What is the strategy in Syria?

[Plane]

  I don't see overwhelming force being used, I don't see locals being effectively trained , I don't see enough of anything to fit any strategy I know about.

    Except one , and I don't want to think it of President Obama.

     Fly paper.

     A strategy of attracting as much of the enemy into a kill zone as possible , keeping attacks tolerable by the enemy until the environment is so thick with them that every bomb kills a few of them, then the shelling starts in earnest, eliminating a lot of the problem by killing the most and worst as efficiently as can be.

      Is President Obama this cold?  Or is the situation we see the result of dithering and lack of strategy ?

       Does this make a difference? The ISIL is a concentration of the most earnest and faithful adherents of a particular sort of Muslim, the most that has been seen in modern times, and the international consensus is turning towards more force being used against them, so the flypaper strategy is being effected whether it was actually intended or not.

      Even more importantly, the Islamic state has behaved very badly during the time that they have been in charge of this territory, they have dishonored themselves and make their international support ashamed.

         When this chapter is over Islam might be more healthy than ever , but Jihad might never again amount to an international modern Children's Crusade.

[Xavier_Onassis]

Islam is a dogmatic and silly religion. but it is not a threat to others except when it becomes violent or tries to prevent minorities from having equal rights.

The same is true of many iterations of Christianity.

[Plane]

Islam is a dogmatic and silly religion. but it is not a threat to others except when it becomes violent or tries to prevent minorities from having equal rights.

The same is true of many iterations of Christianity.

Oh?  What equivalence do you want to point to?

The likeness of Islam now and Christianity six hundred years ago?


Or the rampaging Christians who are massacring thousands of non-Christians ,beheading and burning and bragging about it right now.

[Xavier_Onassis]

If you notice the polls, Americans want the government to destroy Isis immediately.
They also are overwhelmingly against  sending a large invasion force to do it.
Experts tell us that American troops in large numbers will only infuriate nearly all Iraqis and Syrians other than the Kurds, and that only a Muslim force can be effective at destroying Isis.

It is an very difficult problem. We know from experience that sending American troops in to bust down doors, arrest hundreds and use massive force has not worked and will not work.

[Plane]

Do you mean the "Surge" did not work?

It did work.

Or did you mean that it did not solve the problem for all time with one event?

It didn't do that.

The other choice is to bomb as heavily as we bombed Serbia, that kinda worked too, but nothing is perfect, the collateral damage was a high butchers bill.

[Xavier_Onassis]

If the surge had actually worked, then there would have been no Isis. What the presence of American troops does is to breed radical Islamic movements. But it did not do this instantly, as this is based on attitudes and those change more slowly.

Why would anyone assume that another surge would produce a stable Iraq when the first one did not?

The American public dos not want anther surge: they do not want to see troops killed, they do not want to pay the cost.

They can bomb and use drones, and send a limied bunch of advisers, and that is what Obama has done.

[sirs]

Oh ye of so much blinding ideology.  We were NOT winning the war in Iraq, until the surge.  The surge is what ultimately took us over the op in accomplishing the mission of taking out Saddam and any WMD threat most all of us believed he had

ISIS came about as we languished in not better supporting and pushing Iraq to get their new found democratic act together, then hit the accelerrator as soon as they knew when we were to pull out....thank you very much Obama.

Surge & ISIS.....apples & oranges, simply in the same cart.  One did not beget the other

[Xavier_Onassis]

The Surge imported huge amounts of American weapons with the troops that used them. The troops left, but the weapons were left with the incompetent Shia  dominated Iraqi Army, which fled in terror at being attacked, leaving their weapons behind. It is American weapons that have enabled  Isis to become powerful.

The US advisers obviously misjudged the competence of the Iraqi Army. Isis is a direct result of the surge.

[sirs]

The troops left......and.......?  The surge worked.  It deposed Saddam and the presumed WMD threat.  Had we done a better job of supporting the new Iraqi regime, and most importantly, DID NOT SET A DATE FOR OUR DEPARTURE UNTIL IRAQ WAS READY TO RUN THINGS ON THEIR OWN, all those weapons you refer to would be in the hands of the Iraqi army, and able to fight off ISIS with them

Apples & Oranges

[Plane]

  There are a lot of things that could have been done better.


   One of these things is not to produce a power vacuum without being willing to fill it somehow.

   Another perhaps is to avoid giving the enemy a certain date for our withdrawal.

[Xavier_Onassis]

The Iraqi Army was technically competent, but they were cowards. Their cowardice was not due to a date for withdrawal. Another year's training would not have made them brave.

[sirs]

We'll never know now, will we

[Xavier_Onassis]

If you were a coward, would another year's training make you brave?

[Christians4LessGvt]

it really doesn't matter what anyone says, thinks, or does
it really doesn't matter what the cry-babies protest
many of the Muslim Countries will have strong brutal dictators in place to keep order
that usually works unless outside super powers get involved supporting opposition
some of us have now learned the Saddam's, the Assad's maintain order
and they do it by being just as brutal to the "ISIS starter kits" before they become ISIS
there is really no ISIS in Iran, Morocco, etc...because the brutal leaders don't put up with it.
my close friend from Morocco says sometimes after an incident guys w/long beards are rounded up & never seen again
on some levels fire has to be fought with fire
 

[sirs]

If you were a coward, would another year's training make you brave?

If I were a coward, I wouldn't have been in the military to begin with.    Suffice to say, that following the surge's success at removing the Saddam regime from power, with mission accomplished, we screwed the Iraqis in 3 ways, following the war
- We disbanded the original military (all Bush's fault)
- We broadcast a specific date of our departure (all Obama's fault)
- We didn't leave a reactionary force, upon our leaving, which we have done following countless other wars (all Obama's fault)