In the Feb. 8, DI, the Daily Iowan Editorial Board’s decided to back “Obama’s proposal” as prudent, “ targeting the No. 1 national-security threat … Russia.”
This is Yellow Journalism.
Another Vietnam in the making?
“In February 2014, Russia invaded Crimea, which was then part of Ukraine — Crimea was annexed into the Russian Federation and set off a civil war.”
Mark Mazzetti’s report Oct. 15, 2014, New York Times: “CIA study Says arming rebels seldom works.” The CIA has run guns to insurgencies across the world during it 67-year history, from Angola to Nicaragua to Cuba. The CIA effort to train Syrian rebels is just the latest example of many American presidents’ folly at using the spy agency to covertly arm and train rebel groups. An internal CIA study found that it rarely works.
In April 2013, President Obama authorized the CIA to begin a program to arm the rebels based in Jordan and expand the training mission with parallel Pentagon programs in Saudi Arabia training “vetted” rebels to battle ISIS, with the aim of training approximately 5,000 rebel troops per year.
Mark Thompson in “The U.S. War Against ISIS Is Going Nowhere,” *Time*, Oct. 5, 2015: The first batch of specially trained moderate Syrian rebels deployed in late July. “This group deemed adequately trained,” says a spokesman for U.S. Centcom, responsible for the program.
“The American effort has failed in form and function,” says a recently retired U.S. four-star general. “It will need to be completely reworked or dropped as a failure.”
The war could be going even worse than it appears. U.S. intelligence analysts at Centcom have alleged that their military superiors [as in Vietnam] have been spinning the war to make it appear the ISIS campaign is going better than it actually is.
There are few good options available for the U.S. military in Syria. President Bashar al-Assad is fighting for his life, politically and otherwise, against all rebel factions, including ISIS. Rebel groups fighting among themselves, Kurdish forces fighting ISIS with U.S. aid, NATO ally Turkey is fighting the Kurds, complicating alliances. The chaos triggered the biggest refugee crisis in Europe since the end of World War II.
Republican presidential candidates believe “boots on the ground” is the answer. Over the past 15 years, the U.S. has tried several military strategies in this part of the world: in Iraq, massive ground-force invasion; Afghanistan, smaller ground-force invasion; Libya, overt air war supporting local forces on the ground; Yemen, drone campaign. None have succeeded. Maybe there is no military solution to Syria and perhaps no solution at all.
The great distraction: Ukraine
Ukraine covers the entire southwestern frontier of Russia, and from the Russian point of view, it is the key to Russian national security.
Lothrop Stoddard and Glenn Frank in Stakes of the War (1918). “Ukraine Territories: Historical Background”: the Ukrainians (also known as Little Russians and Ruthenians) was once the center of Russian life. The modern Great Russians (the people generally spoken of as Russians today) are really the descendants of colonists from the original Ukrainian center who migrated to the great forest regions of north Russia and there mingled their blood with Finnish tribes, becoming thereby a different stock.
They speculate what would become of Ukrainia (the original name) at the 1919 Peace Conference. An independent Ukrainia would certainly include both Russian and Austrian Ukrainians. Such a solution would satisfy Ukrainian nationalist aspirations, is unlikely. Russia would not want to release her direct hold on the valuable economic resources of this area, nor lose direct access to the Black Sea.
Russian fears
With NATO on its doorstep, the Russians understandably became alarmed. Russia saw no reason for the West to expand NATO unless sooner or later the West wanted NATO to be in a position to strike.
The turning point in relations between the United States and Russia came in 2004, when riots in Ukraine persuaded the Russians that the United States intended to destroy or tightly control them.
The Orange Revolution
The Orange Revolution rather than being a popular uprising was a carefully orchestrated coup, sponsored by the CIA and British MI6. Western money in Ukraine managed elections, but from the American point of view, there was nothing covert or menacing. Self-delusional, the U.S was simply building democracy.
Containment was the American strategy.
The enemy of my enemy is also my enemy
After 9/11, the Russian cooperated with the United States in two ways. First providing access to the Northern Alliance. Second, Russia used its influence to obtain air and ground bases in the three countries — Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan — Russia also granted flight privileges over its territory.
Russia’s understanding was that these bases were temporary, but after three years, the Americans showed no signs of leaving.
Mary Gravitt