We do have interests ~ one such interest are the several Christian communities still there. You side with the Sunni you sign their death warrant.
“You side with the Sunni you sign their death warrant.”
I don’t “side with the ‘Sunni’ “.
Yet idiots in this country want the U.S. to, on the mistaken notion that an enemy of my enemy is my friend; a mistaken notion the American people have been led to believe in, in spite of what that notion produced in Afghanistan between 1979-1989 - built up Al Queda and helped the Saudis and Pakistani ISI to create the Taliban.
Without a dime from the U.S. Russia was going to lose Afghanistan in time anyway, and we would not have had the pretense that the governments that followed the Russians ever were or would be our friends.
As much as we have our own problems with Russia, the Islamists are a threat to both of us.
Russia, no matter what it does in the Middle East in its opportunism to sell more Russian weapons to help shore up its sagging defense budget, is no match with our resources in the region.