Posted on 10/24/2019 8:30:34 PM PDT by Zhang Fei
The US is reportedly planning to deploy tanks and other heavy military hardware to protect oil fields in eastern Syria, in a reversal of Donald Trump’s earlier order to withdraw all troops from the country.
The most likely destination for US armoured units is a Conoco gas plant near the city of Deir Ezzor, the site of a February 2018 clash between US special forces and Syrian regime-backed militias fighting with Russian mercenaries.
Fox News reported such a deployment was “likely” and that the tanks would come from units already in the Middle East. CNN said it would happen relatively soon.
Trump has justified his decision to stand US troops down to allow a Turkish offensive in north-eastern Syria at the cost of abandoning Kurdish partners, by saying he was “bringing the troops home”.
However, it is quite likely it would take more troops to deploy, maintain, supply and protect armoured units in the middle of the eastern Syrian desert than the roughly 1,000 that were in the country before the Turkish invasion.
The contradiction has been apparent in Trump’s remarks in recent days, in which he claimed the US had “secured the oil” even while withdrawing its forces.
“It would mean walling off eastern Syria as a US zone,” Aaron Stein, director of the Middle East programme at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Washington, said of the plan to put tanks around the Conoco plant. “You would have to protect it from the air. You have to supply it and then you have got to protect the road, presumably from Iraq. You can easily see a scenario where we end up with more troops in Syria than we started off with.”
On Thursday, Trump added to the confusion on Thursday by tweeting: “Perhaps it is time for the
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
And why does my illegally invading government think it has a right to steal sovereign Secular Syria’s oil?
I am so disgusted.
This is not news. President Trump has said there will be troops at the Syrian oil fields.
Good point. But if we’re not there to win, we shouldn’t be there at all, blood & treasure being what they are...
Ah yes. I’ve had similar thoughts.
Bump!
[And why does my illegally invading government think it has a right to steal sovereign Secular Syria’s oil?
I am so disgusted.]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_of_conquest
You do realize that we fought the Indians for 400 years for possession, don’t you?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Wars
Problem is, that’s probably not what we’re doing in Syria. And there’s no route to the sea, which means supply-wise, we either have to go through Iraq or air drop everything.
This is not only illegal, it is stupid.
I pray that Graham & Rubio haven’t talked Trump into this folly, which will end badly.
[This is not only illegal, it is stupid.]
It’s not going to happen, Trump hasn’t approved it and it isn’t practical.
Ankara, Turkey’s capital, and Moscow announced that Russian military police and border guards from Syria, Russia’s strongest ally in the Middle East, would jointly “enter” the Syrian border, beyond the area Turkish forces initially assaulted, to remove Kurdish groups within six days.
“The situation on the eastern bank of the Euphrates raises some flags,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday, referring to US military presence. “It is in that area beyond the control of the [US] and the US-led coalition have been actively creating comfortable accommodations, complete with electricity and water supplies and social and health services. Moreover, they were not even hiding that they wanted to create a quasi-state there.”
“I am sure that the implementation of this memorandum will strongly interfere with these plans,” Lavrov added. “In the final analysis, we will work to nullify them.”
Brett McGurk, the former US envoy to the anti-ISIS coalition, said Trump “seems not to realize the extent to which the entire position in NE Syria has unraveled.”
“Under the Putin-Erdogan deal, the Syrian regime will take control of the main border crossings with the Iraqi Kurdistan Region at [Faysh Khabur] and Rabiya,” McGurk said on Twitter, referring to vital towns that border Syria, Iraq, and Turkey.
“Putin and Erdogan want us out,” McGurk added. “That’s been their plan for some time. What they agreed to yesterday makes it very difficult to realistically maintain a US presence, let alone one that might meaningfully impact the situation on the ground in Syria or against ISIS.”
McGurk, who resigned in December, citing Trump’s “complete reversal” of US policy that came as a “shock,” also said the small number of special-operations forces still in the region would face logistical complications after the military campaign.
Trump announced he would keep a small military contingent in Syria to protect oil fields, a goal Trump’s backers have advocated for, but which confused some military officials: “I don’t know where all this oil infrastructure stuff is coming from,” a senior US official said to Al-Monitor. “Maybe playing to what [Trump] wants here. We have not seized the oil fields.”
“How would a small residual US force be sustained without land supply,” McGurk said. “Extremely difficult and high risk. In military affairs, you don’t preserve options after making a catastrophic decision without thought or preparation. You foreclose them, as last three weeks demonstrate.”
More at: https://news.yahoo.com/trumps-plan-leave-us-troops-194123345.html
So if China arms Mexican & Mexican-American insurgents to take over Texas oil fields, we have no right to complain, when China shows up, if they’ve got the power to do it.
When American military might diminishes, as is inevitable given the debt load & cultural decline, we can watch this.
It’s better to have rules people abide by.
Israel & Lindsey Graham want our boys there on the Syrian oil fields, and it gets them off Trump’s back. I’d rather have Israel put its troops there, but they’ll probably get hurt & we can’t let that happen.
It’s long past time we stopped paying the blood and treasure for Israel’s interests, they can take care of themselves just fine.
I believe Trump when he says he wants to end the wars and bring the troops home.
I don’t think this is going to happen, it’s just the warmongers trying to pressure him into starting an all out war with Syria.
Where are these tanks coming from? Iraq? Afghanistan? Saudi?
This is a lie.
Tax free off the book oil smuggling operations is too mucho plata to easily part with.
Yep. Foreign media shows US military withdrawal and Kurds throwing food at them in disgust for perceived ‘betrayal’. Syrian troops are driving pass them in the opposite direction and everybody flipping birds at each other.
At least we can dispense with all the high minded talk. We are simply yet another aggressive expansionist nation.
That’s a lie, but also classified.
Who is leaking?
[So if China arms Mexican & Mexican-American insurgents to take over Texas oil fields, we have no right to complain, when China shows up, if they’ve got the power to do it.]
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