- 27 Apr 2017 07:03
#14800551
What comes after the US missile strike in Syria?
After experiencing a lot of hype after the missile strike, we have reached a point where the US seems to have nothing to offer to the people of Syria except support for the powers that have played a central role in fomenting the crisis in the first place. While the US president’s response to the so-called chemical attack did boost his domestic ratings and introduced a sense of conflict with Russia, he is yet to offer a practical strategy to wipe out real terrorist groups operating in Syria.
By now, we all know that Trump’s one strike, although initially over-praised as the beginning of a new era of US military engagement in the Middle East, was a lonely act and that such lonely acts achieve nothing but only escalate tension and allow the ruling elites to maintain a semblance of seriousness and firm resolve to fight the “evil” and restore the “good.” In geo-political terms, however, his resolve implies an absence of both a clear-cut strategy and refined political objectives.
No strategy!
Even in the words of former defense secretary William Cohen, “One strike doesn’t make a strategy”, and that the “US policy on Syria remains unclear”, arguing further that the US “strike does leave one with the impression that foreign policy in the Trump administration is not being made by carefully evaluating a situation, assessing various options, weighing costs and benefits, and choosing a path. Instead, it is a collection of reflexes responding instinctively to the crisis at hand”.
A continued absence of strategy indicates that the US, even after launching 59 missiles in Syria, has failed to carve out some space for its own geo-political manoeuvers. Not only does Russia remain in the driving seat, but the US remains severely restricted by the options it can resort to. Such a situation owes its existence not simply to Russian presence, although it certainly is an important factor, but mainly to the self-contradictory objectives the US is following in Syria i.e., the imperative of defeating ISIS and removal of Assad. Could it get any worse for establishment of peace?
Top US officials have so far failed to reconcile this contradiction, and it is this very absence of coherence that has eroded whatever impact the strike could possibly have left. While Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the United Nations, suggested that Assad’s ouster is now a priority, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson continues to insist that defeating the ISIS still tops America’s agenda.
This contradiction is being compounded by the fact that the Trump administration has so far been unable to break out of the Obama administration’s long aversion to another large scale military engagement in the Middle East. This is also evident from the way the US military has started to prefer using big-bombs instead of relying on boots on the ground in Afghanistan (read: the US drops MOAB in Afghanistan). The Syria missile strike is itself a clear indication of this very fact.
After experiencing a lot of hype after the missile strike, we have reached a point where the US seems to have nothing to offer to the people of Syria except support for the powers that have played a central role in fomenting the crisis in the first place. While the US president’s response to the so-called chemical attack did boost his domestic ratings and introduced a sense of conflict with Russia, he is yet to offer a practical strategy to wipe out real terrorist groups operating in Syria.
By now, we all know that Trump’s one strike, although initially over-praised as the beginning of a new era of US military engagement in the Middle East, was a lonely act and that such lonely acts achieve nothing but only escalate tension and allow the ruling elites to maintain a semblance of seriousness and firm resolve to fight the “evil” and restore the “good.” In geo-political terms, however, his resolve implies an absence of both a clear-cut strategy and refined political objectives.
No strategy!
Even in the words of former defense secretary William Cohen, “One strike doesn’t make a strategy”, and that the “US policy on Syria remains unclear”, arguing further that the US “strike does leave one with the impression that foreign policy in the Trump administration is not being made by carefully evaluating a situation, assessing various options, weighing costs and benefits, and choosing a path. Instead, it is a collection of reflexes responding instinctively to the crisis at hand”.
A continued absence of strategy indicates that the US, even after launching 59 missiles in Syria, has failed to carve out some space for its own geo-political manoeuvers. Not only does Russia remain in the driving seat, but the US remains severely restricted by the options it can resort to. Such a situation owes its existence not simply to Russian presence, although it certainly is an important factor, but mainly to the self-contradictory objectives the US is following in Syria i.e., the imperative of defeating ISIS and removal of Assad. Could it get any worse for establishment of peace?
Top US officials have so far failed to reconcile this contradiction, and it is this very absence of coherence that has eroded whatever impact the strike could possibly have left. While Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the United Nations, suggested that Assad’s ouster is now a priority, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson continues to insist that defeating the ISIS still tops America’s agenda.
This contradiction is being compounded by the fact that the Trump administration has so far been unable to break out of the Obama administration’s long aversion to another large scale military engagement in the Middle East. This is also evident from the way the US military has started to prefer using big-bombs instead of relying on boots on the ground in Afghanistan (read: the US drops MOAB in Afghanistan). The Syria missile strike is itself a clear indication of this very fact.
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