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Vol. 80/No. 25 July 11, 2016
(front page)
State Dept. rift shows US imperialism’s
Syria quandary
BY BRIAN WILLIAMS
A rift within the U.S. government became public in mid-June when an
internal State Department “dissent channel” memo disagreeing with
President Barack Obama’s course in Syria was leaked to the press. Signed
by 51 diplomats, the memo calls for using missiles and airstrikes
against the Bashar al-Assad regime.
The Obama administration’s course has been to direct U.S. airstrikes
against Islamic State, give limited aid to Kurdish forces in northern
Syria — who have been the most effective force against Islamic State —
and to rely on cooperation from Moscow to rein in the Assad regime.
Obama’s 2012 declaration of a “red line” in Syria if the regime used
chemical weapons, turned out to be a bluff. Instead, viewing Assad as
the lesser evil to Islamic State, Washington under Obama has
collaborated with Moscow and Tehran, which back Assad, to try to bring
some stability to the country.
The memo says, “A more muscular military posture under U.S. leadership
would underpin and propel a new and reinvigorated diplomatic initiative”
and that Washington should take measures to ensure that the Syrian
“regime’s warplanes are grounded.”
The release of the memo, the number of diplomats who have signed and its
criticism of the course of the commander in chief of U.S. imperialism in
the midst of a shooting war is unprecedented. Washington’s has more than
4,000 U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq and 300 special forces in Syria.
Secretary of State John Kerry, former CIA Director David Petraeus and
former Secretary of State and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary
Clinton all argued for a similar approach presented in the memo.
In an interview with CBS June 20, Vice President Joe Biden reiterated
the administration’s line that Assad’s rule is the lesser evil. Pointing
to the ouster of Libya’s President Muammar Gadhafi through military
operations by U.S. and other imperialist powers that has led to chaos
there, Biden drew the analogy to Syria. “He’s gone. What happens?
Doesn’t the country disintegrate?” … “Tell me what we’re going to do.”
The next day Kerry met with eight of the 51 dissenting diplomats. The
New York Times description that “the session was an unusual one,” is
accurate both for Kerry’s personal views and that the meeting took place
at all. Paraphrasing the conversation, the Times reported that Kerry
told the diplomats, “What would happen if American forces came into an
accidental confrontation with the Russian Air Force, which has defended
Mr. Assad? What if American pilots were shot down?”
The State Department split comes from the inability of U.S. imperialism
to put in power an alternative to the Assad regime no matter what
tactics are tried.
The more than five-year-long civil war began after the Assad regime —
based on a narrow layer of capitalist families, mostly from the Alawite
minority, a branch of Shiite Islam — attacked massive protests demanding
political rights and the end of his dictatorial rule. In the absence of
any working-class leadership, Islamist and secular groups — based among
the Sunni Muslims who make up 75 percent of the country — began
competing for territory and fighting government forces. At the same time
Kurdish fighters have taken advantage of the conflict to establish an
autonomous region in the north.
Nearly half a million people have been killed. More than half of Syria’s
23 million people are displaced, with millions in refugee camps in
Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, and hundreds of thousands seeking refuge in
Europe.
According to the Syrian Network for Human Rights, the Assad government
has killed many times more civilians than has the reactionary Islamic
State.
As part of a Washington-Moscow brokered cease-fire agreed to in February
that rapidly fell apart, the Assad government agreed to allow food
deliveries to some areas besieged by Syrian government forces. Food was
delivered for the first time in four years to Daraya, a rebel-held town
outside of Damascus June 10, but the same day Syrian military aircraft
bombed the town, hampering distribution of the aid.
U.S. forces expand role in Afghanistan
The Obama administration in early June approved a more aggressive use of
U.S. troops and airstrikes in Afghanistan in battles against the
Taliban, who now control more areas of the country than at any time
since the 2001 U.S. invasion.
There are about 9,800 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, the majority of whom
function as part of NATO operations there. The White House had
previously announced plans to reduce its forces by nearly half this
year, but is now reconsidering this, according to Reuters. In mid-June
NATO decided not to go through with a troop reduction and closure of
bases there.
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