US sends hundreds of marines to Syria to support fight against Isis

[bathroommonkey76]

Source: The Guardian

A few hundred marines with heavy artillery have been deployed to Syria in preparation for the fight to oust Islamic State from its self-declared headquarters of Raqqa, a senior US official said on Wednesday.

The deployment is temporary but is a sign Donald Trump’s White House is leaning toward giving the Pentagon greater flexibility in making routine combat decisions in the fight against Isis.

Military commanders frustrated by what they considered micromanagement under the previous administration have argued for greater freedom to make daily decisions on how best to fight the enemy.

The marines moving into Syria are positioning howitzers to be ready to help local Syrian forces, said the official, who was not authorised to discuss the deployment publicly.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/mar/09/us-sends-hundreds-of-marines-to-syria-to-support-fight-against-isis

[global1]

1. Since The Failure Of His First Failed Raid Where .....

he lost us a Navy Seal and was criticized for it - he decided to let the Pentagon have greater flexibility in making combat decisions so if there was a future loss of life - he could be absolved of any of the blame.

Some commander-in-chief - hmmmm......

[March 4th]

2. Mission Creep

And I'm not just talking about Trump.

[Mc Mike]

3. Great idea, dRumpfenfuhrer.

Coz the mission parameters are so well defined. Obvious objectives, two distinct sides in the conflict, opponents' territorial boundaries clearly marked out.

What could go wrong? Sure to be a smashing success. Obviously, we're backing the mass murderer who's running the country, that the repugs were trying to oust as recently as last year, the guy who's a puppet of Putin.

Bad time to be in our country's arrmed services, when the repugs have installed a brainless cowardly draft dodging war mongering chicken hawk into the CIC position.

[lunatica]

17. Don't forget a clear exit strategy

[Mc Mike]

19. The complete package, from a g o pee p o v.

[Achilleaze]

4. republican Draft-Dodger-in-Chief orders troops

into the military-industrial quagmire...

[HoneyBadger]

5. Hopefully not to kill 8 year olds, getting sick of that

[watoos]

6. I mean I'm just curious

who are the local Syrian forces that we are supposed to be helping, al-Qaeda, al-Nusra?

[bathroommonkey76]

10. President Putin will decide which side we'll be helping. n/t

[Ligyron]

7. Artillery, just as I thought when I saw this headline.

At least they'll be waaaay back from the front.

That way they won't have to see the mangled bodies of women and children when their syrian or kurdish forward observers call for a strike on a hospital or market place.

Still, all it takes is for one Marine to be captured somehow and we're off to an American propaganda campaign and full-scale ground war for sure.

Maybe ISIL will catch "Old Shoe".

[George II]

8. When Obama proposed to send troops to Syria republicans were up in arms. Where are they now?

[dalton99a]

15. +1

[KingCharlemagne]

9. Taking sides in another country's internal civil war. - nt

[DeminPennswoods]

11. After watching the atrocities ISIS/ISIL perpetrated

I believe the US should have deployed troops sooner and taken them head on years ago giving no quarter. These are evil people, on par with the Nazis in WWII.

[Marengo]

12. Agreed...this former Marine wishes he could go on this deployment. It's a "good" fight.

[mpcamb]

13. Maybe it is. But we're hated enough there. Doing it thru the UN would be smarter.

Moreover, giving trump a chance to be a 'war president' is a horrible idea with predictable consequences.

[Mc Mike]

14. You deserve respect, Marengo. But have you seen this breakdown of the factions?

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2012/0607/Syria-conflict-5-warring-factions/The-Assad-regime

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_armed_groups_in_the_Syrian_Civil_War

Who do our troops shoot, who do they safely turn their backs on? Makes discerning allegiances during the Viet War look like a cakewalk.


Here's repug prez candidate McCain with some of the opposition leaders he backed:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/5/31/1212774/-John-McCain-Photographed-Palling-Around-With-Terrorists-In-Syria-VIDEO

3 bircher repugs, Bachmann, Gohmert, and King made a couple high profile foreign policy photo op trips that same year together, to Egypt and Libya, while doing everything possible to ignore and distract from their party's constant flip flops on regime change in Syria. I can't dredge up the info, but they were backing some Russian arms manufacturer, in their Sep or Dec trip that year, who was shipping weapons to Putin's proxy, Assad. The story was covered by Maddow, I've been looking around with no luck to get a link on it, though.

Boots on the ground is a bad idea, any where in the Mid East. Even if we had a competent CIC. And of course, we don't.

[Marengo]

16. A confusing mess to be sure, and to be honest I've lost track of the various factions. I would...

Like to see the overall mission redefined to eliminate ISIS and not interfere with the Assad regime or its regain of control of formerly Syrian territory.

[Mc Mike]

18. Russia and Assad have been attacking our anti-ISIL coalition forces, though.

Assad is a butcher. So is Putin.

I've been opposed to all the little regime change moves that our hard line cons and neocons have pushed, for decades. But putting our people in harms way to help Assad get up on top again, and help Putin keep his flunky in place, seems like a typical repuglican mission. Our people's blood, dRumpf's 'guts'.