As America Leaves Syria, Iran Isn’t as Happy as You Think

WSJ ^ | October 20, 2019 | Ray Takeyh

[FreedomNotSafety]

There are many sound arguments about why the U.S. should not have withdrawn its modest presence. But the notion that the pullout empowers Tehran is belied by its leaders’ expressions of anxiety. The Middle East rarely offers a respite to ambitious nations, even Iran.

[SunkenCiv]

The Three Amigos

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani, Russia's Vladimir Putin and Turkey's Tayyip Erdogan meet in Sochi, Russia November 22, 2017. (photo credit: SPUTNIK/MIKHAIL METZEL/KREMLIN VIA REUTERS)

[cpdiii]

“If they want to kill each other we shouldn’t get in their way. Bring our boys home.”

If a nation or terrorist group is an existential threat to our nation we should kill them with extreme prejudice and efficiency. If they are not just let them get on with killing each other if we do not have a dog in the fight.

We should support our allies with military arms so they can defend themselves but not with American blood.

Our enemies should tremble in fear of harming us.

[SunkenCiv]

• Iran holds surprise military drills near Turkish border

[NorseViking]

The end of Cold War was bad for defence lobby. And it is one of many reasons.

[wastedyears]

So we invaded a country because of oil, and the lie that we were going to be energy independent? How was our safety threatened?

[MNJohnnie]

Because at the time we we still highly dependent on Saudi Oil and it looked like Saddam was going to keep rolling. We could not afford to have a Soviet client like Saddam controlling 1/2 the worlds oil. Remember this is still the era when the Soviet Unio’s Empire was dissolving.

Now that we finally woke up from 1960s radical environmentalism and are making ourselves energy independent again, and the Soviet Empire in Central Asia and Eastern Europe is gone, it past time we start re-thinking what really is in the USA National Security interests.

The world has change dramatically in the last 30 years, the group think in DC Swamp has not

[MNJohnnie]

Exactly where they should of been to make sure ISIS could not grow again. We had NO business in Syria.

Obmama, playing to domestic politics, pulled all US Troops out of Iraq right in time for hie 2012 re-election campaign. He, and Hillary, were told this was a massive mistake by the Pentagon but in typical Democrat Fascist Party way decided Politics trumped National Security.

[MNJohnnie]

No we invaded a country because we were locked in a bear hug with the ME tarbaby due to Bush 1 have meausre in Desert Storm. Bush locked the US into having troops on the ground in the ME in a forever ware to enforce the No Fly Zone and contain Saddam.

“Infidel” Troops that close to Mecca was a rallying cry for every wack job religous extremeist in the ME.

What Bush 1 should of done was taken out Saddam and then turned Iraq over to the UN and the Arab Legaue. Brought everyone home and had a gaint victory parade.

The Arabs and the UN would, of course, created a giant mess of Iraq just like the UN did in the former Yugoslavia. However that would NOT be the US’s problem cause we were back over the horizon not having troops actively involved on the ground. We can always project power into the ME, we should avoid being on the ground there for extended periods. Bush 1 screwed that posture up big time. 30 years later we still trying to recover from that mistake.