying that his organization’s morality supersedes all other forms of morality?
Military involvement in the Middle East has been a disaster for the U.S. What makes anyone think the Russians will fare any better? They didn't do so well in Afghanistan. How is our leaving a 'gift' to them? They are welcome to it. If they succeed, they deserve our thanks.
2
Tom Friedman’s column used an interesting phrase to support “islands of decency”. While he was referring to the Kurds in Iraq and Syria, I believe this term would be good to apply to Palestinians, international organizations, and Arab societies in their relationships with Israel.
Islands of decency are the employment sites for 200,000 West Bank Palestinians who are working with Israelis in Israeli companies. Islands of decency are the Israeli universities where Israeli Arabs constitute 20% of the student body and sit alongside Israeli Jews. Islands of decency are the recent decision by the World Judo Federation to permanently bar Iran from competition over their refusal to allow their contestants to compete with Israelis…this shows courage, decency, and correctly puts the onus on Iran for anti-Israel behavior in an international forum.
Israelis can also point to many other islands of decency, including efforts to support Arabs who have been victims of Israeli Jewish price tags and their aid to thousands of Syrian refugees who have received medical care. We can support these islands of decency to encourage more.
2
Partnering with Syria was inevitable for the Kurds and sooner is better than later. Naturally they would have preferred a super power offering free defense for many years but the US would have came to the revelation soon it doesn't make sense to be in Syria.
I wholeheartedly accept Tom Friedman's argument, but I also hear the frustrations of those who express their approval of getting out of Middle East conflicts. The problem is really HOW we got out. Trump's persistent problems are his willful lack of judgement, ignorance of history, and mistrust of expert opinions, among other things. Even if one embraces the idea that he might be correct about getting out, he did it in a monumentally poor manner. Even if one agrees with his basic positions, his Presidency has been been repeatedly marked by delivering those in a deeply flawed way and without thinking things through, and with the end result being problematic.
1
Mr/Ms Editor,
I just sent a well-though, civil and intelligent response to Mr Friedman's piece. I am hoping you will print it in a timely fashion. It disagrees with his assessments in broad terms and puts it in context of his past prognosis and positions. They happen to be not popular these days, at least not as popular. Globalization (The Earth is Flat), Support for our wars in Iraq are the cases in point. It is important to bring those up to let readers know that he is not the guru he projects himself to be.
Thanks you.
3
"and amplify our power at a low cost to us ". No really. the mighty US Military is the background cost.
1
Your predictions regarding Putin’s future problems managing affairs in the Middle East is, I believe, inaccurate. He has proven to be masterful at leveraging his limited resources, and ruthless in achieving his goals.
What is predictable is the loss of America’s future credibility and reliability in bilateral international relationships both existing and hoped for in the future. Perhaps worse is the abandonment of U.S. ideological and moral support for democracy and human rights.
3
Putin has always felt underestimated on the world stage, well he no longer feels underestimated thanks to Donald Trump’s incompetence.
1
Trump’s most recent statement, "We've secured the oil and, therefore, a small number of US Troops will remain in the area. Where they have the oil. And we're going to be protecting it, and we'll be deciding what we're going to do with it in the future" says it all. Everything is monetized, human lives do not count.
5
Where Mr. Friedman now calls "islands of decency", just a few years ago he used to call "countries with respectable human rights records". But since he can no longer discuss human rights in the same sentence with some of Mr. Trump's and his own favorite places, such as Saudi Arabia and U.A.E., creating a replacement for "Human Rights" has become necessary.
Predictably, when it comes to defining his islands of decency, Mr. Friedman does not shy away from what is in his heart; that is, to him an island of decency is now:
".... where women tend to be more (sic!) empowered, Islam is practiced in more moderate forms and Western liberal education is promoted in American-style universities."
With a few superficial "reforms", any Middle East country can claim to satisfy the first two criteria. But to set up an American-style university, access to American text books and American teachers are essential. If the State Department does not list your country as pro-American, then getting either - in particular American teachers - becomes a tall order.
Since only pro-American countries can have American-style universities, for a country to be an island of decency, it must be pro-American. Since Saudi Arabia and UAE have American-style universities, under Mr. Friedman's new definition, we should forget about all human rights violations in Saudi Arabia and the savage murder of Jamal Khashoggi by murderous thugs of MBS and proudly declare Saudi Arabia an "Island of Decency."
1
Well, Turkey's Erdogan has declared that he considers going nuclear a good idea. When Erdogan meets Trump in the near future he will be speaking to someone who is happy to sell Erdogan the technology and means-for cash. And this doesn't take into account the 50 some U.S. nuclear weapons in Turkey that could become a little problematic, if not up for sale.
6
Thank you, Thomas. We can rely on your clear vision. Our notions of nation building are paternalistic and anachronistic. But to "amplify decency" projects our values and trusts emerging democracies to follow their own stars, with American backing.
2
At this time Trump has made his address about his Syria debacle in which he states "We are willing to talk about our mistakes as well as our successes." But just when will he finally reflect openly about his failures? When will he acknowledge the mountain of mistakes that are heaped in the wagon he pulls behind him?
3
@Bunbury
"We are willing to talk Obama's mistakes (even if they weren't his or they weren't mistakes") and Trump's successes (even if they were really failures)."
4
@Bunbury
Let's be clear about one thing: Trump has never made a mistake in his entire life and he will not start making one now.
2
There is a lot of revisionist history in this piece, even in discussing the recent past.
Saddam was a brutal dictator, but he didn't have weapons of mass destruction. Iran and Iraq were mortal enemies who fought a long and bloody war. Now Iraq is in ruins with countless dead and the Shiite majority in Iraq is aligned with Iran.
The war in Iraq was a terrible mistake. Americans would be more supportive of our role as the world's police if it was not just a pretext for imperialist motives like controlling oil wealth [Cheney/Halliburton...]. For example, our actions in Bosnia were late, but they were the right thing to do.
While everyone is eager to praise "the greatest generation" who helped defeat the fascists in WWII, most forget how conflicted the US was about joining the war.
Going to war should never be any easy choice, but with our current commander in chief, disaster looms.
4
I find it amusing ( not) that the words of an erstwhile leader of Britain about DESTINY have been used as a preface to this piece by the all-knowing, always-right Mr. Freidman. People all over the world shall always remember how England used that word DESTINY to systematically impoverish socially, culturally, and economically a large swath of Mother Earth.
The rest of the piece is of consonant quality with the preface.
2
I have two questions:
1. How do these Americans square their "we're out, you are own own world" view with their self-proclaimed Christian values of doing the right thing and help others and protecting the innocent and defenseless? Maybe they are no longer on the side of right, but now its just might?
2. What did Trump get out of the Syrian deal (presumably from Erdoğan and/or Putin) since even his supporters will tell you that everything he does is transactional and there was no given to the US for its abandoning the Kurds? If he didn't get anything than why not since Turkey and Russia benefited a lot from it?
1
The difference between Trump's betrayal of the Kurds and Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler in 1938 is that the Czechs that Chamberlain betrayed when he allowed Hitler to occupy some of Czechoslovakia, had never fought along-side British forces.
Trump famously said "I could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose any votes". That has now been replaced by "Trump could be caught handing America’s top military secrets to Russia and still not have any Republican votes for impeachment".
Whatever evidence and proof of criminal acts that Mueller could have come up with, it is certain that such evidence and proof could not be as powerful an indication of wrongdoing as the evidence in the public record that Bret Kavanaugh was lying in the senate hearings relating to his confirmation as a Supreme Court Justice.
Once Ford’s account included three people she said were there AND his calendar had them all at Tim Gaudette’s house on July 1, 1982, AND Ford’s description of the interior of Gaudette’s house in Rockville, MD exactly matches that of the actual house, which still exists: the only way that Kavanaugh was not lying is either: Ford somehow obtained access to his 1982 diary/calendar, or Ford has a time machine or Ford stalked Kavanaugh in 1982 and planned for this if he was nominated to the Supreme Court..."
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4216597
"We were reflexive...and not reflective."Ah, the Bush legacy lives on.
1
The Middle East is what it is and probably always will be. It is presumptive of America to try to impose its form of government on other nations. Still, in all, it a gross betrayal to abandon the Kurds. Like the Marines, you don't leave your comrades alone on the battlefield. Trump has left a huge vacuum in Syria that the Russians are rushing to fill. Trump, through his stupidity, will leave us a much weakened and less secure nation. The situation is too complex to be left to Trump's lame brain.
2
Come on TLF, you had the making of a decent article here but you predictably blew it by weaving in too much partisanship. (Really, moderation is an asset.) This isn't romper room, it's geopolitics and while it doesn't compute with the frantic twitterati, a hard choice was made and we're gonna have to let history be the judge. The Kurds have no homeland and it is not our mission to indefinitely park military forces in zone to create a de facto Kurdistan, or to conquer Syria: leaving is the sensible choice and were it Obama, I doubt anyone at NYT would be so critical. The heartstring tugging on behalf of the "Kurds left in the lurch" is a weak tactic. Even from the armchair, you're capable of better analysis.
7
Isn't it highly possible that we are experiencing Trump's version of realpolitik? Polls are showing his chances of being reelected in 2020 are not great.
If the only thing really important to Trump is that he get reelected in 2020, and Russia could help him out with election meddling, and Russia wants to increase its footprint in Turkey and Syria---then the practical thing to do is to help Putin increase Russian influence in Syria and Turkey, in return for Putin's help with Trump's reelection effort.
Sure seems like another quid pro quo to me.
The theme of this article should have been: "Letting Trump be Trump has disastrous consequences. Wake up Republicans!"
There are henchmen around Trump enabling his insanity and it is way past time to shine a relentless journalistic light on this fact.
Trump is a master catalyst of chaos and mayhem if not contained by thosearound him.
The lamp of sanity has gone out in most all of this administration. There should be journalistic condemnation of those who allow a madman to be a madman.
Instead of condemning the madman, journalists such as Friedman should be castigating the enablers of the madman.
The only one who looks good in this monstrous mess & who was a mainstay in the Trump administration is John Bolton. Isn't the irony of that worth contrasting to the servile actions of Pence in "securing peace with honor" thanks to the "brilliant leadership of Donald Trump"?
Go after the "syncopathic" enablers of Trump. Label Trump as a traitorous moron and move on to the real culprits in this worse betrayal of foreign allies ever.
1
Trump is the proverbial bull in a china shop. Nearly everything he touches he breaks. What he misses are only those pieces he hasn’t yet touched.
1
Oh come on...isn't it obvious by now that the WH is an arm of Russian foreign policy. Pls let's stop pretending this is some kind of grand Trumpian strategy...
2
The US emerged from WWII as the world's leading military and economic power. Since that time, US hegemony has relied on: 1) unrivaled military power, 2) control of world's energy reserves, and 3) maintaining the dollar as the world's reserve currency. All of the pillars supporting US power are now threatened by decades of neo-liberal economic policies and spending large sums of money on the Pentagon and war. Since the 911 attacks on the WTC, US taxpayers have spent $ trillions supporting the Pentagon, maintaining circa 800 foreign bases and subsidizing endless wars in Afghanistan (longest running war in US history; heroin production has increased 50-fold), Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen. Trump’s decision to remove US troops from Northern Syria is an admission that US foreign policy over the last 2 decades has been an astronomically expensive strategic debacle, which has irreversibly harmed US strategic interests and global prestige. No amount of jingoistic rhetoric from politicians or TV commenters displaying ‘old glory’ on their lapels changes this reality.
See- What’s really going on in Syria? Link: twitter.com/RaniaKhalek/status/1184516917098373122
1
Yup.
Trump blew it. You can’t make international power decisions like you’re simply stiffing the sheet-rock guy. America amplifying and letting Russia own the Syrian quagmire are concepts and levers beyond this Pres’s scope.
2
This article is insufferably pedantic, everywhere and nowhere, worthy of a graduate seminar on what-ifs. I'd rather like Thomas Friedman to stretch his analysis and address the following debate point:
Kurdistan will be the spark for the next world war.
3
Fear not Thomas. The New York Times believes that someone they vetted and deemed honorable, currently fights the good fight from within the inner sanctum of Trump’s dark inner sanctum. So they say, but the rest of us can detect no visible evidence that there is anything honorable or remotely enlightened emanating from that unholy place. Perhaps we should solicit input on how well Anonymous succeeds from the ghosts of ten thousand dead Kurds, hundreds of caged children on our southern border, America’s traditional allies, Ukrainians on the brink of losing their country to a Trump cuddled, marauding thug, or American citizens who were beaten outside the gates of the White House by Erdogan’s traveling coterie of goons.
I'm willing to bet my house that trump doesn't know the difference between a Shiite and a Sunni.
3
Sorry, Americans want a break? No, they do not think in those terms. But what Americans want a break from? Stupid wars, stupid engagements, and stupid foreign policy that serves to enrich the 1 percent.
Evidence? DJT’s inane statement “We’ve secured the oil in Syria” or sending even more troops to Saudi Arabia.
2
Amplify?
Thomas, the reference to Tony Blair's statement justifying going to war with Iraq was an unfortunate choice, particularly for you. At the time you were cheer leading a charge into war, predicting a marvelous transformation to democracy for the Arab mid-east. It was clear at the time that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction, and Bush was marching to a foolish war of choice. Hundreds of thousands of people were demonstrating to avoid that war, to no avail.
Trump is an idiot, and abandoning the Kurds is disgraceful, but calling up the proud words of Tony Blair inciting us to war, along with you and many others, is most unfortunate.
2
There are many, many dark stains on American foreign policy conduct since 1775. Trump’s self absorbed and cruel actions towards the Kurdish people in Syria at least offer the transparency of deadly policy by Tweet. Consider the millions killed and hurt in America’s decades long war in Southeast Asia, or other millions killed or displaced by the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. Consider the Americans killed and wounded in those unnecessary, stupid wars. America as a shining beacon in the world?
1
I keep emphasizing the fact that Erdogan is no saint and is as wicked as Bashar Assad, when it comes to minorities among the Turks, in this case the Kurds. He will not stop on anything but the final extermination of all Kurds, in Turkey and near its boarders...Word is now getting out that the Turkish army is using chemical weapons against the civilian population in Ras el Ain...
2
Trump has blood on his little hands over this.
The place now to start an "island of decency" is the White House.
"I feel terrible for the Kurds, but at least America might get the last laugh on Putin. Trump let Putin win Syria — and the indefinite task of propping up al-Assad’s genocidal regime and managing Iran’s attempts to use Syria as a platform to attack Israel."That says it all. So the method was brutal. But the world’s not fair to anyone including the U.S.
Why on earth would Putin and Russia care what Iran does to Israel? They do not.
Do you think Russia will now assume a a US-like roll as a peace keeping force? What a miss, Tom!
1
Putin won the trifecta; we get borscht.
1
I has to stop after the first paragraph. To reference the Iraq War - of all things! - to make an argument about American involvement in the Middle East is insane.
It’s also a reminder of how embarrassingly, utterly wrong Friedman was about that conflict. Reader, beware.
4
America was the worst hegemon, except for all the others.
"Make fine distinctions." Yes. Peace-at-any-cost isolationism is not anti-war. It is 1930s style America-first, which will make war, ethnic cleansing, even genocide more likely rather than less likely. Our soldiers aren't even coming home. That is, surprise of surprises, an untruth. Trump just sent 3,000 additional soldiers to Saudi Arabia. Abandoning a loyal ally to ethnic cleansing or genocide is inhumanly brutal. How is it different than turning away a ship full of Jewish refugees? All roads lead to Putin or cold hard cash in the Trump family pockets from the likes of the dismemberment prince.
A week and a half post phone call and Friedman is already assigning the costs mostly to the Middle East. Look up from that map, sir. The world is round and anything that happens anywhere in it affects us directly. Trump is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocents Kurds, he is responsible for unleashing the three despots to dominate that area now with no American power to push back. Think those thousands of released ISIS prisoners are planning to just go home to the farm? Think again. They will soon be back to their old destructive, disruptive bombings and killings and intimidation all in the name of Allah.
Trump is responsible for setting back the American efforts of decades to support and expand democracy not only in the ME but everywhere in the world: no one trusts us now and no one should. The bulwark in the ME is now Israel and they are in disarray for their own reasons. Republican philosophy centered as it is on weaponized capitalism makes more enemies than widgets. That call will come back to bite us and people in our own cities will die because of it.
If we are lucky Senate Republicans will find their patriotism and their courage and throw out this destructive narcissistic emotional void who tries to pass as human. If they don’t fear this person with the nuclear codes they are beyond redemption and we may be as well.
1
We either lead, follow, or get out of the way. trump is not a leader, hates to follow, so he has chosen to get out of the way. In world diplomacy and relations between nations, we collectively face threats from many angles: threats to our freedoms, democracy, institutions, borders, businesses, safety and well being. As a nation, America eventually responds to these threats and often times this means an armed, military response to keep the gains we’ve made or keep the peace we have earned. The situation in Syria/Turkey was one of those instances where we needed to keep the peace and the gains we made; much like the troops we keep in Europe, South Korea, Japan and elsewhere, we will always maintain a troop presence to keep what we have gained and maintain peace. Every generation pays the price of freedom and we are no different. Unfortunately though, we have a transactional President with a limited strategic view of the world and only seems interested in self-preservation rather than adopting a strategic view of the world.
1
America is better than that, even if our current president is not.
No so sure, America elected our current president, and a vast swath of America shares his views.
I would disagree, Mr. Friedman. I believe Turkey is now an ally of Putin - and not a "client state" - and that they very much share the same "interests and values". Ditto with Iran. And what American "value" did we show our allies by stabbing the Kurds in the back?
We have a president who acts almost entirely on impulse. He does not consult those who are better informed and he is too incurious to do the research. Those in congress who should be advising and teaching this man who has never held public office and who may very possibly be mentally-challenged are not performing their job as checks and balances. The president is emboldened every time his enablers choose to look the other way. And only when he does something so egregious as he has done to our Kurdish allies, do his enablers finally find their outrage. The blame has to lies squarely on the shoulders of those who have failed to provide direction to this feckless president.
Prediction: Pompeo and Nikki Haley WILL be the GOP nominees for 2020. Trump will finally make a big, beautiful deal, and resign, to spend more time with his loot. Pence will grovel back to Indiana, and become a televangelist.
Bet on it.
1
Bottom line is that even when Trump manages to do something right ( a broken clock is right twice a day), he still manages to mess it up because he only believes in himself. From the glimmer of light in the darkness angle, our allies must notice that Trump is being impeached, so realize that a sizable chunk of US citizenry, the majority actually, want Trump and his disregard and disrespect for allies banished along with his corruption.
Tom Friedman inadvertently makes a great case for Trump's actions to withdraw American troops from Syria.
The Iraq War as an example of our destiny? Some people just never learn. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were killed. Their country is still in turmoil. Democracy? Iraq is now riven by sectarian Shia-Sunni tensions worse than ever, and the "government" there is a corrupt kleptocracy. Trillions of dollars spent by America. The birth of ISIS. And our allies? All except Tony Blair (W Bush's lap dog) was the only one who supported that misguided invasion sold to us with lies, all the others refused to engage in our stupidity. Remember how our legislators were so incensed with France they renamed "French fries" as "freedom fries" in the Congressional cafeteria? Remember that Barack Obama got a Nobel Peace Prize, essentially for not supporting the Iraq War?
The American public does not share Friedman's enthusiasm for overseas engagements. Perhaps the American public is right.
3
@Unconventional Liberal So what does the Trump do about Iran as they team up with Turkey and Russia? Nothing I guess since Trump wants to bring the Troops back home. Hmm , I wonder if that includes the carrier group that he sent to patrol the Persian Gulf. BTW-- what will Trump do to protect the Saudi oil field if they are attacked, especially if some of the 2000 American troops guarding the oil are killed. Nothing , I guess -- right.
Trump made it clear during the primaries of his affinity with Putin. His Helsinki performance was unforgivable. He had to be aware Putin and Erdogan carved up Syria with the possibility of Kurdish genocide. He almost achieved an additional gift to Putin and himself by using extortion with the Ukraine. He is personally corrupt and has ferreted out like minded individuals who are drunk on power and short on morals. Whether or not we agree on America's endless wars created by Bush and company Trump's actions in Syria and the Ukraine will be a stain on this country historically and for good reason. Trump, Barr, Pence and Pompeo have no credibility. Mitch McConnell failed to bring election security to vote, confidence has evaporated in that Democratic right. They need to be removed before more diabolical damage to this country unfolds.
Such misreading of ISIS by such premier expert is mind boggling.
And takes a real art to write about todays Turkish invasion & genocide of Kurds, and leave out any mention of Erdogan or Turks!
At its root, ISIS is all things Sunni Islam. ISIS Iraq was created to destroy of Shia power structure in Iraq. It was defeated by brutal application of Shia power in Iraq, with USA help.
ISIS Syria was a natural progression of Arab Spring, which was itself a force for Islamism in garb of revolution. ISIS was the most sectarian of all, Iraq, Syria then (Ref. Yezdi of Iraq), and Afghanistan today.
This fundamental misreading (by Mr.Friedman and by Team Obama), and their natural affinity for Erdogan/Turkey, led them to argue for a free rein to ISIS in Syria, to the extent leaflets (not bombs) were dropped on tankers smuggling oil, (revenue from which financed the ISIS). Later Russia would bomb those tankers, choke off ISIS.
One reason Turkey or Erdogan does not get a mention today is because we never discuss Turkey/Erdogan role support of ISIS back then. We looked the other way because in a way we were partners in a horrendous event; We are now being blackmailed for that past.
2
Doing the easy thing is rarely the smart thing. This will come back to bite us.
Here’s a list of peoples and countries that are probably paying very close attention to Trump and his “foreign policy” - Ukraine, the Baltic states, Afghans opposes to the Taliban, Israel, South Korea, Japan. They have all been reliant on U.S. money and power over the years. Now that we’re a “transactional” friend under Trump, who’s next to go on the trading block like the Kurds.
Here’s the thing: The Kurds were never going to build Trump luxury properties on their territory. Nor were the Kurds ever going to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in Trump luxury properties. Hence, the Kurds were completely expendable, useless human beings to one Donald J. Trump.
Trump will not read Friedman’s analysis and he does not care a whit about it.
1
Here is the problem. We have stood down from Russian and Turkey. Russia will probably over-extend itself the way they did in Afghanistan which led to their dissolution as the USSR.
THere will come a time soon, probably in our defense of the oil fields when Trump will actually order our troops to stand down in the face of Russia's attempt to attain them. They made one attempt already which required our air and ground troops to resist them . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Khasham
That will not happen again with Trump in charge.
Mr. Friedman, do you realize that our President - if he had only reasonable reading comprehension skills - could not understand a single thing you said? That's where we are in my opinion.
1
Mr. Friedman. As always, thank you.
By throwing the Kurds, an US ally, under the bus, is a warning to all of our allies. There is no guarantee that we can stand by them, in case of need, or in times of crisis. Because, our beliefs and consequently, our policies are changing.
World War 11, gave us the value of Allies. Both our allies and the US, developed and built the modern world. Both the US and the traditional Allies were benefited immensely. With their help and understanding, many democratic institutions were established. We are now ignoring them and on a path to just forget them, and to think of them as just a thing of the past, and no longer has value.
It is easy to note that during the last three years, we have seen very little of our traditional allies - Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Australie, Israel to name a few. Instead, there are the autocrat regimes - Russia, China, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Hungary in focus.
Our treatment of the Kurds, a steadfast ally, can be the beginning, of more changes to be seen.
So what quid pro quo did George H W have that enabled this house of horrors for the rest of the world. I believe he left the Kurds also along with Saddam. Republicans, their generals, their analysis why were and are they still making mistakes. From Nicaragua in the 70’s through George HW leaving military equipment behind to George W run away military costs to Trumps impulses. Is this all just the end of the game to get countries into buying are military arms. All the lives that have been lost
3
Erdogan wanted the refugees from the Syrian civil war out of Turkey. He has nowhere to deport them other than the Kurdish part of Syria. If the rebellion against Assad ends, the factions may be able to resume a tense state of peace. On the other hand if Assad wants to punish the rebels, the bloodletting will destabilize the entire region. ISIS will then return to Caliphate.
1
How about this scenario -- Iran, Russia, Syria, and Turkey form an alliance. Turkey withdraws from NATO and boots the US out of the Incirlik AFB. Past differences will be replaced with animosity towards the US.
Perhaps China and N. Korea become even closer and form a partnership with Iran, Russia, Turkey, and Syria based on the same idea, that US leadership is weak, incompetent leadership can't be trusted, and they understand that Trump is full of bluster.
Perhaps there are other countries ( Philippines ?) who would like to come along for the ride.
Just a hypothetical, since that's what we are dealing with here.
Remember the TPP? Looking better everyday.
I think that Thomas Friedman forgets what Make America Great Again Means. What Friedman sees as decency is what Trump, his enablers and supporters want to reverse.
I wonder what is going through the minds of the Afghan troops who fight for us, and the minds of all the other people there who work with us. If I were them, I would consider joining the Taliban while there is still time.
2
Breaking News!
The Kurds were not “slaughtered”. There has been no ethnic cleansing. Turkey, in fact, has barely made any inroads into Syrian territory.
The Syrian Kurds received protection from Assad and less so, Russia. They are now safe.
Turkey and Russia have now agreed to patrol a safe zone in Syria that is actually much smaller than originally envisioned by Turkey.
Some Kurds are being forced to leave this safe zone. That’s it. It’s not great, but it’s not a disaster either.
The Kurds have been forced to give their dream of a fully autonomous/independent Rojava state within Syria. This is unfortunate in a way. But the Kurds themselves chose to accept Syrian authority when they accepted Syrian protection. That’s their decision and they can live with the consequences.
Let’s just be honest.
Nobody really cared about the Kurds in the first place. They only cared about expanding U.S. influence into a traditional Russian sphere. That wasn’t necessarily a bad idea in 2011, but by 2015 we should have understood that it would likely not happen.
4
I have always thought that Bush, the Younger's Iraq war on false pretenses was America's worst foreign policy decision since Vietnam, but the abandonment of the Kurds makes the Iraq war look reasonable.
Trump demands loyalty, but rewards it with treachery. Every American ally from Japan to Israel now has good reason to doubt American promises. How will we ever recover from that?
7
As I recall Mr. Friedman was one of the biggest cheerleaders for the second Iraq War, arguing that it would bring democracy to Iraq and create a stable, US friendly government in Baghdad. Glad to see he has come around on that nonsense. Unfortunately, it took thousands of dead and injured, trillions of dollars, utter chaos, the rise of ISIS in Iraq, and more blood, treasure, and chaos to convince him of the error of his ways. As for his current take he seems now to have a better and more realistic handle on the significant limits of American power.
7
Politics and America’s military role in Syria are beside the point. The point is a complete abandonment of an ally, and a moral failure. Not just in letting Russia, Assad, and Turkey take over, but in enabling genocide. Not a forced error; a sin.
5
I think we should be clear that we entered these wars without any understanding of what we were doing and the only goal I could ever see was to make the armament manufacturers richer. We should be clear that we are no shining light driven by god and human altruism; if we were, we would use our wealth to make the United States the best place to live and work in the world, and influence the world through example,
not by force.
2
To be sure, the U.S. probably doesn't have many allies left since this president has done his best to alienate them all with his nationalist and isolationist policies.
But if there are any left, they certainly have every reason to be unsure not si much of this nation, but of the person who is supposed to be leading it.
To say his impulsive decision to pull American troops out of Syria was a bad idea is just part of it.
It was catastrophic, at best.
And we haven't even begun to feel the repercussions of it.
But the fact that Turkey wasted no time in running over the border and now Recep Tayip Erdogan is saying he wants the Bomb, is just a fair indication of the direction this escalating conflict seems to be going in.
No doubt this is a "win" for Bashar al-Assad, Vladimir Putin and for everyone else in that region except the United States, but no doubt we'll be paying the biggest price.
We've lost the trust of our allies.
2
The Times is reporting today that Turkey and Russia have made a deal. The Kurds are leaving the buffer zone and the Turks won’t proceed any further into their territory.
So the real trifecta is that barely two weeks into this supposed catastrophe the conflict is over, our troops are out of it, and even Friedman admits that Putin has won himself a host of new problems.
2
@Max So you don't care about the Kurds who were killed or the large number of displaced people. You don't care that we are still protecting the oil fields and care more about that than people. You don't care that we've sent a clear message to the world that we can't be trusted. You don't care that we've empowered Iran (I bet Israel does).
Putin has his own reasons for being there and he controls trump.
Those displaced people will eventually come to bite us. trump has made us thoroughly hated throughout the region. Even Erdogan who manipulated trump deals more with Russia. trump has made us irrelevant.
1
@Bill
I can care about the Kurds and still understand that Syria has been a chaotic hell of fighting, death, and displacement for years and there are no clean solutions, other than the US playing referee forever. The rest of it - power shifting, credibility, relevance, etc, are all just opinions and predictions.
Putin's success in gaining Turkish alliances in the region seems to have been garnered with Trump's removal of our forces. Kurds and others have shown their dismay at this action. The alliance between Trump and Putin continues at a cost that is too large to ignore. Whether the island of decency Friedman refers to has been permanently weakened will be seen soon enough. We as a nation must redefine our role in these matters and at home. Our system of checks and balances must work to avoid these catastrophes there, here, everywhere.
1
Good insights, but my gut tells me you are missing something. While not surprising in light of Trump's butterfly personality, this decision could not have been about 1,000 American troops. For some reason, Trump suddenly decided to allow the evil villains, Erdogan and Putin, to crush the Kurds and take over large portions of Syria. Sure, Turkey wants an ethnic annihilation of the Kurds. But why would Trump authorize the invasion now? What changed overnight? This couldn't have been about 1,000 soldiers. And even if that was the case, America could have provided other military aid, air support and continued to let Turkey and Russian to keep their hands off of Syria. Perhaps, it was simple stupidity, but Trump must seek advice from someone before such a massive policy blunder. Something else lurks in the background.
9
Letting ISIS thrive in Syria sounds like a bad idea. They didn't seem to be putting much pressure on Assad, and they certainly were acting like genocidal fanatics to the Yazidi and presumably anyone else swallowed up by their caliphate. If 11,000 Kurds were willing to die to defeat them, I don't see how we could in good conscience NOT assist them. With Iran and Russia propping him up, Assad wasn't going anywhere, and without Western support, Idlib never had a chance...the abandonment of the Syrian Kurds is the single most humiliating thing Americans have had to witness in my lifetime, which includes Vietnam...
3
Americans may be tired of our schizophrenic foreign policy mostly because the republicans have been the macho bunglers of American foreign policy. The Republican track record from Eisenhower bungling the Suez Canal incident in which Nasser played him off against the British to Nixon,s treasonous intervention into Vietnamese politics during the johnson administration. Have we forgotten the Iran-contra arms sales for Reagan. The Iraq invasion by junior Bush now the trump card! Stabbing a potential ally and one of our few friends in the back. The Kurds.
All done by republicans at the helm. Yes Thomas we are tired of it.
2
Suddenly Thomas Friedman is concerned about America's incursions? He expressly advocated for the invasion of Iraq, and was part of the machine that tricked a frightened country into a wrongful war waged by neocons and oilmen. That terrible decision destabilized the entire Middle East and set in motion one of tha worst humanitarian crises in history. After creating this horrible mess, we have decided to pull out and leave the Kurds to be slaughtered by Russians and n Syrians. I can't even imagine the terror they must be feeling right now as we sit here reading the paper.
4
If America is better than being Trumpian, this is the time to prove it. As much as we felt our transactional interest lay in the free flow of oil, and deserving of protection, military included, so do our Allies in the region that made it possible, now betrayed by a cruel and vulgar home-made bully. If we were really strategic from the 'get go', we would have pushed for Kurds to be given a sovereign piece of land they could call their own. But for that, we were not smart nor thankful enough. To everybody's loss. And to our shame. Incidentally, Trump's blunders are only possible while he counts with a pliable cadre of sycophants, 'yes- men' doing his bidding unmercifully.
3
Undoing Trump's calamitous Middle East follies will take years. Already he's caused homelessness and misery for hundreds of thousands of refugees and very possibly has endangered American lives both at home and abroad. There are seasoned and 'informed' Republican players in the House and Senate who acknowledge the negative potential of his poor decision making - which leaves me wondering how they can sit back and do nothing to slow if not stop Trump's lazy and lumbering defense of America's vital (critical) interests abroad.
You'd be forgiven for thinking that Trump's foreign policy is being directed by Vladimir Putin.
2
The American public is ADHD when it comes to foreign policy or for that matter most problems. We want issues solved in a few episodes, as if problems are a 5 part Netflix series. After seeing or hearing about any issue for a couple of news cycles, we want to move on. “Isn’t impeachment done already”, “haven’t they put that fire out yet”, “are our troops still over there” are just a few of issues Americans just want to be gone. Trump sees policy this way; don’t work on a bill, sign an executive order, don’t work with allies, dump them, don’t negotiate, threaten. Trump and many Americans don’t want to be involved rather entertained with a new, easily solved story. Trump’s ridiculous comments of Kurds not fighting for us at Omaha Beach resonates well in a selfish America First world.
2
But even if you argue that walking away from the Kurds in Syria was the right coldblooded, strategic thing to do, how a president does things matters. By just pulling out of Syria without advance planning or coordination with our allies — and dumping the Syrian Kurds after they sacrificed 11,000 men and women in the fight against ISIS — we sent a message to every U.S. ally: “You’d better start making plans to take care of yourselves, because if Russia, China or Iran decides to come after you or bully you, America does not have your back — unless you’ve paid cash in advance.”
That's how this president does things. You can argue it will work for now and the next president and congress will take care of the future. No accident that the U.S. motto is "In God We Trust."
1
Thomas, you seem to be pinning for a lost era. It’s over, finito, like gone with the wind. America no longer leads. And like nature, world power plays abhor a vacuum, and it is usually the most ruthless that will have brute force to fill it.
1
Your article illustrates the incredibly complex world of issues in Syria, Iraq, Iran. That complexity requires coordinated analysis by teams of experts, real ambassadors that know the region and the players, and leadership that understands how cause and effect works.
Unfortunately, we have Trump and his band of greedy merry men, including Guiliani, Sondland, etc, pursuing far-right conspiracy theories and looking for money under the couch cushions.
Trump's actions against our Kurdish allies was a childish tantrum. Not sure what Edrogan promised him, more far-right Biden stories?
The damage done by these incompetents may never be undone. We've cut loose the good guys and let the bad guys roll over them. Unconscionable.
Trump is mentally unbalanced and for some reason, all the sycophants he's put in place have no moral compasses, and no idea of how insane and illegal Trump's directions were.
Impeach. And the Senate had better start finding it's soul and help get this mess fixed.
2
Before President Trump announced his betrayal of the Kurds and the American Special Forces fighting beside them and before Trump expressed and demonstrated his ignorance stating that ISIS was 7000 miles away, someone in his cabinet of Brain Surgeons should have pointed out to him that many of his Trump Hotels and OC Russian buds are alot closer to those ISIS fighters than 7000 miles. Doubly, Did our self serving Prez think about how those betrayed Kurds and the PKK feel about his personal business interests? Based on Kurdish history, character and warrior's ethos, they don't forget. Remember, they are Christian. An Eye for an Eye. We already know what ISIS does to Western hotels and the people in them.
2
Indeed, America is better than that and that is why the GOP has to do more to stop Trump. The GOP AND Dem members of the House are trying to sanction Turkey but sanctions generally do not make extreme countries change course. It is a policy tool that only works on regimes that actually care about the suffering of their citizens.
As for the issue of leaving Syria, the US definitely needed to get out, but I agree, not like this. It had to be a coordinated and slow effort. The quick withdrawal left US forces no time for real break down of bases and left it with few options. It also allowed for Turkish forces to make immediate and surprise attacks. The US has become the little brother of Russia and Turkey. It is simply embarrassing. I do not believe in US exceptionalism but I believe in making plans and properly executing them.
Finally, why does the US care so much about the finances of foreign involvement? It is worse than worrying about the US debt level. Who cares if other nations pay or if the Saudis buy jets. The US is the best investment in the world. It can always come up with the money. It just wasted millions of dollars destroying its own ammunition in Syria for a quick withdrawal. Trump's idea that US help is based on payment is idiotic even for him.
1
Friedman is giving the war monger neo con thesis. The insanity of the argument is that its basic premise is that Assad and even worse Putin is being given a gift by Trump. The reality is that Syria must reestablish its borders to end the cruel proxy war in which the US has contributed greatly. The USs strategy was to allow vicious sectarian jihadists to overthrow Assad. Then leave the country a smoking heap of rubble. Yea USA. The US has killed 1000s in their efforts to defeat ISIS and have done nothing in the way of helping in reconstruction. Mosul and Raqqa were destroyed by US attacks to defeat an enemy that was inflicted on Syria by the US and its allies. If the US wanted to do good in Syria they should focus on humanitarian and diplomatic efforts.
— Americans want a break. President Trump is not wrong about that.
What? When did America become so stinking lazy and apathetic? Trump's decision is a reflection of Trump's thought process and lifestyle. Any endeavor that requires thinking, sacrifice of time proves too much for Trump. If Trump were a cartoon his head would be smoking because thinking requires too much energy. Guess what? Life is hard when you're not born into millions, live in gilded towers ,and have money to pay others to satisfy your even whim. It's also hard when you're the leader of the greatest experiment ever conceived. Spreading that ideal around the world takes time, sacrifice, and hard work. Get over it!
1
Drawing down US troops and other military presence around the world is supported by most Americans. We are sick of war. Sick of killing. Sick of our tax dollars being used for killing. And sick of the military industrial complex and the bipartisan “war party”. https://link.medium.com/HAj4XW4TZ0
Could Trump have been smoother about this particular withdrawal? Absolutely. He's hardly known for his finesse. But arguing that we should be there to protect the Kurds is obvious mission creep and could be used to keep US troops there permanently, like has happened in Afghanistan.
No to the War Party.
No to permanent war.
1
@Tam Hunt Are you aware that trump actually increased our footprint in the Middle East? We are now protecting Saudi Arabia but all trumpettes approve of that.
Tom, The International Tribunal at The Hague still has Bush, Blair and Cheney on the docket. Interpol red notices still restrict their travel. Quad up Trump to the list?
It's estimated that there are approximately 2 million Kurds living in Syria, 2 million in Iraq and 8 million in Turkey. If it is Turkeys intent to commit genocide why aren't they stating with the Kurds that live in Turkey proper?
This armchair strategist says getting out of the Middle East is
a smart move. Leave the region to the Russians. One politically
backward culture deserves to get mired in the other.
@Charles Packer We increased our footprint in the Mid East. Now we are protecting Saudi Arabia but I'm sure you approve of that.
Most of us by now understand that Pres. Trump has little or no empathy. He is an egomaniac with an inferiority complex. Most of his businesses are hemorrhaging money very much like his credibility. If you look at Trump's face now he, looks confused and scared. You can see by his tweets that he's up late trying to lash out using words like conspiracy/lynching. It really is too bad that the politicians in our Capital have to deal with this political crime that he has committed. Oh to be able to fix our roads, bridges and to build a secure electrical grid. And let us not forget our climate disaster. Make America safe again.
1
What Friedman is trying to say in his article by illustrating the complexities of ISIS, Turkish Kurds, Syrian Kurds, Syrian and Iraq armies, and all the countries involved is that Americlan troops need to exit the Middle East as fast as they can because everything we do in the name of "democracy" will result in the U.S. remaining there for another forty years. Every positive action by the U.S. results in an opposite and negative reaction by the various factions fighting against us, themselves, as well as the countries they are in. It is stupid to think the U.S. can bring peace in the Middle East, just alone due to the fact we have been trying to do that for forty years, with no success. You call American invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan successful. Pitiful. You think it is wrong for Trump to say it is time for us to leave the U.S. Now there is someone who is telling the truth for the first time in his life.
The tactics of desertion of the Syrian Kurds is bizarre, cruel, and inexplicable.
Trump was on the phone with Erdogan one day, and within a day and a half American troops were moving and Turkish troops were moving in and killing Kurds.
There was no consultation with Administration aides or Congressional leaders, Kurdish allies, or European allies.
Trump hated the fact that his personal whim had been stifled by Gen. Mattis when he tried this before and he wasn't about to let his genius (buried in his gut) be negated again. So with his belligerent, in your face, temper he pulled the troops out just to prove that he could regardless of what anyone else thinks!
Mr. Friedman, with his open criticism was too kind. Trump "just walked away" all right like a bully stomping away across the playground after beating the lives out of people who thought he was their ally only a day before.
This man has the fundamental skills of a middle school bully and half of America sees him as a great leader. Remember that as an adolescent Trump was a bully and his parents sent him to a military school to suppress those inclinations. They weren't successful.
1
Tony Blair is a discredited and corrupt individual who behaved as a lackey to the Bush Regime in USA and has profited greatly for ignoring the democratic wishes of the British People.
Tony Blair is an example of the type of Western Politician who has brought widespread distrust of the bought and paid for Politicians who inhabit so called Western Democracies.
Tony Blair is one of the reasons for the growth of populism [Politicians who listen to the voice of the People] throughout Europe and the so called Western Democracies.
We can do without the italicised ‘in a sustainable way’. Laissez Faire Capitalism has no connection whatsoever with sustainability; it should not appear in the same column with Tony Blair.
1
Trump has made America an entire continent of indecency.
1
Are there any historians here who can comment on what was the Middle East reaction when do US pulled out of Lebanon back in 1983? Is this similar or dissimilar?
1
At the end of WWII, the Russians, who lost 20,000,000 to the Nazis got as their peace dividend a communist dictatorship and a perpetual and suffocating police state. The British, who had withstood the destruction of the Battle of Britain, got universal healthcare. We got the G.I. Bill, Medicare, and a renewed appreciation of our freedom, but universal healthcare was put off. At the end of the Cold War, the Clintons ran on universal healthcare, but failed miserably, and for most people we still have a high cost, low coverage system with many going without, and this by choice as one political party continually attacks the poor. But basically no peace dividend after the Cold War, and our MIC in collaboration with our oil companies have kept defense spending high.
What has this got to do with Mr. Friedman's column? Decency begins at home. Just as Vietnam was national treasure lost, so was the Bush/Cheney War. At home it was used as cover for continued attacks on the poor in incarceration and limited government services. This continues under McConnell and the Republicans.
The kidnapping of children and locking them up in cages is a major human rights violation. While the double crossing, doing Russia's bidding, and subversion of elections is impeach-ably bad, there should also have been some reckoning for Trump and his henchmen including Pence at the International Court of Justice at the Hague for the human rights violations. After Trump, we shouldn't get a free pass.
The one thing Mr. Friedman did not include in his comprehensive column, that should be considered, is perhaps an issue that neither he, nor I, knows anything about.
During Trump’s presidential campaign, he was being conspicuously influenced by Steve Bannon, who, at that time I likened to Rasputin. The Rasputin who brought about the end of the the Tsaritsyn government in pre-Soviet Russia.
My hypothesis: Steve Bannon, is still Trump’s Rasputin, and it’s he, who’s calling the shots in the Middle East.
No other explanation makes any sense.
Please, Mr. Friedman, address the question: “is Bannon still Trump’s Rasputin?
1
After WW II, America was the strongest, richest, most powerful nation in the world. After, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, although we are still rich and powerful, we are not the dominant power we had been. What Trump did in Syria is really despicable. Yet, the fact that our allies in NATO and the Middle East did little or nothing to help America in this fight is shameful. The fact that our MSM continues to berate our government , whether it be a Democratic or Republican administration in power, is suspect. Where is the MSM in berating our "allies"? Or does the MSM not hold them accountable?
Just who are the "real" Russian trolls? The MSM???
The concept is right, but the war that effectively destroyed Iraq was, in addition to a budget buster, the force that created ISIL (why we keep using the name of an Egyptian goddess for the organization - an insult to many yet-non-radical Muslims is beyond me).
And calling Iraq’s current government a democracy is accurate only when you define democracy: ‘to a starving man, a full rice bowl’.
Iraq is a ruined nation, destroyed by the misguided George W. Bush who wanted to show daddy he was tougher, smarter than Jeb and knew how to run a war.
1
Nicely reasoned, but Trump is incapable of understanding any of this. If George W. Bush famously said he didn't do nuance, Trump is too ignorant to even understand the concept.
Erdogan rolled him like a Bowery wino. Trump yanked a small trip wire force out northern Syria in exchange for exactly nothing. The Art of the Deal as tragicomedy.
Now, as we approach one year out from the election, what is Putin thinking? Is he imagining now is the time to roll into Ukraine or the Baltics with brute force because he understands Trump will do nothing about it? I think Trump's moronic move in Syria has dangerous implications beyond the Middle East.
2
The world according to Trump...just follow his global business interests and there's your foreign policy.
3
We lose sight of everything important to the idea of America, if we try to isolate the pro-Russian abandonment of Ukraine for the personal gain of President Trump from the pro-Russian abandonment of the Kurds in Syria at the behest of dictators in Turkey and Saudi Arabia for the personal gain of Mr. Trump.
No matter what sophisticated reasoning one uses to adorn the Trump actions or inactions in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Israel and Afghanistan, the dismantling of the ISIS caliphate was important and allowing a resurgence was stupid. The abandonment of the Iran nuclear deal was stupid. The abandonment of a chance for an Israeli peace with the Palestinians was stupid.
Regardless of what professorial jargon and posturing is offered, President Trump’s pro-Russian abandonment of our traditional allies in Europe at the urging of Viktor Orban was stupid.
And, so on and so forth.
1
Speaker Pelosi was right again, "all roads lead to Russia"
1
“What makes America unique as a global power...”
... is that we have a Constitution that grants only Congress the power to declare war.
“What makes America unique as a global power...”
... is that we are $22 trillion in debt, owing primarily to spending on wars of choice and aggression.
“What makes America unique as a global power...”
... is that, according to former President and Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, we “go not abroad in search of monsters to destroy.” And that according to Thomas Jefferson, we should seek “honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.”
1
What is the status of the "50 tactical nukes" on the US air base? are they under Turkish control now?
1
The Trump Administration is nothing more than a pit of vipers.
It has been clear from the beginning that they had no interest in serving the country.
1
Was this decision decided by Team Trump or just lunatic Trump individually?
As a matter of fact, do we still have a Team Trump at the White House?
1
“the understandable desire of Americans to no longer bear every burden and oppose any foe to ensure the survival of freedom“.
It’s quaint that Friedman still thinks that American foreign policy is about ensuring “the survival of freedom”. Tell that to the starving Yemenis whose suffering is a consequence of ensuring the survival of a corrupt and murderous monarchy. Or to the Bahraini pro-democracy movement, crushed under the watchful eyes of the Fifth Fleet. Or to the victims of Egyptian dictators upon whom we lavish billions in aid.
“we will only reduce the pressure on Assad, Iran, Russia and Hezbollah and enable them to devote all their resources to crushing the last moderate rebels in Idlib, not sharing power with them.”
It’s quant that Friedman still thinks there is such a thing as “moderate rebels”. The vast majority of those people in Idlib are the dregs of the al-Qaeda/al-Nusra terrorists which the US and allies tried to use for regime change. The idea that the goal of such people is to promote democracy is ludicrous.
“propping up al-Assad’s genocidal regime and managing Iran’s attempts to use Syria as a platform to attack Israel”.
Assad = bad, okay, but genocidal? Really? And Iran wants to use Syria to attack Israel? Rather, Israel has wanted to use the chaos in Syria and the economic sanctions on Iran to provoke a war on Iran, with US help. As stability gradually returns to Syria, one hopes Israeli war fantasies will continue to be disappointed.
One horrendous too clever by half, vacous piece of screeding!
"I feel terrible for the Kurds, but at least America might get the last laugh on Putin."
Really?
What is called for, Mr. Friedman, is a pirmeval outcry of horror and shame over our betrayal of the Kurds -- NOT a cool one-two step analysis of some imaginary chess board that plays in your head.
We are living, right now, a moral catastrophe, and not a strategic blunder or a tactical misstep.
Perhaps we have indeed been exposed for far too long to far too much immorality.
Quite honestly,Trump has brought Dishonor to our troops on the battlefield. And dishonor to our national aspirations.
I believe many folks who declare death before dishonor are hanging their heads in shame. Rightfully so.
Some dealmaker. Trump totally caved to Erdogan, and who knows what conversations Trump had with Putin? Until that is revealed, we can only assume that Trump is doing someone's bidding or else he is just so ignorant and impulsive that this is all of his own making. Either explanation is plausible.
The question that Americans must ask themselves at the ballot box in 2020 is whether or not Trump makes us a greater nation and a respected and trustworthy Ally ? I suspect that those constituents that measure their lives by how much they earn, how little they pay in taxes, and whether they are the 1% that have benefitted financially, it will be business as usual. It's not just the economy stupid! Not only has Trump divided the Republic and alienated our most trusted allies with his lack of diplomacy, strategic thinking (?) and leadership, he has attempted to rape the Constitution while verbally assaulting anyone that doesn't agree with him, because he is the Oracle. I do agree with him about one thing, if Congress doesn't lynch him the Kurds should come over and give him a dose of his medicine.
It's bad enough that Trump is using the presidency as a cash cow. The Trump Hotel in Washington, DC is just one example which clearly violates the Emoluments Clause of the US Constitution. He is also in clear violation of his lease with the federal government (which owns the hotel building). His lease requires him to give up the property if he is elected to office. But Trump has refused to do so. And we've all heard a dozen other examples of his profiteering on the presidency.
But much worse is that Trump is allowing a genocide of the Kurds for personal and family profit.
Besides the Trump Twin Towers in Istanbul, he has investments in 219 Turkish businesses. Trump earns $ Millions for the use of his name on the towers. Erdogan already threatened Trump once before with taking away those $ millions and Trump backed down immediately!
Would Trump refuse to give Erdogan permission to slaughter the Kurds if it meant losing $ Millions a year? Based on Trump's values ($$$$ for moi) he wouldn't, and he didn't. Trump sold out the Kurds. This is genocide for profits.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdNbM91zKZg
1
"We are better than that."
Really?
El Salvador
Chile
Vietnam
Laos
...
1
The sociopathic Trump revels in ruthlessly pouring salt on wounds. Not only does he hand over the Kurds to the Turks to be slaughtered, in doing so he ridiculously denigrates them for not helping us at Normandy and then preposterously claims his decision made them very happy. The day he struck that deal with Erdogan will go down as another day of infamy in our country's history.
"...what we can do and should do is amplify decency wherever we see it...'
Make America Decent Again.
Please. Vote.
For Anyone But Trump.
1
This article is like a table spread with hundreds of scrambled puzzle pieces. What's the point?
"The job of the president, though, is to balance the understandable desire of Americans to no longer bear every burden and oppose any foe..."
Nice JFK reference.
Henry Kissinger's realpolitik. I don't think America is doing good all over the world. When you dig down into it you see it. It is cynical self interest served well with powerful moralistic messages. If China Russia Iran etc do the same thing as the US the US propaganda makes them look really evil.
48
@PK Jharkhand
Since 9/11, when the US took revenge against nineteen, mostly Saudis, armed with box cutters, who were angry that US troops were based on the holy land of Saudi Arabia, the US has been responsible for the deaths of millions directly or indirectly, millions maimed, unimagineable misery, wrecked Iraq, Libya, and Syria, turning cities into rubble, creating millions of refugees, many of whom flooded into Europe, destabilizing Europe and probably the tipping point for Brexit.
Tom Friedman and most NYT commenters are deluded if they think the US is a force for good in the world.
"interests and values still require us to remain engaged around the world in a sustainable way."
I wonder what Friedman means about sustainable way...
The carbon footprint of US actions required by US values and interests are making the world's future more uncertain.
But then the hate, the metastisizing of terrorist all over the globe, the misery and destruction created by US looking after its values and interests, may destroy the world's future, anyway.
And to think that the Establishment and its media thrive in criticizing Russia and China...
6
@PK Jharkhand
Yes. When any country hears that the U.S. is concerned about their wellbeing and is going to bring “democracy “ to them, they need to run because a whole lot of bombs, and killing are coming their way. Of course they probably have abundant natural resources like oil. I don’t mean to sound cynical but when the shoe fits.
5
@FXQ
The not so invisible hand of
corporate power at work.
3
Friedman, like most pundits, accepts Trump's assertion that he and his administration worked out a deal with Erdogan. I believe Erdogan told Trump what he was going to do, after Erdogan had worked out a deal with Putin. The speed at which the region was carved up with troops and personnel is my evidence. Trump knew the deal had gone down and that he had no choice but to accept it. He was forced into acceptance because of whatever hold the Russians have on him (Debt to powerful people most likely).
Israel is at greater risk than ever because Donald Trump is president. Iran and KSA are already talking to each other, maybe working out their own deal for post-America in the ME
"In Syria, ISIS was the enemy of multisectarian democracy, and so were Russia, Shiite Iran, Shiite Hezbollah and the Shiite-Alawite Bashar al-Assad regime. And they and ISIS all deserved one another."
Yet Assad offers safe haven for many Kurds while Erdogan shoots them in the back - despite the Kurds having cleaned up ISIS for Erdogan.
Furthermore, in retrospect, had Assad (the war criminal) fallen, many of the ethnics groups under his control - e.g. Yazadi's and Christians, would likely have been subjected to war crimes by ISIS.
On last thing - by declaring that Assad must be overthrown (without a realistic plan for orderly change) - the US limits it's ability to broker peace later, when Assad is still there.
I am perplexed. Many commenters are suggesting that we are obligated to defend a NATO ally who is fearful of "terrorists", and that defense comes in the form of allowing them to invade another country and kill those supposed terrorists. Is that what the NATO charter says?
And, not so long ago, and still I believe, our NATO Ally, Turkey ,was arming itself with Russian weapons, to such an extent we were threatening to withhold our supply of weapons to them fearing they would sell our secrets to our adversaries (yes, the Russians).
Erdogan has suggested that he might not be interested in NATO protection, and indeed he and Russia just shook hands on a deal to divide up Syria.
If this is an Ally whom we should trust and placate, show me an enemy.
I'm happy to agree that Trump's ill considered withdrawal from Syria was cruel to Kurds and damaged our credibility but I'm old enough to remember how the "neo-cons" including Friedman encouraged the insane war in Iraq so I tend not to take Mr. Friedman's views on foreign policy too seriously.
For once I find myself agreeing with Tom Friedman--Americans are exhausted from the outdated Cold War role they've been playing for over half a century as the world's policeman. I know this sounds heartless but not too many people in Trump's America know anything about the Kurds. Why is it our job to referee the current train wreck between the Kurds, Syrians and Turks. These three groups have been at war for centuries. Every time America interferes with keeping the warring sides apart we only succeed in making a bad situation worse. Enough already.
Want to hear something even more amazing?. A New York Times columnist finally admitted that Trump is right about something.
Is betrayal of an ally an impeachable offence? I think that it fits the definition of a high crime. It must be added to the list of impeachable offenses that Congress is drafting.
Can we parse “betrayal” and use Trump in lieu of American? It’s an unfortunate byproduct of this Presidents decisions. A student of history, he is not. Better yet, Trump and Pompeo’s betrayal as he knows better.
Would Trump’s betrayal of a two state solution or Palestinian right to self determination be in the same league?
Those under the American security umbrella best get out their own rain gear. It’s a pay to stay protection racket now and shakedowns part and parcel of the plan.
I wish things were as simple as you described them here.
Good article, but it misses a larger point.
Appeasement by any other name is an invitation to a direct attack on the United States. Since the Vietnam war, terrorism has become known as the best way to take down a large military. Add nuclear capability to that equation, and 9/11 will look like a minor bruise.
Layering complex details over a fundamental security issue helps keep the American people ignorant about their own best interest. It reinforces the most dangerous isolationist tendencies.
This “endless war” trope must stop. Large-scale invasions in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq were huge mistakes, but that does not mean that the U.S. can ignore organized terrorism.
Just as we must strengthen pockets of decency, we must attack pockets of threat.
1
I guess ignorance is bliss to our president.
The United States is now part of putin’s sphere of influence.
Nobody will believe or trust the United States on a wide range of foreign policy issues and our role in the world has been abdicated.
At some point, those who can will emigrate to countries more favorable or suitable for work or wealth or whatever, and the shell that is left will evolve into the almost dystopian place written about in too many novels.
😭
1
So much for the brilliant strategic thinking of the reality show president who thinks he knows more than his diplomats and generals. Yet again his foreign policy blunders have given a win to Putin, Erdogan, Assad, the Ayatollah Khamenei and the terrorists of ISIS. Even MBS, the murderous crown prince of Saudi Arabia, regards Trump with contempt and secretly negotiates with Iran while getting the "stable genius" with "great and unmatched wisdom" to send more American troops to protect the Saudi dynasty.
1
What's left out of this is Trump never does anything without personally getting a cut in the deal. He will allow people to get killed . People who sacrificed for us. And he cares not for them. If our troops have been there too long, will he also pull out of South Korea, Germany, and other places? And do so without any input by those countries? Oh we will eventually discover what he gets out of this, but , unlike with the G7 Doral decision and reversal, it will be too late to undo his decision by the time we figure out the details of what he is up to.
Regarding the present situation re Kurds, Assad, Putin, Mr. Friedman's essay makes sense.
Missing, however, are two issues:
1. Erdogan and Turkey: While the western world sees the Kurds today, and I stress today, in one manner, Turkey and Mr. Erdogan have a different view of the Kurds and their history. Mr. Friedman ignores the Turkish perception and how the US should react in his view. Not a long time ago Turkey and Russia were almost fighting one another. Now they were great buddies. What do you suggest Mr. Friedman, apart from laying blame.
2. There is nothing more certain in Middle Eastern History than the US (and the West) betraying the Kurds. Mr. Friedman takes a few short years of history and reaches conclusions. The US has long been betraying the Kurds. Nothing new here. Jon Schwarz counts 8 times:
https://theintercept.com/2019/10/07/kurds-syria-turkey-trump-betrayal/
"America is better than that, even if our current president is not."
Apparently not and many presidents not.
1
Youre analysis is right on.
But it would be great if you could devote your next editorial finally giving the Kurds a homeland of their own. Thirty million Kurds live as minorities in Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey, at the mercy of their respective governments. All the countries of the modern Middle East were carved out of previous empires. Why not take the autonomous Kurdish state in northern Iraq, add some territory from adjacent Turkey, Syria, and Iran, and create a new country, Kurdistan? At last.
He might as well have tweeted for the Japanese, Koreans, SAUDIS, and God knows who else to go nuclear. In the absence of the Pax Americana they really have no choice. Does ANYBODY think that is going to make things better. Keep in mind the Japanese could probably put several dozen useable nukes together in a matter of months. The Koreans probably not much longer, I don't know as much about their nuclear power program.
“America is better than that, even if our current president is not.”
I don’t know about that. A nation’s actions are more about self interest than values most times; and America has this tendency to act like an apex predator any time you are made uncomfortable, or suffer a setback.
This is to say that 9/11 was a horrible crime, not an act of war, but people are still dying in Afghanistan because of it, no?
1
Without over thinking this Trump surrender to Turkey thus turning Syria over to the Russians that Trump is comprised and a Russian asset if not a Russian agent.
On the evening of 10/22/2019 under the guidance of the Trump administration the USA has been reduced to a third rate power, no longer the leader of the Free world.
In time the reason Trump turned on the Kurds and surrendered to Turkey will be known. It is money and ignorance.
In time we will learn about the Hungary and Poland advances in Ukraine and African diamond mines.
It will be too late because the self proclaimed stable genius of America supported by a band of traitors have destroyed democracy.
GREAT COUNTRY-AMERICA WAS
"Uncertainty for our allies."
Which ones? Really he means this was war for Israel, but he won't admit it.
Saudi Arabia? They were siding with al Qaeda in this.
Jordan? They were using Saudi money in this.
Turkey? Friedman is against them now.
That's all there is there. It is just Israel's desire to see Syria kept in chaos.
As for the Kurds, we could have and should have set up their Kurdistan in 1991, 28 years ago, when we set up a no-fly zone to protect them in Iraq. Daddy Bush didn't, Clinton didn't, Dubya didn't even when he went in and took the whole place over again, and Obama didn't leave it to the Kurds when he left.
So now it is Trump who didn't? And on the Turkish border where it is least practical? Right where is abuts the vital national interests of our actual NATO ally?
This hawkish begging for Forever War is sickening.
1
trump may not get the Nobel peace prize, but I think putin might award him with today’s equivalent of hero of the soviet union.
1
Both Before WW I, and WW II the US thought that what happens “over there” does not concern us ...
We were wrong - and paid heavily for it in both days Blood and Treasure...
How fast we forget “9-11” which happened “Over Here” ... not “ Over There” ...
If there will be a next time, who will help us ?
If the US cedes control of the of the World to “others” - I shudder to think of a World controlled by Russia, China, North Korea, Turkey, Iran... etc.
In an age of Supersonic Missiles and Cyber Warfare, does Trump and his supporters really think that they can
“isolate” the US from the rest of the World ?
The President has no friends and so doesn't see the need for them. I'm ashamed of what he did and want the Kurds to know that most Americans still regard you as our friends, though we understand how you probably feel.
Well this analysis seems to say that we had all the leverage, but I'm not sure the U.S. did. First obvious fallacy here is that we could have demanded autonomy for the Kurds. Yes we could have demanded it, but one has to know that Turkey would never allow an autonomous Kurdish government. Yes, our presence could and should have protected them, but its a fantasy to think Turkey would acquiesce to that. Further, I'm not sure we would ever have been in position to force a moderation of Assad's forces. What we did do and what we now stupidly lost is that our force and support did curtail ISIS, and did create a somewhat more stabilized situation where the Russians and Turks were checked even though Assad has largely preserved his rule. Now we've abandoned our position and the motivation is unclear and the manner of the withdrawal is highly suspect as to what Trump is getting out of this. Lastly, the elephant in the room is the loss of American standing in both the middle east and the world because we could so casually throw an ally that carried our water at the cost of their blood under the proverbial bus. It will take some time to rebuild that trust.
123
@Barry Fisher. Bravo!!!
4
@AACNY I (might) feel better about Trump's troop withdrawal and regard it as a fulfillment of his promise to end endless wars and bring our troops home. But as I understand it, he has found geopolitical purpose in leaving troops elsewhere in Syria to guard oil facilities, he is leaving others in Iraq, and has INCREASED our troop presence to Saudi Arabia.
Clearly, other purposes are at work than bringing the troops home from the Middle East, no matter what. And that being so, one marvels at Trump's priority of defending an autocrat in Saudi Arabia, while abruptly, unilaterally and without warning surrendering all U.S. influence in the border region, and giving up the Syrian Kurds to the mercies of Turkey, Assad and Putin.
9
Speaking of Iraq, how long before Trump cuts and runs in Iraq and Iraq turns to Putin. Putin has a long range strategy in the Middle East, and the Middle east leads to the underbelly of Europe.
1
I enjoyed this piece. Nowadays there is less thoughtful writing in the press, most writing is Trump and more Trump. A good way to turn the brain into intellectual mush. Friedman's piece is thought-provoking. I learned from it. It's not angry which may disappoint some readers. The careful judgment which he says was necessary to distinguish ISIS in both Iraq and Syria would be impossible with this president whose depth of understanding crucial issues is non-existent. As Friedman speaks of islands of decency, this piece is an island of thoughtfulness, a rarity these days.
2
All America needs to do is to support decency and the people wanting decency will take care of themselves. We'll still need to, in the words of Ronald Reagan, "trust, but verify", but it allows us to support American values. Mr. Trump, are you listening . . . ? . . . ?
1
I agree with Mr. Friedman's "trifecta" conclusion. I'm even wonkish enough to understand and concur with his "reflexive" vs. "reflective" approach to the fight with ISIS. But, so what?
I even agree with his conclusion: "America is better than that, even if our current president is not."
But does that mean 57% of us are "better" than the other 43% who identify with Trump? Well, yeah. But again, so what?
Trump's not going to resign; the Senate's not going to remove him from office; and he's not going to concede victory in any election that he spuriously deems to be rigged, in 2020, or ever. (Isn't this obvious in the faces the 43% of Americans who cheer him on -- regardless of the "trifecta" -- at his campaign rallies?)
Forty-three percent! This is a greater percentage of supporters than any despot I've ever read about in recent history. However you want to characterize them, these "left-behind" "despicables" have placed the role on Mr. Trump's shoulders--they are his Destiny. Sounds MAGA, right? Sounds melodramatic, right? I agree, but it feels like this is where we're headed. So to the point of the "trifecta" analysis, I would ask, so what?
1
It's a safe bet that Trump would not aid any European NATO country (nor even Canada) if Putin were to invade. The reasons Putin hasn't done so is he thinks he can destabilize the West via non-military means; and perhaps he lacks the economic resources needed for military incursion and long-term occupation.
7
@Rethinking
Rethinking, one might 'rethink' Putin's "non-military" invasion of Ukraine (a European country, and possible member of NATO) from the east; and the Crimea "non-military" takeover.
I certainly agree there is little chance Mr. Trump would seriously assist any NATO ally that has no American troops there. Where we have troops stationed, there is a physical presence capable of some deterrence.
@Kenneth Galloway Ukraine is NOT in NATO. US troops - wherever they are - would not deter if the commander-in-chief told them to 'stand down' - which is what Trump would tell them, IMHO.
Living on this planet is about making decisions, more decisions, and more decisions. That’s really what life is about. It’s a journey. During this journey, however short or long, we’re all going to make mistakes, and some of these mistakes are extremely hazardous to our future life.
An example:
I was born in 1938, but didn’t have any memory until at least during WW2. I remember the end of the war in Japan. I felt American won the war, never giving too much thought or credit for any other country. We were the victors. All went fairly well until Korea. Like most Americans, we were invincible, especially towards a very small country like Korea. Two weeks was what most Americans thought would take us to Win The War.
It’s all been downhill since then. What happened? It’s called LIFE!
In 2016 Donald Trump somehow WON the election and became the President of the US.
All of us, and I do mean all of us took our eyes off the ball. The penalty for that is our present situation around the world.
The wonderful thing about living on this planet is that we all have the ability to make good decisions that will make not only OUR life better, but others as well. It’s time to make some very GOOD decisions. Our planet is counting on it.
1
Sir, American Foreign policy has little to do with virtue and a lot to do with making safe places for American corporations to flourish irrespective of local or regional needs. Think Central America.
Please be honest. Your massive footprint is destroying the planet with a myth of forever growth, the shiny city on a hill: all aspiration, certainly not fact.
2
Tom quotes Tony Blair that: "Because destiny put you in this place in history, in this moment in time, and the task is yours to do". This is true in Trump's case too. He is the man put in to place by American people to fulfil some historical duties. Trump is fulfilling that duty as promised by him during the last election with some practical application and without sacrificing American ideals, without sacrificing its allies and without sacrificing American lives. If Trump had defended Kurds against Turkey's determined military action to defend its national interest, the situation would have been much worse. That was the assessment of Trump and I agree with Trump. I don't think Trump appreciates advises from a pundit who supported Bush's invasion of Iraq that was turned out to be a disaster. Trump has much more practical sense than any pundits to know what is reasonably possible and not.
2
@Alex E
" I don't think Trump appreciates advises from a pundit " or anyone else. He rules on a whim. It is hard (impossible) for allies to rely on anything he (The United States) says. Which is concerting going forward.
@Steve
disconcerting going forward
Trump is a president who doesn't understand how our foreign policy works and functioned for the past seven decades. Other presidents didn't understand well, but had advisers to help. Unfortunately, he is listening only to his "impulse" and functions based on that, which is damaging the US credibility now and for the foreseeable future.
13
@Paul Read the article again, Paul. The increase in global instability stemming from this action puts your grandchildren at greater risk, not lesser.
25
@Paul In addition to the chaos and destruction of lives (and possible loss of 40 nuclear weapons left by trump in Turkey) and every other negative consequence of trump's kowtowing to Erdogan (for what? Another hotel in Turkey), he didn't actually get us out since the troops were not brought home; they were transferred to Iraq.
16
@Donna
The Kurd Allies were abandoned whereas the Saudis were supplied with thousands of American soldiers to defend their oil from Iran's hostility toward the Saudis. What are the priorities here? Interest, nothing but base interest...not decency, not support of democracy, not solidarity!
7
Kurds didn't save us from a Russian or Chinese invasion, or last I checked they aren't defending the southern border against drug cartels, or anything like that. With or without American help, they had to fight ISIS in the interest of self preservation; Americans paid them hundreds of millions of dollars, trained and armed them heavily. So they should be thanking us, instead of all this "abandoning our allies" talk.
By the way, how would Mr. Friedman - or any Israeli for that matter - feel if the US had paid lots of dollars, and heavily armed and trained Hezbollah right on Israel's border; after all Hezbollah fought ISIS as much as any other group (Sunni Muslim extremist ISIS see Shiite Muslims, like Hezbollah, as even bigger sinners than non-Muslims). Kurdish YPG in Syria (which does NOT represent all the Syrian Kurds) is an offshoot of the terrorist organization PKK, which routinely commits acts of violence inside Turkey. So that's how the average Turk is looking at this.
Erdogan is an autocrat; has jailed many Turks and Kurds in Turkey for opposing him. But about a fifth of his members of parliament are ethnic Kurds and in the largely Kurdish southeast his party gets about 30% of the votes. So his fight isn't with the Kurds; it is with Syrian YPG.
I wonder if the US have other plans for the Kurds, like caving land out of Iraq, Syria, and Turkey and creating a puppet state as a buffer between Iran and Israel, and to use them as foot soldier against Iran?
Those people who live somewhere in Idaho or Nevada and are tired of the US trying to keep our Allie season safe are short-sided. By sending our troops to those dangerous areas to backup local forces, we let our enemies know that they risk engagement with the full force of the US military. It can make most enemies think twice about engaging in mischief.
Also, what jobs are available for the youth I need those areas? How about a stint in the military. They can learn a skill, see how other people live and get VA benefits when they leave service. Also, maybe they might be less likely to stay home and get addicted to opioids.
3
“The role that destiny has placed on America’s shoulders” . Yet one wonders how well we have taken on that role. Vietnam,Middle East wars, turning our backs on democracy in South America and supporting so many dictators. Yes we have formed important economic and international alliances,our military has given a sense of security to our allies. We one the Cold War. But too many times that role was to further our own national interests and not to take a more worldly view.
4
I think that many give Trump more credit than is due; his actions are examined through the prism of some strategic vision or a desire to serve the country whereas all of his actions can be explained by corruption, greed and self dealing. The fact that Trump has telephone calls w Erdogan and Putin than bails on the Kurds and does the same with Putin and Orban and delays the aid to Ukraine proves this and should be sufficient to impeach him; he’s clearly enamored with dictators and/or owes them money and/or is looking to do more hotel deals.
13
Turkey is a NATO ally, and the NATO ally with the 2nd strongest military. Under the NATO treaty, when Turkey said it was threatened by the 'terrorists' who inhabit the northernmost 18 miles of Syria, Article 5 says the US should help Turkey fight those 'terrorists'.
Trump had a long talk with Erdogan and asked him not to bomb the Kurds, but Erdogan just reiterated: if all US troops are not withdrawn from the 18 mile-wide strip, some will be killed, the bombing is non-negotiable. So Trump had all US troops withdraw to positions in Syria south of the strip the day before the bombing was to start.
When two allies of the US want to kill each other, and refuse to listen to reason, there is no good option for any president.
Tom Friedman writes: "America is better than that, even if our current president is not."
Not all of America, yet a majority of America. A minority of America thinks every move of the president is a gift from God, and they have a disproportionate influence on the Electoral College and the Senate.
22
@T Norris. Living in Florida I agree. Surrounded by Fox viewers and consumers of crazy right wing media. The 40% is not worthy of being American.
1
@T Norris
...............and the Supreme Court
In reading Mr. Friedman's articles, I appreciate his ability to lay out in a column the complexities of a region that offers no simple strategy for peace. At the same time, I also understand the reality that there are just too many moving pieces in the region for Trump to understand---as if he was disciplined enough to read up or seek out expertise on the region. No, our foreign policy goes from day to day, whoever he talks to, whoever makes him angry, whatever he hears on Fox..that is where our country is right now---in a strategic void with a very stable genius in charge.
22
Enough superficial reporting and commenting.
We need to know more than which country's leader is most despotic and how the various military powers stack up. These are important, but often are symptoms of more profound forces, or tips of the iceberg,
Saying the names of the various groups does not explain who they are.
So, how do the various economies work in Syria (what regional economies are there), what are the geographical differences between regions, what are their local governments' structures and who are the interest groups and leaders (below the very top), what environmental conditions are each group facing, how are populations housed -- are they segregated by wealth or religion or sub-ethnicities, or what? What are daily conditions like? How are the urban areas and rural areas distributed and what relations do they have. What are the ideological/religious understandings that affect their politics -- legitimacy, goals, methods.
These are the things we discuss in America that are seen to explain what is going on. The same goes for the rest of the world. Sure, it's complicated. But that is the job of reporters.
2
@Just Thinking’
No, what you describe is the job of university professors. Let's be grateful for Friedman's (and others) island of breakfast illumination within the cheap whirlwind of the 24-hour news cycle.
2
@Just Thinking’
You need to find a book on the current situation in the Middle East. What you want is not possible in a newspaper opinion column. Mr. Friedman is not a reporter, he's an analyst.
Or you could try the reporting of Richard Engel on NBC. He's been living in the Middle East for many years, speaks Arabic fluently, and recently did a long (2 hours?) report on the Kurds and their defeat of ISIS.
@RMW
You are settling for incomplete reporting. Reporters should be aware of some of the best research on their subjects. They all are given briefing books when they begin their beat and then should be reading up as well as going into the field. To say that this group depends on oil revenues, while that group is agrarian based, while another is dependent on merchants does not take a lot of space. Then we should be informed about why their interests are in conflict, overlap, or require interdependence. Who they are competing with, whether there is an issue with water supply, electricity, etc. This is the context they need to share with readers when explaining their statements , and their connecting the dots the best they can on a daily basis (serious research requires a much longer period of time, but can be usefully applied to the daily reporting).
Personally, I don't understand why Trump wants to spend so much money on the military if he is going to give all of its hard-earned successes away. How much do we need to keep Boeing and the Generals happy, I assume with the selling and buying of expensive toys, if the strategic landscape those toys ply are unbolted from reality?
5
The huge flaw in Friedman's argument is that he ignores the history of Al Qaeda in Iraq and ISIS.
The instability of Iraq following the 2003 Iraq invasion created Al Qaeda in Iraq. From AQI came ISIS.
The instability of Syria during it's civil war allowed ISIS to move back and forth between Iraq and Syria and take control of cities and towns in both countries.
Friedman ignores all of that and pretends that the choas can be isolated to Syria.
Worse, he clearly doesn't care about the Syrians who suffer the consequences of Al Qaeda and ISIS being empowered.
The only country that benefits from the policy proposed by Friedman is Israel. Syria, Hezbollah, and Iran being pre-occupied with fighting Al Qaeda and ISIS makes it less likely that Israel's regional enemies will attack Israel.
Of course that policy is unsustainable. Also, the attempts to use Jihadists to overthrow Assad led to Russia intervening in Syria. Now Russia imposes a No Fly Zone over all of Syria preventing Israel from attacking Syria.
I don't agree with the way Trump has handled the US troop withdrawal from Syria. However, the crazy ideas of people like Friedman are why US policy in Syria over the past decade has been such a monumental failure.
4
Your first premise is bothersome; "Americans are exhausted" and "Americans want a break" from what? being Americans? T's base are people who love the flag, feel patriotic and want to feel the power of America. It is a visceral emotion, a pride in place and mission, born out of being veterans, and traditional. If we have infantalized these people, that military service is remedial trade education, not serious service to strengthen our geopolitical strategies that does carry risks, shame on us. Our strong military gives us the soft power to have 50 soldiers keep the Turkish army at bay, a trick only rivaled by the Greek Spartans at Thermopylae. Our mission of keep the world safe is not trivial. No one else can do it and it is with our soft power, that we should be proud of that allows us to be that nation. The task has been ours. We need help but not retreat. Those 50 soldiers shows that at this time it is not as hard a burden as when we lose our allies, China is waiting. Trump is wrong to dangle the prospects of America as a gated community, safe and playing Golf, while the rest of the world rots.
9
What a disingenuous article. Not one mention that in 2012 we initiated a covert CIA-Saudi plan to overthrow Assad with Islamic jihadists (the "good" rebels as we called them). They turned out to be al Qaeda affiliates and worked hand in glove with arming ISIS. The program was later abandoned after our Pentagon, which had been arming and assisting the Kurds fighting ISIS complained that the CIA program was hampering their efforts. Also, we did not "hand over Syria" to the Russians. They have had a long and strategic relationship for decades with Russia even having military and naval ports in the country. What we did almost accomplish is turning secular Syria into an Islamic jihadist failed state, overrun with terrorist groups, similar to what Libya is now. Please Mr. Friedman, mention our involvement in Syria in the proper context.
16
Secular Sryia? The Syrian constitution requires that the president be a Muslim . That's hardly secular.
@Jeff Assad protected not just the Shia Muslim minorities, but the Yazidis, the Syrian Jews, the Coptic Christians, the non-religious/secular, and even more often than not the Kurds (but only when the Kurds weren't engaging in violent tactics).
Assad was the only thing standing between all these groups (and more) and the Sunni extremists who wanted to establish a pure Sunni theocracy where non-Sunnis (and even the "wrong kind" of Sunnis) had no rights or legal protections. We armed, trained, supplied, and provided air support for these "moderate" Sunni rebels in their efforts to eliminate Assad using the mindset of "the enemy of my enemy" same as we did with the "moderate" Mujahedin in Afghanistan when the USSR was bankrupting themselves in a forever Afghanistan war (you know, the group that spawned Bin Laden and al Qaeda).
Look, I'm not saying Assad is a good guy (he's fairly brutal when it comes to dealing with threats), but he's not remotely close to the worst national leader in the region. He's not even in the top 5. He just made the mistake of being friendly with Russia instead of cozying up to the US like Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Jordan, Egypt, etc. Same mistake that doomed Qaddafi and decimated the (former) #1 economy on the continent of Africa which had exactly zero terrorist training camps within its borders due to his brutal zero tolerance policies and practices.
Thanks to Trump an effective U.S. presence in the mideast is no longer a matter of choice. We are neither welcome or wanted as indicated by Iraq's invitation to pass thru and leave. Merry early Christmas Putin.
7
The United States has committed many sins in order to pursue what Mr. Friedman calls its "destiny." But still, there is hope that in the future it will be sin-less. It was sin-less in our intervention in Kosovo, not at all sin-less in our invasion of Iraq. But still ... There was hope under Obama that this would change. What was unanticipated, as Mr. Friedman says, is that we would, after Obama, commit sins of negligence.
That is what we have done.
8
Whom is this president, this administration and these elected
officials beholden to? To you and me, its citizens. Not to themselves for their own personal gains, or to their political parties or to our most formidable sworn enemies.
It's that simple. It's that vital. It's that urgent.
9
"Blair is still right about the role that destiny has placed on America’s shoulders, but years later it is also clear that many Americans are exhausted with that role."
By "many Americans," I'm assuming that Mr. Friedman is talking about Trump voters. That said; I strongly disagree with his analysis. These Americans, like Trump himself, don't understand the role that the US plays in keeping this world safe for the entire free world.
They voted for Trump and, in most cases, barring impeachment and conviction, will likely vote for him again. This will not be because they agree with his foreign policy (if Trump has one), but because they believe his lies on domestic policy - coal will make a comeback, manufacturing will return to the US, and - lest I forget - the whites are being taken advantage of.
By opting to change the role that the US plays in keeping this world a safer place, Trump runs the risk of relegated these US to country with no influence.
11
@MS ... Agreed, but is it very clear the US has been keeping the world a safer place?
Let us understand the Trump doesn't consider any "deal" that wasn't made by him as valid or binding. Further, he doesn't understand complex relationships, only those where he thinks he can sit with a single (autocratic) leader and make a new deal. Pulling out of Syria was just a form of his dictum of walking out of the meeting to make a point.
That being said, he likes autocrats and sees himself as one of them. Hence he does things to make them happy without realizing the larger consequences. Unfortunately, in the process he is getting very close to "giving aid and comfort to the enemy of the USA." He just doesn't see it that way because he is intellectually incapable of doing so.
The real root-cause problem is that his dedicated supporters share his world view of single-point deals made by an autocrat is the way things are to be done. As long as he has the financial and emotional support of his "base" this will continue. Going after Trump is a lose-lose game - rallying the moderates and building a case for American and the planet is the path forward. Unfortunately, Trump bashing has become the path-of-choice and we are well down the wrong road with little time to turn back.
Time to find the money trails and see where they lead - Saudi Arabia, Russia, American Oligarchs, and others behind the curtain. That is that path to the future.
17
This latest American betrayal of an ally reminds me of how we adjust to being dealt a bad hand in life.
Given the relative briefness our lives my philosophy has been to never stay in an untenable position when you can spend your energy moving on to a better situation.
Moving to another state, changing jobs, promoting out of an undesirable position at work, and retiring to another country that is more in keeping with your values are all life choices.
I have seen too many people stay in a place that is personally unproductive for them instead of cutting ones losses and moving on.
7
few US journalists understand middle east politics, and middle east in general, as friedman does. however, there is a certain "naiveté" about the US that tends to recurrently appear in many of his columns.
for example, in this one he says "what makes america unique as a global power is that we have allies who share our interests and values...".
really? and what "interests and values" are those? could they be those of allies like saudi arabia, pinochet's Chile, or the nicaraguan contras, to name just a few of the many unsavory regimes and groups the US has supported and even (on occasion) helped install over the last 50 years or so?
friedman then concludes with "america is better than that, even if the current president is not".
yes, the US is great in many ways, but in this particular way, i wouldn't be so sure. half of the country supports the current president, and couldn't care less about what the US does or doesn't do in syria or anywhere else. the other half, of which i'm part, i'm not so sure most of it cares that much either, except as a way to criticize trump.
15
I agree with you, Guillermo. The United State's actions in Central and South America, and the Carribbean, were abhorent, and seemed to be driven largely by U.S. greed. If we appear to be the Shining City on the Hill to hopeful immigrants, it is only because we've had a hand in ruining their home countries.
1
@guillermo Democracies: Europe and the Western Pacific, mainly, but also many people in India, Israel, and Latin America.
America still commands a degree of admiration and respect in the Middle East but compared to the days of President G. H. Bush and Baker it pales by comparison. I’ve lived and worked in the Middle East for over 20 years and was stationed in Damascus during late 1980s and early 1990s. Then, along with Ambassador Djerejian, Bush and Baker were at the one yard line on a peace deal between Syria and Israel. Word spreads quickly, as it does on the streets, and a palatable sense of euphoria enveloped the city. People talked about “Pax Americana” in glowing terms. Some Syrian government officials began talking about a Middle East economic bloc, to include Israel, that would rival the EU.
But history had other plans and when Clinton was elected President the new team had other priorities and other ideas about how to approach the peace process. Timing is everything.
Point being, I still believe there is room for America to right and steady the ship. So much of foreign policy success depends upon the POTUS. I’ve found that career diplomats by and large have a pretty pragmatic realistic view of the world but sometimes (most times?), like now, their advice is marginalized or dismissed.
If I were a one-issue voter, that is my number one priority is peace in the Middle East, I’d vote for Bernie Sanders. I believe he is the only one who has the courage to confront and cajole all players in the region. But I’m not a one issue voter. I know, that’s my problem.
13
Isn't Trump's aim to leave the rest of the world to stew in its own juices and only help those who give the US something in the short term? In this scenario, the Saudis are the only nation deserving help in the world.
The problem with that thinking (if Trump thinks at all) is that situations change and the US may end up alone without any allies, and then the US must fight its wars totally alone.
5
Not only that, but the fact that the US has been allowed to establish and keep military bases in foreign countries isn't exactly 'never getting anything in return'. Those bases are all massive springboards for US influence and (together with experienced diplomats) saves enormous amounts of money for the US, while at same helping to multiply the force of the host nation, which given what the world looks like is no bad thing. It's easy to say 'We're tired of being the policeman of the world, folks' like Trump does, but what is the alternative? And also, let's face it, some of those conflicts around the world, the US has a big hand in, too. Iran, for instance, where the US in 1954 toppled the government in favour of the shah, whose rule spawned resistance and led the Iranian revolution in 1979. Chile 1973 and Pinochet's military dictaroship. Actions always has consequences.
10
Saudi Arabia is a huge island of indecency and spreads the indecency of fanatical religion far and wide. It is also engaged in a theological conflict with Iran, and some of Iran's bad behavior is just defending itself and those who share its faith from attack. Perhaps we lack the ability to create democracy in the Middle East because of our staunch support of local powers who do not like democracy at all but who have lots of oil and oil money to buy our weapons.
If we are going to play geopolitics Middle Eastern style, we have to give up any more than a feeble pretense of favoring democracy or decency. If we are going to promote democracy or decency, we are not playing traditional geopolitics and must rethink and perhaps move away from the alliances we have made using traditional geopolitics.
Trying to have it both ways is a good way to spend a lot of resources and get neither.
27
The Trump about face in foreign policy is an important warning to future allies that we Americans can’t be trusted for the long haul.
The changing of presidents every four years means that a new president can betray his predecessor and American allies.
How many times has America walked away from a commitment to a friend?
10
Friedman: "America is better than that, even if our current president is not."
No, as concerns the Kurds and even Iranians, America is not and never was "better than that". During the Iran-Iraq war, the USA was no better than Donald Trump, perhaps even worse.
This from Foreign Policy 08-26-2013:"The U.S. government may be considering military action in response to chemical strikes near Damascus. But a generation ago, America’s military and intelligence communities knew about and did nothing to stop a series of nerve gas attacks far more devastating than anything Syria has seen, Foreign Policy has learned."
The March 1988 gassing of 1000s of Kurds in Halabja, Iraqi Kurdistan was carried out with the full approval of President Reagan, gassing that also extended over the border into Iranian Kurdistan.
A close friend of mine from a Kurdish family that fled to Sweden from just that area, writes today:
"Our sorrow is never ending"
The USA was not better then and shows not the least sign of becoming better in my lifetime.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
30
@Larry Lundgren .....You and I have something in common.
We both have chosen to become expatriates because of disagreements over cultural and political values.
How many Americans have grave misgivings about their country but refuse to improve their lives by moving away?
3
could it be that many Americans can't move because of work,school or family concerns? It's also expensive to pack up and move to another country. So the majority of us have no choice but to take a deep breath and cope as best we can for now. Trump won't be president forever.
3
@Larry Lundgren I hired a Canadian immigration attorney to explore moving there. Unless I become a political refugee (possible the way things are going), it is virtually impossible to gain residency status in Canada no matter how much money I have and if I have my own health insurance.
2
The American public tends to only see US foreign policy as American benevolence (which the elites are at pains to emphasise), but the bottom line is always US influence. US hegemony stems largely from the petrodollar, which was a pact negotiated between the Saudis and Kissinger. At a time when the US just delinked the US dollar from gold, questions about the US dollar remaining as a global reserve currency were raised. By persuading the Saudis to transact oil in US dollar only cemented the US dollar's position, and many other commodities followed suit. The quid pro quo in this transaction is US military support to the Saudis (more specifically the House of Saud). US military involvement in the Middle East has therefore become an obligation. Creating (or at least maintaining) chaos in the Middle East serves to maintain Saudi dependence on the US. When the US was attacked by Saudi citizens in 911, the government had no option but to look for a scapegoat in order to pacify the domestic audience. Saddam Hussein, an ex-ally who had outlived his usefulness ever since the end of the Iran-Iraq war, became that scapegoat. But the fall of this dictator opened up the field to other pretenders such as ISIS and Iran.
The American public should therefore see this not as an act of benevolence, but merely fulfilling their side of the bargain, and a cost of maintaining the hegemony.
14
When Kissinger finally dies, he will be extolled as a great statesman, when in fact he was a war criminal, beginning with the catastrophe that was Nixon’s Vietnam policy.
Tom, you gave Donald Trump too much credit for his decision to abruptly upend US Middle East policy without consulting anyone. Trump has more than 115 business interests in Turkey, and he is also in a hurry to fulfill campaign promises made to the Russian before he has to leave office. As Pelosi observed :" All Roads lead to Russia."
54
Let's be honest. 'Containing' communism was a victory for capitalism. Once the Soviet Union was taken down, America had a free hand in exporting capitalism. Enlargement, therefore, was about expanding America's commercial interests and geo-political goals under the feel good banner of promoting democracy. Notwithstanding our commitment to Israel, democracy took third place behind securing access to Iraq's oil fields and blocking Iran's growing hegemony.
If Americans are exhausted with our role in the world and our foreign entanglements, it is in large measure to due to the belief that we spend huge sums of money only to botch the job, mismanage the results, and get mired down in endless muck. We've never had patience for foreign involvements that appear to have no direct bearing on our lives. But, when get us tangled in conflicts that are seemingly un-winnable, have no end in sight, turn into black holes of money, are in areas where conflict has been raging for centuries and isn't ready for democracy, and ultimately make us less safe -- well, why should we support the effort?
Americans would feel much different if we saw our men and money put to productive use where we can see real improvement in conditions and outcome in these nations.
12
If the U.S. Is so exhausted from trying to run the world it should not abandon it to the wolves but work to build an international order that can better take on the existential challenge of climate change and the resulting social turmoil. Like it or not we cannot withdraw to a gated community.
32
Or maybe the explanation is even simpler...
Trump abandons Ukraine, Putin wins. Trump abandons Syrian Kurds, Putin wins; Trump undermines rule of law in America, Putin wins. And on and on... He must be getting tired of all that winning. What’s in it for Trump?
Let’s see those tax returns!
226
@The Observer
I wish I could like this comment dozens of times!
"But sustainable engagement requires us to do at least three things: make fine distinctions, leverage allies and amplify islands of decency. Alas, Trump violated all these principles in Syria."
And, alas, Bush II also violated all these principles in his arrogant and dishonest invasion of Iraq -- an adventure that was enthusiastically supported by Friedman. So the need to learn difficult lessons about foreign policy is a more general American phenomenon not strictly limited to the ignorant and hapless Trump. Our recent history tells us that even the self-appointed experts have stumbled.
That recognition is important because Trump's folly has not arisen in a vacuum. The national disenchantment with the American imperial enterprise fomented by Bush's war of choice in Iraq is still rippling through the political system. The Iraq War was a tipping point in at least two ways: it destabilized the fragile balance of the Middle East, with no end to the chaos yet in sight, and it permanently debunked the self-serving thesis that US policy has been motivated by pure humanitarian impulses.
There is likely majority political support among ordinary Americans for Trump's movement toward Middle East disengagement, if it could be done in an intelligent and measured way. The objection is to the fecklessness and incompetence, not to the impulse itself. The experts, of course, will argue the horror of Trump's folly as proof of a moral duty to maintain forever an American foreign empire.
17
Let's not delude ourselves into thinking a military alliance between our country and any other is done for any reason but to extend our power and enhance our interests internationally. Any pretense to the contrary is simply a charade. The Kurds, in the greater scheme, were merely cannon fodder.
14
Trump undoubtedly deserted the Kurds andpulled our troops out of Syria to make political points with his base. It was just one more effort to win an election rather than consider the effects of what he does. Trump has never cared about America's position in the world or even the safety of the troops in any of his actions. After all he not only left political and fiscal chaos in the wake of the withdrawal, but put our troops in harms way by the way he did it. I am sick and tired of hearing about this man who pretends to be the leader of our country,but only cares about himself never our world or country.
17
Several commentators, including Mr. Friedman, conclude that the U.S. left Iraq too soon (and thus allowed the rise of ISIS and their brutal capture of Mosul). Did the U.S. not comply with a Status of Forces agreement signed by George W. Bush, one in which the President of Iraq at the time refused U.S. requests to keep a contingent of U.S. military troops in the country? And were there not 30,000 equipped and trained Sunni Iraqi forces on the northern border, troops that withdrew (ran, essentially) in the face of less than a thousand ISIS fighters? Impossible to see how the U.S. could be criticized for withdrawing precipitously as many want to claim.
10
How many readers can remember American concerns about the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan? It was thought to be a stepping stone to their further expansion in central Asia. Instead, it turned out to be a morass that ultimately forced their withdrawal nine years later, and almost certainly contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
I long ago learned to ignore the handwringing of the liberal establishment. Mr. Friedman is right! Let the Russians be responsible for containing ISIS for awhile, and otherwise keeping the peace in the Middle East. It is a veritable certainty that, at some point, they will invite us back in.
4
@Ron Cohen Mr Cohen while I do not agree with everything that has transpired or written at some point we have to pull the plug on these endless wars. We have been in Afghanistan for almost 20 years.
If the Japanese and Germans want to get nuclear weapons that just adds another level of uncertainty to the Russians and Chinese. The French and English and Israelis amongst others keep nuclear weapons. Somehow we have survived maybe we need to bring back M.A.D. On another level? Would the Russians mess with the French to trade Paris for Moscow?
I highly doubt that the Japanese and Germans, Fins, Dutch etc think we would ignore them like the quagmire in the mideast.
Time to give the Russians and Pakistanis Afghanistan. Let them figure it out. Take the $70b/year and reinvest it in our infrastructure.
2
@Ron Cohen -- I remember the real concerns we had at that time.
It would have lodged the Russians into an area very sensitive to our new found friends we'd just opened to in China. It would have lodged them up against a deeply troubled Pakistan that was our ally. It would have put them next to their sometime friends in the non-aligned world in India.
It would have allowed them to surround our new enemies in Iran, just when we wanted to isolate them.
It was meant to be a cheap and easy way to bleed the Russians. It was.
Now those roles are reversed. America has been bleeding trillions in the middle east and losing, just like Russia in Afghanistan, but a thousand times worse.
Every single aspect of the events of 1979 suggests we should get out of Syria now.
If only it wasn't Trump doing it. If Obama had done this a few years ago, it would be all cheers here and a solid defense of the decision.
Domestic political advantage is supposed to stop at the water's edge. It hasn't for awhile. We are the losers for that. We really are not so all-powerful as we think, able to disregard such a fundamental as keeping our partisanship out of our foreign policy.
4
There’s a good reason why Afghanistan is called “the graveyard of empires.”
So the Kurds and allies of the US can no longer trust Trump. Now the rest of the world knows how most us here in the US feel.
58
@Jay Orchard -- When could the Kurds trust the US?
When Saddam gassed them with the gas the US supplied to him?
When in 1991 we did not set up Kurdistan?
When in 2003 we did not set up Kurdistan?
When we supported the Saudi jihadis against them, while they were staying neutral in a deal with Assad?
Oh, only now, only when we won't put them hard up against Turkey, our own ally declaring "vital national interests" it will defend unto war, all that we not do so?
Now, when we pull out about 50 guys from border posts that were never going to protect the Kurds from the Turks, according to the Turks who were quite clear about that? This was, "We are coming, get out of the way or get hurt." It was war. We made the only possible choice, except to fight Turkey.
Who wants us in a war with Turkey?
11
Our founders designed checks and balances domestically, but they failed to design a system that required more than one person to make decisions overseas. How a system requiring a group of persons to make such decisions can be designed, I do not know.
Thousands of people are suffering thanks to Trump’s ignorance.
31
@James Noble The founders had just experienced a unique leader (George Washington) and they built a system around the assumption that other presidents would be similar. There does need to be someone equipped to make quick unitary decisions, but that someone needs to be responsible to the people, always keeping an eye over one shoulder. The mistake we have made is in building up this notion of "coequal branches." Congress, should be unreservedly paramount to the extent it truly represents the people. Impeachment, of both President and Justices, should be easier and require no justification: the upper crust of the other branches should serve at the pleasure of a congress that weights member votes by population represented and that is elected without gerrymandering. The other branches should be dismissible agents of The People, implementing the laws they make much as presidential appointees and lower courts are subordinates of the president and supreme court, their power derived and subject. How a group of persons can make such decisions is called democracy.
5
@James Noble -- "but they failed to design a system that required more than one person to make decisions overseas"
They were very clear about that, when they threw Citizen Genet out of the country for trying to lead a Southern voice in favor of French privateering, against the decision of Geo. Washington, who was very clear he was the one and only man who would be making such decisions. The country backed him up in that, all the way to the Quasi-War with France.
1
@James Noble "Our founders designed checks and balances domestically, but they failed to design a system that required more than one person to make decisions overseas."
Incorrect. They designed a system where the sole power to declare, fund, and maintain war resided in Congress. It was Congress which, via multiple rounds of legislation, gave all that power away (and in my cynical opinion, they did it so they could -successfully- absolve themselves of much of the blowback if the voters rebelled by blaming it all on the no good dirty rotten big baddy in the Oval Office).
The Kurds are a persecuted nation whose territory is split among four countries. They have been historically on the side of the free world, since they fought the Iraqi regime. If not longer. Doing the right thing - supporting them to unite their split territories and establish an independent country is the right and just thing to do. The "price" is damaging relations with dictators - is that so bad?
13
@AH -- Half the Iraqi Kurds fought for Saddam against Iran. The other half fought against Saddam and for Iran's "mullahs." And the both fought each other. They made peace with each other only when Saddam started to gas with with American gas weapons.
But don't let facts get in the way of a rant.
2
@AH The Kurds are NOT a nation and never have been. They were a numerous and prosperous nomadic tribe in the region who didn't even consider the idea of a "nation" for themselves until relatively recently when their various Kurdish factions became pawns in the proxy wars between the US and USSR and both nations pushed that idea on the "enemy" Kurdish factions.
It wasn't until Saddam Hussein started massacring Kurds that they became (kind of sort of) united. Even now the different factions have more of an uneasy alliance that a united front.
"Enlarging the sphere of democracy" has proved to be dangerous for those we choose to lay it on them.
3
If you gave Trump a map of Turkey,Syria and Iraq and provided him with a sharpie, he could not draw the lines to illustrate where we fought with the Kurds in northern Syria.He has no idea of the territory the United States and the Kurds liberated from the scourge of Isis.Autocrats are Trump whisperers and he listened to Erdogan who wanted the Kurds far from Turkey.Trump has visited Saudi Arabia and Israel where he was certain to receive a royal welcome.He considers the rest of the Middle East as just so much sand.The Kurds trusted us- now everyone knows that the U.S. can not be trusted with the amoral Trump in charge.
33
Sometime during the 1980’s, America lost its way.
Government became the problem rather than “we the People, in order to form a more perfect union”.
Americans became rugged individuals, fending for themselves, while the Republicans started collecting the spoils and carting them off.
Things have deteriorated since then.
Is there a chance to save America??
17
@Grove Maybe. There are politicians started to cater to the movement to save America, among their many interest groups, and if they can win and not forget why then yes, the people who have been hoodwinked will see the way and we may be able to guide our way back to the light. It will be touch and go.
2
So the Kurdish peoples, a rare bloom of loyal, dependable moderates in the Middle East are getting the stiffed Trump contractor treatment. Hasn't our long hemorrhage of blood and treasure to this region dating back to 2001 been all about promoting moderation in the region? But when the lights of reason are dangerously dimmed back home in the once shining city on the hill, little wonder they're getting snuffed out one by one along notorious fault lines of Middle Eastern conflict.
10
@Davis The Kurds are NOT moderates. They are an assemblage of various Kurdish factions with varying ethical standards, but many factions are hard-line totalitarian or authoritarian communists in the former Soviet mold. And some (especially within the borders of Turkey) consider the terrorist bombings and murders of civilians and children to be perfectly acceptable in the name of bringing about their definition of "the greater good." Hence the reason Turkey gets so much support from the bulk of their citizenry in their efforts to combat the rise of
Kurdish power.
Whatever leverage the US had to find some resolution to the situation in Syria it appears lost by Trump's action. The major players, Syria, Russia, Iran, and Turkey are all authoritarian states to a greater or lesser extent. Since Trump is not trying to spread democracy but to spread authoritarianism to him there would be no point in keeping US troops in Syria. The remaining authoritarian states will serve his purpose. There would not seem to be any reason why he would not support a growing influence of Russia in the region as he is personally indebted to Russia for rescuing his real estate empire and winning an election. From Trump's point of view his action makes perfect sense.
18
This is a very long essay in which Friedman try to convince himself that his full throated endorsement of the war with Iraq was not so bad. And a few days after the Iraqi army mowed down hundreds of peaceful demonstrators mad at ongoing poverty, incompetence and corruption would make us believe Robinson that democracy is blooming in Iraq.
Friedman also spouts the neocon dogma that we left Iraq too soon forgetting Bush negotiated and signed the treaty that gave Obama no alternative to pull our troops when Iraq wanted them gone.
ISIS was the Sunni revolt in Iraq because of Shia bad behavior. It flourished because The Shia Iraqi army fled and abandoned their equipment.
Now Iran controls Iraq, Northern Syria and has a path to supply the Hezbollah.
Israel was supposed to benefit from our war with Iraq but the contrary has happened.
The war with Iraq was the worst policy decision America made since the VietNam war.
119
@Edward B. Blau
Perfect summary. The invasion of Iraq back in 2003 that was so strongly touted by Friedman (and Blair, as this piece reminds us in a sort of absurd morality play) is the gift that just keeps on giving to America's adversaries.
In Europe the consequences have included the arrival of refugees in the millions causing a resurgence of the hard right and an impetus to Brexit.
And now Trump is just making things worse.
Heck of a job.
64
@Edward B. Blau
Iraq requested US military to return remember AND Obama did NOT have to accept a withdrawal of troops from Iraq but he favoured that position!
The US does not understand the ‘mindset’ of Arab/Muslims who are tribal/clannish/sectarian and NOT like Western man ... the neocons were naive ... they knew how to blow up Iraq but democracy was never gonna work ...
1
@tzatz Iraq would not agree to extend the SOFA. Obama’s choice was leave or stay w/out a SOFA which W would not do either.
3
Putin's hand is becoming clearer to basically force Trump to abandon the Kurds and American national interest. And it's not just Syria or Kurds or few isolated issues. Trump's pattern of decision making on many issues including the main reason for his ongoing impeachment, i.e. his Ukraine affair, also strengthen that suspicion.
I'm equally, probably more, worried about Turkey just like most sensible people & well-wishers of Turkey in Turkey & around the world. Now Turkey is fast becoming just another Middle Eastern Arab country ruled by a dictator and supported by other dictators, departing from its decades old ways that brought it prosperity, peace, and an unique distinction of being the most progressive Muslim majority country in the World with a functional democracy. Now Turkey is entering into an stage of perpetual civil unrest, if not civil war, and declining personal freedom and diminishing prosperity.
32
U.S. power is indeed receding slowly across the globe. This is the normal and predictable outcome of the U.S. comprising an ever smaller percentage of the global economy.
Simply put, Pax Americana is no longer affordable, and therefore no longer sustainable.
(And, yet, we’ll remain the largest power for decades to come, especially if countries like Germany and Japan will increase support the global security architecture.)
The only question is whether the relative U.S. decline will be a managed, peaceful, gradual decline or a sudden, chaotic, violent decline (i.e. war).
Trump is our last, best hope for a managed decline.
5
@John
Really? I see Trump more as a prime specimen of an unmanaged (to say nothing of unhinged) decline. I doubt he can manage to put his pants on in the morning without help. Unless you mean, he will manage to cause the US to decline, in which case - yep.
1
@John
Not sure if you’re joking but Trump is the epitome of chaos, confusion and deception.
There is nothing “ managed “ about the mess he has created in Syria with nothing more than a phone call to Ergodan.
We will be fortunate as a country if Trump is removed from office before he gives away Ukraine to the Russians.
Do you really think that Trump is going to rush to the aid of Ukraine if Putin decides to invade and take over?
No, not a chance.
Don’t think it could happen? Just wait and see.
Bottom line.... Trump needs to go ASAP !
1
@SB and Beth
Allow me to clarify the difference between a managed and chaotic decline.
A managed decline will occur over a decade or two, where the U.S. will pull back incrementally from distant regions that are in the historical spheres of influence of other powers and/or less vital to the U.S. strategic interests.
For example, we’ll pull out of Syria which has been in the Russian sphere of influence for 70 years. But we’ll never leave Saudi Arabia or Gulf countries (and maybe not Iraq), because securing the global oil supply is critical. Looking far back into history, Emperor Hadrian established a classic blueprint for a managed decline of the Roman empire.
A chaotic decline will occur when the U.S. tries to overreach or maintain influence beyond what is possible with the military. A full-blown war will expose the U.S. weakness. A good example of this is the Russian-Japanese War, which exposed the limits of the Russian Empire (and contributed to the splintering of Russian society as well). Similarly, it took two world wars to destroy the British Empire.
Ask yourselves a simple question. How much empire can the U.S. afford? We already have a $800 billion defense budget and a $1 trillion dollar deficit.
(And, yes, in the short term Trump has mistakenly acquiesced to large increases in Pentagon funding. But if we reduce our global footprint, either Trump or another president will be able to reduce defense spending.)
1
Tom it's not clear that Trump really is pulling troops out of overseas conflicts or just reshuffling them to support countries like Saudi Arabia, while claiming that he's bringing them home. It would be a real service to report on what is actually happening as opposed to what Trump claims.
36
Up until now I was convinced we won the Cold War. Because the Soviet Union has ceased to exist. That has been a pyrrhic and premature victory. Russia, not the Soviet Union though has an agent occupying the White House, the citadel of our government.
It is about time we examine more critically the arc of history and rededicate ourselves and go for diadem. To push tRump out of the White House is a task that must be done pronto
Cry for the beloved country
39
Friedman overreacts to the removal of US soldiers.
The Kurds were not our first allies. The CIA was arming and training rebels before ISIS appeared. Remember the Free Syrian Army? Or politicians having their pictures taken with the likes Mohamad Nour or Abu Ibrahim. These groups turned over their US arms to al-Qaeda, melted away or joined the terrorists and our bands. Friedman mentioned Idlib, Patrick Lawrence puts it at 80% al-Qaeda.
What is Friedman’s final outcome?
Doug Bandow has written that none of the opposition could bring about a democratic Syria. Daniel Davis wrote about our intervention, “fails to keep us safe…damages our ability to effectively defend ourselves against potential threats elsewhere.”
Anthony Cordesman pointed out “the US cannot answer either the question of why the fighting should end or can end in a stable peace. In fact, at least the public side of American strategy seems to consist largely focusing on tactical victories against ISIS and pretending that the rest of Syria and the region do not exist or will magically become peaceful and stable because of some formal peace negotiations. Unlike Afghanistan, there is not even the shell of a plan to shape the future structure of the U.S.-back military forces in Syria or its security.”
Syria is not a zero sum game. Those seeking greater US involvement have no end game. Is it war for war sake? If it is peace and stability, then we are following the wrong strategies.
11
Escalators have consequences. Especially faux golden ones.
Seriously.
32
" ... make fine distinctions, leverage allies and amplify islands of decency."
Hopefully the American public have realised that America has no allies now. If you need help sorting out problems somewhere, it will only be American troops doing the fighting. No non-American politician would bother suggesting that it's time to help America - Trump has guaranteed that.
America is going to need a bigger army. Time to fire up the recruitment campaign so the army has the manpower to manage the difficult situations ahead.
The days of a few American troops leading a "coalition of the willing" in an inexpensive overseas intervention are done. Any future operations will be more costly, produce more dead Americans and will be far riskier.
As Trump would say "sad".
51
"Work smarter, not just harder"? America in its diversity has always managed innovative approaches to any problem. And perhaps that diversity is a source of greater empathy to the straits others find themselves in.
At least - this is what we should all be very proud of.
2
At the end of this piece, Mr. Friedman says America is better than all this, even if our President is not - which actually gives me pause. I'm not so sure. As a boomer, I grew up around the WWII generation. In general, they were highly disciplined and they valued community and citizenship. They were hard-working and patient, and they valued a principled life. They'd disagree over politics, but discussions were civil, and the other side wasn't an object of hatred. Congress actually believed our system of government was meant to accommodate compromise.
Of course, they were lucky to have avoided the upheavals of digitalization and the corporatization of news media. But I'm discouraged at how much civility we've lost and how little respect there is for informed citizenship. People take so much for granted, and they would rather be entertained by a reality-show president. Some seem to feel it's all a game and a joke. In 2016, I saw a couple at a Trump rally with T-shirts saying, "I'd Rather Be Russian". Really?
And our Congress is beyond dysfunctional, which makes it pretty much impossible to tackle big challenges like we used to. So I'm not sure we really are better than all this - although I know we can't give up trying.
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@original
In order to form a more perfect union, we need to keep trying. The people who are testifying in Congress these days can make us proud that we still have patriots willing to do the hard work of defending our Constitution, in spite of the powers of greed arrayed against them.
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@original
Beautiful! Thank you!
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@original I'm sympathetic to much of this but it is important to be precise. At the end you mean
"REPUBLICANS in Congress, particularly in the Senate are beyond dysfunctional."
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What we should have done is extracted support for an independent Kurdistan from our efforts to fight ISIS in Syria. But we didn't do that.
That said, I think Friedman gives short shrift to the other cost of Trump's betrayal: it's not only that allies will doubt our reliability and tenacity, it's that Russia will say that it has more of it.
This will prove dangerous in eastern Europe. It will also encourage China to do the same, which it has already started to do with its "Belt and Road Initiative."
The threat is that we will be isolated as our influence wanes in just the areas of the world where it is most needed, both for other nations and for our own.
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@CastleMan "What we should have done is extracted support for an independent Kurdistan from our efforts to fight ISIS in Syria. But we didn't do that.
"
Because we couldn't. We didn't have the leverage. Not only did we arm and fund and supply a huge number of "moderate" rebels that were intent on eradicating every non-Sunni and Assad loyalist without mercy, we completely ignored the public declarations of the internationally recognized government of Syria by sending troops within their borders in the first place.
The only way we could have helped the Kurds (realistically) with their aims would have been a full scale invasion of Syria with that specific aim. Which would have put our troops in direct military conflict with Iran, Russia, Syria, and Turkey (and likely pulling in the current Iraqi regime in direct opposition to our intervention to boot), likely launching WWIII.
A good summation of Syria.
But Trump does not care.
We've experienced bad presidents. But never a sociopath president.
Evidence against Trump for the Ukraine business is mounting. Hence, Mitch McConnell would be doing himself, the Republican Party, the country and the world a big favor by knocking out Trump by means of the 25th Amendment.
Mitch would beat the Democrats to the punch, and then install a nominee who would be viable in the minds of centrist Americans. Mitch McConnell is now facing the Republican Party going down with Trump. Mitch made a deal with the devil, and will be on the wrong side of history.
(I still very much favor Elizabeth Warren.)
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As much as I detest Trump and his green-lighting of the massacre of the Kurds, let's not act like his predecessors were saints.
In 2003, George W. Bush invaded Iraq under the pretext it had WMDs - a claim since proven false by admission of the man himself. Between 2003 and 2007 there was constant fighting between Sunni and Shia militias which even US ground forces couldn't tame.
The rise of ISIS years later was also a consequence of the leadership vacuum in the country following the invasion. Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the ISIS founder, was a former officer in Saddam's defeated army. Since the 2003 invasion, at least 300,000 Iraqis have died.
When the Arab Spring began in Syria in 2011, the US and Gulf allies funnelled arms to anti-Assad groups. It has been proven the al-Nusra Front was one of the beneficiaries. This group has elaborately massacred religious minorities in Syria. The power vacuum from fighting was what allowed ISIS to spread from Iraq and capture major cities in Syria such as Raqqa and Aleppo. 5 million Syrians fled their country and 6 million became internal refugees.
Of the DNC 2020 candidates, only Tulsi Gabbard has had the conviction to speak out against the armament of this al-Nusra Front as well as "regime change wars". She has been heavily censored in the mainstream media.
Trump is a disgrace for abetting the massacre of Kurds, but I fail to understand how Obama should have gained the Nobel prize, or how Bush should be absolved of blame either.
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I believe the plight of the Kurds to be a watershed event for the United States.
Their destiny, be it death or destitution is entirely in our hands now. We basically tricked them into weakening their defenses as recently as 3 weeks ago. This tragedy is all on us. The United States has never been more responsible for a foreign policy disaster as this one. There was Bosnia, there was Ruanda. Both horrendous genocides. but neither were actually caused by a feckless US policy decision. This one by Presidential fiat, NOT by our foreign policy establishment to allow one aberrant individual, be he a president or not, to drag our destiny into one that will go down in history as a near war crime is heinous.
There’s still time. Focus on changing this policy now, now, now.
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@RjW I walk around with such a heavy heart when I think about what Trump has done to the Kurds in our name. And we have their blood on our hands. We've always felt entitled to criticize other nations for their moral lapses. But we don't have that right any more.
I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop, to see ISIS fighters attacking targets in Europe and the U.S. We have no idea what awaits us and I am very fearful.
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@RjW
I agree this wiil be a stain on America's honor for years to come. To make amends America will in due course have to endorse the creation of an independent Kurdistan. Turkey will have to leave NATO. Heck of a job.
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@RjW I'm sure our military did not do this intensionally as they didn't know our stable genius was about to let Turkey invade, but the definition of perfidy in Wikipedia is:
"In the context of war, perfidy is a form of deception in which one side promises to act in good faith with the intention of breaking that promise once the unsuspecting enemy is exposed."
We did Erdogan's dirty deed for him. This is a stain on America that will never go away.
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Standing Together Under God And In Alliance With Our Brothers And Sisters. That Is What Is Expected By Our Allies With The U.S. Not A Socialist, Communist Country. But A Country With Separation Of Powers, Executive, Legislative And Judicial. And Our U.S. Constitution And Bill Of Rights. With Scientific Discovery And Religious Freedom. But Most Importantly With Civility.
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Domestic American policies influence the nation's foreign policy. Policies that have led to:
-Declining American standard of living -American Labor Movement moving backwards.
-The wealthiest individuals in America's 21st Century oligarchy pay less in taxes than the working poor. -Corporations still pay taxes?
-Insurance companies make record profits while one million children have just lost health care coverage.
-Mass shootings are regular events.
-The number of homeless individuals and families increases.
I can go on but you get the point Mr. Friedman. You attribute the declining role of America's place in the world to Americans being tired. Yes, Americans are tired...of the state of America's domestic situation.
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@John Q. Public
Churchill was right...when asked about democracy:
"Democracy?...the absolute worst form of government... except, of course, for all the others they try from time to time." As said previously, the jury's out on American democracy.
Sir Winston also said "The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter."
I recently spent a month-and-a-half driving to and through the American heartland. Many (most?) of these are not bad people, just uninformed about the vagaries of the world outside of their immediate environs. Understandable...and eventually it all comes back to bite them...e.g. the trade wars, and tariffs on soybeans and other MIdwestern produce and livestock.
Listening to 'The Farm Report' on local radio, I heard from 'local experts': "Well yes, those tariffs are hurting us, but The President has our back...he won't let it get out of control...abandon us. Things will get better."
It's called people unclear on the concept.
Trump did have one striking policy victory yesterday. He fired up his base to vote for former press secretary, Sean Spicer, on Dancing with the Stars.
As a result, Spicer got through to the next round, the judges were shocked and unhappy, and the loser--an attractive young woman who was a much better dancer than Spicer--was left crying uncontrollably.
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@bnyc "As a result, Spicer got through to the next round, the judges were shocked and unhappy, and the loser--an attractive young woman who was a much better dancer than Spicer--was left crying uncontrollably."
I thought people were supposed to vote based on the quality of performance, not who is the "better person" and thus "deserves" to win something which has nothing to do with the content of their character?
This is such a Politically Correct column.
Here's the brief, accurate version:
Donald Trump is a traitor who stabbed loyal American allies in the back, costing thousands of them their lives and hundreds of thousands of them their homes and security.
Dan Kravitz
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@Dan Kravitz
Well, it was brief.
@Dan Kravitz ....yes. I’m disappointed that Friedman felt the need to shower us with so much persiflage. Our president is a Russian tool. And the GOP should be forced to clean up his foreign policy messes, not merely make polite protests.
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@Dan Kravitz: Three cheers for you for stating things explicitly.
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“I feel terrible for the Kurds, but,” said the cheerleader for the Iraq War. How shameless. This is the same fellow who, in 2005, suggested in these very pages that "If they the Sunnis won't come around, we should arm the Shiites and Kurds and leave the Sunnis of Iraq to reap the wind.” I think we’ve had enough of your bloody suggestions, Mr. Friedman.
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"Finally, most everyone now understands (I certainly do) that we don’t have the time, patience, energy or know-how to create democracy in the Middle East. But what we can do and should do is amplify decency wherever we see it in hopes that the islands of decency there might one day connect up and flower into democracy."
"For instance, Iraqi Kurdistan and the Syrian Kurdish regions, while they have plenty of corruption and tribalism, are nevertheless islands of decency where women tend to be more empowered, Islam is practiced in more moderate forms and Western liberal education is promoted in American-style universities. In just walking away from the Syrian Kurds, Trump has weakened their island of decency, rather than amplified it."
_____________________
Well Said Thomas L. Friedman
Standing Together Under God And In Alliance With Our Brothers And Sisters. That Is What Is Expected By Our Allies With The U.S. Not A Socialist, Communist Country. But A Country With Separation Of Powers, Executive, Legislative And Judicial. And Our U.S. Constitution And Bill Of Rights. With Scientific Discovery And Religious Freedom. But Most Importantly With Civility.
5
In a few short years, Trump has converted the U.S. from a world power and moral authority to a second tier player led by the newest incarnation of Idi Amin.
Turkey and Syria have completed their pilgrimages to the power that is, Putin, and been assigned their share of the spoils. Everyone is simply waiting for the U.S. to get out of the way so the division can be formalized.
Beyond the obvious, we are probably ignorant of the actual impact in terms of confidential strategic agreements and sharing of resources. The lack of thinking in this regard was highlighted by the publicized episodes of American pilots bombing American bases to destroy supplies and equipment which could not be evacuated - Tax payer funded ordinance destroying tax payer funded equipment. Clearly an example of the highly skilled management provided by this administration and its Congressional fellow-travelers.
Now the world watches Iran, Turkey, Syria, and Russia negotiating the future of the northern Middle East, with the EU trying to play a part, but rudderless with the absence of its former partners. Just image what Trump could have done for Cuba if he had been in office when Castro first took over.
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Middle East strategies of previous Administrations have worked so well. All President Trump needed to do was follow the map of his predecessors and their advisory personnel.
Prior to the arrival of President Trump on the scene, there were scenes of bear-hugs, happy faces and general friendship. No acrimony, no fighting. Peace had prevailed for decades.
President Trump should have stuck to the same script, which was so clearly working. The best part about the former script was that it has cost America almost zero dollars. Not quite zero, of course - but close.
It had also earned for America great love and appreciation - it's too bad that all of the thank-you notes were delayed. They will be showing up soon. Real soon. Hopefully, once received, Mr. Friedman can publish some of these thank-you notes in his column.
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Undeniably, Trump's abandonment of our former ally and handing them off to Russia and Turkey is now complete. The cruelty of this reckless decision will heap suffering on people who have already suffered enough, they have sacrificed their homes, and lives on behalf of us. Now, dictator Erdogan will commit unimaginable atrocities. The epic disastrous decision by Trump to push the Kurdish forces and people under the bus will go down in history as the worst decision by a sitting president. Russia has what it wants, Turkey has a new super power ally, and Trump has betrayed our only genuine friends in the most volatile part of the world.
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@Marph77
American occupation of Syria was illegal in the first place. No one promised the Kurds a permanent independent state defended by American military in perpetuity. For starters, such a state would also be illegal and never recognised by anyone, not even US itself. How would that be different from what Russia did with separatist 'republics' in Eastern Ukraine and for which it is condemned and sanctioned? The Kurds always had to make arrangements with Assad and to rejoin Syria. And now they did. With US troops protecting them they would never have reason to do it. So removing the troops also served the bigger purpose of bringing peace to Syria and preserving its unity. What purpose would permanent and illegal US presence there would serve?
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@David You miss the point. A deal between the Kurds and Assad could have been accomplished by negotiation. This way the Kurds hate us, with justification, and every country in the world knows we are untrustworthy. What purpose is there in that?
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@phil You miss the point. The Kurds would never have negotiated with Assad or did it in good faith under unconditional American protection. Why would they? And who would? Nothing like putting a little fear of God into people to make them think hard about ensuring their long-term future. It was a brilliant move on Trump's part. And it worked too.
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It's funny how the article starts by referencing a Tony Blair, an architect of the Iraq debacle, but proceeds to chastise Trump alone where Middle East debacles are concerned.
Let's be objective enough to note that every administration has been complicit in today's problems.
After the Cold War, George HW Bush decided (bizarrely) to maintain defence spending levels at current levels even as the USSR disintegrated and ceased to be a threat. A journalist at the time even asked, 'So who's the enemy?'
After 9/11, the US had a legitimate right to act against the Taliban, which refused to extradite Bin Laden from Afghanistan. However, the invasion of Iraq in 2003 was a clear mistake. No WMDs were found contrary to the claims of Bush junior and Tony Blair. A whole country was also destabilised and more than 300,000 Iraqis have lost their lives in post-invasion violence.
The repercussions for the US have been severe too. The US $4.9 trillion expended on prolonged wars could've been invested in education, industry or healthcare.
The election of Obama brought an end to major interventions (i.e. boots on the ground), but he decided to oust Gaddafi in Libya. Pre-intervention Libya was an affluent (and stable) country. By attempting regime change and toppling Gaddafi, Libya was plunged into civil war (lasting till today). The number crossing the Mediterranean by boat reached the hundreds of thousands per year thereafter.
Everyone is to blame...
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@Jack
Yes, let's understand past history.
But let's be objective enough to admit this new problem is all Trump's doing.
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@Martin
You're right. I, in no way, support the man.
However, I don't recall this level of criticism against his predecessors. Apparently, if your'e more likeable and less crass it's easier to get away with murder.
What are we teaching our children? And what has this world come to?
5
@Jack, you make some good points. However, neither G.W. Bush nor Obama betrayed our allies and empowered Russia. That's a supremely critical distinction.
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Deserting the Kurds on the battlefield so a ruthless dictator like Erdogan could slaughter them, with zero remorse from Trump, is a dark, long-lasting stain on America.
Those images of angry Kurds throwing potatoes and rotten vegetables at our evacuating troops are being shown throughout the world and celebrated by our enemies. Our foreign policy is in utter disarray. Nobody, ally or adversary, can trust Donald Trump.
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@Mark McIntyre
Who is ' our enemies '?
Who is ' our'?
Turkey is a NATO ally.
There is no Kurdistan.
Since 9/11/01 a mere 0.75% have volunteered to wear the military uniform of any American armed force.
While the rest of us pretend to be brave honorable patriots by rising to sing the national anthem and saluting the flag at sporting events.
Saladin was a Kurd.
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@Mark McIntyre
No one will slaughter anyone. Calm down and see peace break out in Syria at long last.
6
@Mark McIntyre Yes, Mark...he 'who shall not be named' has done decades of damage to America's national interests. But, the question remains, "Why?"
Why does 45 continuously throw America's allies under the bus?
How does 45 continue to miraculously do Russia's Eternal President so many favors?
Is 45 some uncanny 4D chess master?
Is 45 an incredibly 'stable genius'?
Is 45 able to remotely channel Putin, and read his mind?
Are Putin and 45 on the some magical spiritual wavelength?
Does 45 have a mysterious psychic link with Putin, that enables him to divine, and summarily manifest all of Putin's malevolent anti-American desires?
Or...does Putin have pee tape kompromat on 45p?
To answer this plethora of befuddling questions I will defer to the preeminent words of the wise philosopher, William of Ockham:
"Ockham's razor is a principle from philosophy. Suppose there exist two explanations for an occurrence. In this case the one that requires the smallest number of assumptions is usually correct. Another way of saying it is that the more assumptions you have to make, the more unlikely an explanation."
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"Americans want a break. President Trump is not wrong about that."
What, exactly, is Trump "not wrong about?" What, exactly, do "Americans" want a break from? Neither is clear to me.
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@John A ton of us are sick and tired of forever wars and playing global morality police, determining who is righteous and who needs to be bombed into oblivion.
I may completely disagree with Trump's overnight decision to simply run away without any exit strategy, but I am 100% in agreement that we should not be in Syria period (and never should have been, especially given that the internationally recognized government of that nation repeatedly stated he did not want a single US soldier within his borders - ever).
It is depressing to me that so many "progressives" and "liberals" have gone from "war is bad" to "war is good if Trump is against it" without so much as 10 seconds of reflection on their supposed values.
One has to admire Mr. Friedman's chutzpa in leading in his argument with Tony Blair's eloquent oration in defence of the biggest lie, the biggest mistake and the biggest shameless propaganda effort leading to the biggest foreign policy disaster and the biggest unnecessary violent loss of lives and treasure in the 21st century. That is truly an unorthodox way of making an argument in favour of more of such "humanitarianism". And doing it with a straight face, like no one knows or remembers anything? Bravo!
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@David • And Friedman was one of the biggest boosters of the Invasion of Iraq - a war of opportunity based on lies.
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@Walter...
'you are correct sir"...as WFB used to say.
Friedman has been wrong, or off base on a number occasions...but he rarely sticks to a position when he's proven / or determines he's wrong.
We need Tom and his great knowledge of the ME to weigh in on these topics...today more than ever. The old 'solutions' haven't really worked very well, and the new administration solutions of 'blowing things up', and asking for 'payment' will prove to be even worse, particularly for the ol' US of A.
It all comes down to the president of the United States. It was, not very long ago, a respected and revered institution. No longer, and sadly, Republicans don't really care about America's stature in the world. For them, it's nationalism and nativism; tax cuts, deregulation and an insular interpretation of governance that excludes most Americans.
The Middle East was never fertile ground for democracy; witness Israel. Even Egypt, which took a wild swing at it early on in President Obama's first term, became what it was always seemingly meant to be: an autocratic dictatorship in which the military is the cabinet and the law is what Abdel Fattah el-Sisi says that it is.
President Obama was ridiculed and scorned for his "red line" in Syria but most Americans don't remember (or don't care) that Mitch McConnell stabbed the president in the back, saying first that he would back the president in an offensive and then grandly stating that if he went along with his "red line," he would begin impeachment proceedings for starting a war without Congressional approval. What choice did President Obama have?
The nuclear deal with Iran was working until Donald Trump broke it. ISIS was a moving target in both Iraq and Syria and a war-weary America wanted an end to it. But presidents, as I said above, matter. It's how one approaches an insoluble problem. No. 44 was patient--perhaps too patient, while No. 45 is reckless and without intelligence.
He gave the Kurds to Turkey. For nothing.
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@Red Sox, ‘04, ‘07, ‘13, ‘18
Israel isn’t a democracy? lol.
Egypt was NEVER a democracy, at least NOT a liberal democracy! Give a Muslim majority country a vote and you’ll get a vote for Islam/Muslim Brotherhood.
Obama’s ‘red line’ was far worse than Trump’s withdrawal ... 500,000 Syrians are dead and Millions are still under thumb of a Vile Dictator. Giving Russia a re-entry into the Middle East, as a power broker/player.
The JCPOA was/is a bad idea that is obvious to anyone looking at the malign influence Iran has in Syria/Yemen/Iraq and their recent attacks on shipping and on Saudi Oil fields. Obama was wrong to empower Iran, a vile Jihadi/Islamist government.
Trump is a stooge, a fool but he was elected by the American People. His foreign policies are no better or worse than more ‘brilliant’ policy wonks ... the Kurds were NEVER going to get a state of their own AND Turkey’s Erdogan would NEVER accede to such an idea! Syria and Turkey share a huge border with Kurds living on both sides of that border ... it’s their issue. It was NEVER anything more than a transactional deal ... US military helps destroy IS/Daesh which had taken over the Kurdish ‘homeland’ AND the Kurds do the fighting and dying for their ‘homes’
Trump was right. No pun intended ... lol
Sorry @tzatz...who's the stooge?
trump's "foreign policies"?...surely you jest.
It seems to me that in a tacit agreement, Trump is doing everything that Putin would like to be done when it comes to the world at large. Tom's point is interesting though. Putin wins but can he make it work for Russia. Given their economy, they cannot sustain rampant military adventurism all over the world. Syria would be a test case. If Putin wanted to put back together the old Soviet Union, he is not making any moves in that direction.
In the meanwhile, China is pleasantly sitting back and watching this show......
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@Shishir I think Putin is pushing Trump to get Putin’s wishlist done before he’s impeached. I wonder what Putin has on Trump and whether it will come out once Trump is useless to Putin.
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@Shishir:
Russia has only ~ $200 Billion in external debt; compare that to US's of $22 Trillion, but that's not the point. If Russia needs to take out a loan, China could easily foot the bill; others would easily step in as well. . .
7
There is no uncertainty for our allies anymore. The United States of America has become a satellite of Russia under our current president. That has become more and more evident every day.
If the Senate will not convict after the House impeaches, then the game is over. Checkmate. Putin wins.
And we stare into the abyss.
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"In taking responsibility with the Kurds for defeating ISIS in Syria, we relieved Russia, Iran, Hezbollah and al-Assad of a huge burden, enabling them to crush the regime’s domestic rivals. And what’s really crazy is that — *we did it for free!* We didn’t even demand autonomy for our Syrian Kurdish allies or power-sharing with moderate Sunni Syrian rebels ... and dumping the Syrian Kurds after they sacrificed 11,000 men and women in the fight against ISIS ..."
Turkey -- in addition to killing our Kurdish allies -- has been releasing ISIS prisoners.
So what did 11,000 Kurds die for?
Why have American troops risked their lives in Syria?
What have we done? What a nightmare.
Putin is in control. And he is not troubling himself over slaughtered Kurds or released ISIS prisoners. Control of Syria is his big prize.
No one should trust the US at this point. With Trump as president, we are isolated in the world. That is an unsustainable situation.
12
This is the opposite of what an ‘America first’ foreign policy would look like.
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This is a very interesting perspective on the issue and I very much appreciate the insights revealed. As an outsider, I find it most concerning that even though the ME is seemingly perpetually in chaos, the Kurds were able to maintain decency. Even as they were betrayed by the US, the worst they could muster is throwing old fruit at the US trucks as they left. From my perspective, for the first time in a long time, America is alone.
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I feel kind of bad replying to my own post, but I don't think people realize with this action in Syria, the harm it has done to the United States. The Kurds supported the US enthusiastically. They could have gotten better deals elsewhere, but they chose to stay with the US.
As a Canadian, I stood on a bridge in Belleville, Ontario and watched the convoy of Canadian Heroes who had died fighting America's war in Afghanistan. It was called the Highway of Heroes. Everyone on that bridge was crying. Nobody said they shouldn't have gone.
The first thing Trump did was kill NAFTA, attack our marketing boards and ram an unpalatable trade deal down our throats or else. He called us unfair, insulted our Prime Minister and turned America against us. Do you seriously think we'd fight for America again?
I personally love America. I grew up next to Buffalo and spent my summers in Vermont and absolutely love the American people. Why are you letting someone destroy all of that much deserved goodwill? I can say, without any reservations that the American people are the most generous, hardest working, most compassionate, fair and honest people this planet has ever seen. They are a greatest force for freedom this world has ever seen. It's just that they're not seeing it right now.
Sorry for my mild rant. Mike
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No apology necessary.
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@Mike Please keep in mind that the majority of us never wanted this lunatic to be president. We can't stand him and want him to be removed from office.
Trump is not capable of turning the US against Canada and he certainly has not done so. Many Americans know little about Canada and I cannot imagine that more than a tiny minority of us harbor any ill will at all toward Canada. I don't know why anyone would feel that way.
This is a sad time in our history but I believe that most Americans are superior in every way to 45. And we will continue to like Canadians. Try to think of this as a passing disease that we will soon be rid of if all goes well.
18