Amerika

I am deeply and profoundly disappointed in the man I played a bit part in helping to elect to The White House. President Trump, still my President, had to make a tough decision last night. He had to decide whether or not Bashir Assad should be allowed to deploy chemical weapons against Syrian Rebels. I believe he chose poorly when he launched a military strike against a Syrian airfield. He therefore needs to reverse his course of action and not involve the United States in further military action against Syria.

Every decision involves plusses and minuses. Even bad decisions have their plusses. Yes, I see the utility in scaring the crap out of North Korea. It’s not bad theatre to interrupt high profile talks with China to take the cell phone call. “Ah, yes, Syria. Launch all of them. Bet the house.” Hang up the cell phone. “Sorry, Gentlemen. Just had about 60 missiles to send flying. Now where were we on the agenda. North Korea, I believe it was….” But beyond that, I see no positive externalities.

Now we get to the vastly longer negative side of the ledger. How bad of a defecation sandwich we eat over military involvement in Syria will depend upon the length and ferocity of the involvement. We start with the stupid we already have in the bank. Show ’em what they win, Dom Pardo.

1. We have now established a policy of intervening when other nation states act internally in ways we consider amoral or wrong. President Donald Trump has just acted like The Church Lady. Nobody likes or respects The Church Lady. The like her even less when she wields the Holy Hand Grenade. Imagine the international “commentary” when President Trump really starts turning the screw harder on H1B Visas and illegal immigration into The United States. Sauce for the Goose is indeed sauce for The Gander. President Trump will learn that as other countries take this Syrian strike as a big green light to make Trump’s life had internationally any time he takes an internal decision they view athwart their national interests. Nice people don’t allow tyrants to gas their own people. Intelligent ones know when to stay out of other nations’ internal affairs.
2. Russia will take this as “Game On.” If the contest we are discussing is geo-political chess. I believe we can kick Russia’s collective rear end at many things. See the Cold War. Chess, I would not include on this list. Russian antipathy will not serve our nation well. It will particularly darken horizons in Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Ukraine and Georgia. The Bear has been poked. The hibernation may well come to a grizzly end.

Let’s say President Trump succumbs to even greater McCainification. An ongoing campaign of aerial dominance against the Syrian air force will lead to the following additional negative costs…

1. ISIS gets a lifeline. The Islamic State is a failed enterprise waiting to fail. All President Trump really has to do is let the various jackals they have pissed off devour them. Bashir Assad and Vladimir Putin are carrying out a very dirty undertaking job. Russia and Assad killing ISIS and Al Nusra is a positive. That would cease and desist from happening.
2. Russia’s navy takes an active and interfering role in The Black Sea and The Mediterranean Sea. Our operations there will be just like our operations in The Persian Gulf. It becomes another Vincennes Incident just waiting to happen. Diversity plus proximity could lead to some righteous violence.

In a worst case scenario, Donald Trump undergoes a horrifying transmorgification into George W. Bush. He puts boots on the ground of the hell. He would reap the following whirlwind of abject tragedy and stupidity.

1. Cindy Sheehan is returned to relevance by a turbo-charged Amerikan Left. If you think this post is anti-war, you have forgotten 2004-2006 American politics. Donald Trump’s presidency and any meaningful Amerikan political resistance to the Progressive agenda will be utterly destroyed for another ten years. Happy Obama II, morons!
2. America’s military breaks. We never repaired from the prolonged and draining OPTEMPO for nothing we racked up in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our Air Force will be a self-imposed no-fly zone due to overstress and deferred long-term structural maintenance.
3. Russia probably invades Georgia, the Ukraine or the Balkans in retaliation. Syria has been a Russian stalwart ally since the Assad family assumed power. It would never be tolerated.

So in conclusion, Donald Trump gains the short-term upper hand on The Korean Peninsula. Questions have been asked of Kim Jung Mentally Ill that he would not care to answer. He loses far more. The more he rides into the Syrian dung heap, the more he loses. The time has come for logic and reasonable dispassionate decision-making. This is not an utter disaster — yet. #NoWarinSyria is the correct American policy. I hope my president is perceptive enough to recognize this.

Tags: donald j. trump, syria, war