A fighter with the Free Syrian Army fires a weapon during clashes with forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo on Sunday. (REUTERS/Rami Zayat)
Washington Post: Pentagon leaves door open to strikes against Syrian regime
Top Pentagon leaders on Wednesday left the door open to the possibility of American military strikes against Syrian forces to protect U.S.-trained rebels, but cautioned that no decisions have been made.
Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter both acknowledged that the United States has some obligation to support the moderate rebels who will be trained to fight Islamic State militants in Syria. But any military action against Syrian troops or installations – which thus far in the U.S.-led campaign have not been targeted — would raise myriad complications, including the prospect of retaliatory action by forces loyal President Bashar al-Assad.
WNU Editor: The possibility that the U.S. may launch military strikes against Syrian units that are probably staffed with Hezbollah fighters and Iranian military advisers is .... to put it bluntly .... not going to happen.
4 comments:
Never say never.
You've got that right Phill. This administration has gone through the "Looking Glass".
Never say never. LOL .... that is my favorite line. But yes .... I should not say never .... I should have said unlikely.
This is kind of an invitation for the regime to give up on it's little Jabhat al Nusra campaign that it's currently undertaking and focus solely on the western-backed guys for the next month. Why does the DOD keep making these premature announcements? I imagine the idea is to normalise the public to the idea of direct military involvement against Assad, but the SAA and SAF are a slowly churning land-grabbing machine right now and wherever they choose to redirect their inertia they're seeing big gains against the rebels. It's just bad strategy; unless the real motive is to maintain the status quo by empowering the rebels with millions while simultaneously painting a big ol' target on their boys' backs.
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