When 72-year-old President Donald Trump announced Dec. 19 he’s pulling all 2,000 U.S. advisers out of Syria, the establishment had a seizure, fearing for the Kurds and a resurgence of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria [ISIS]. Trump’s 68-year-old Defense Secretary Gen. James Mattis expressed his dismay, announcing his retirement Dec. 20, in an apparent protest to Trump’s Syria policy. Yet before Trump ever announced his Syrian policy, Mattis was scheduled to retire from the Pentagon Feb. 1, 2019 something omitted by the anti-Trump broadcast and print media. Trump announced Mattis would finish up Dec. 31, replacing Mattis with 56-year-old Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of Trump’s biggest backers on Capitol Hill, met with Trump today at the White House, hoping Trump would revise his Dec. 19 announcement to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria.
Graham thinks keeping U.S. advisers in Syria is necessary to continue going after what’s left of ISIS and keeping Turkey from a military operation against the Kurd’s YPG militia, the U.S.’s main partner fighting ISIS in Syria. When the YPG asked Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Dec. 28 for protection from a possible Turkish onslaught, he moved the Syrian Army around Manbij, home to some 2,000 U.S. advisers and YPG militia forces. Graham learned that Trump was not abandoning the Kurds but coordinating with Russia and Syria to make sure no bloodbath occurs. “I think we’re in a pause situation where we are re-evaluating what’s the best way to achieve the president’s objective of having people pay more and do more,” said Graham, no longer worried about the president’s decision to leave Syria. Graham learned some things talking to Trump he didn’t know about Syria.
Meeting with Trump today Graham was less concerned about the Kurds or, for that matter, ISIS reconstituting in Syria or Iraq. Iraq announced today that they received the green light from al-Assad to bomb remaining ISIS positions. Graham’s argument today about keeping U.S. advisors in Syria involved concerns about checking growing Iranian influence and threat to Israel. Trump heard Graham’s concerns and looks poised to keep U.S. advisers in Syria a while longer. “We talked about Syria and he told me things that I didn’t know that make me feed a lot better about where we’re headed in Syria,” Graham said. Keeping U.S. advisers in Syria to check Iran’s growing influence made sense to Trump, not as concerned about the Kurds or about whether ISIS would reconstitute itself. Since taking office, Trump gave the military full license to go after ISIS it all its safe havens.
Spending the airwaves criticizing Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. advisers from Syria, the anti-Trump media have had a field day making Trump look bad. Quoting Mattis’s resignation letter, the anti-Trump media can’t stop ripping Trump, despite the fact that he promised to keep the U.S. out of more wasteful Mideast wars. Only since Trump became president has the liberal press backed U.S. wars in Iraq and Syria, for no other reason than to oppose Trump. Just like the border “wall” debate, the mainstream press opposes beefing up border because it would give Trump a political win. When Democrats take power in the House Jan. 3, 2019, they’ll fight Trump on a measly $2 billion in border funding to make him look bad. Neither incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) nor Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) have shown any interest compromising with Trump on border security.
With the government shutdown in its second week, Pelsoi and Schumer plan to advance legislation to reopen the government, bypassing Trump’s request for border security funding. When Trump vetoes their bill, they’ll try to damage Trump politically, blaming the mess on the president. Graham has said that the GOP won’t give in to Democrats refusal to fund border security, insisting the government will remain shutdown until they give Trump something for the border. When Pelosi and Schumer get rebuffed, they’ll be forced to cough up some funds for border security or watch the shutdown continue indefinitely. No matter how much they despise Trump or his border wall, Pelosi and Schumer will be forcesd to negotiate with Trump to reopen the federal government. At some point, government workers will turn against Democrats for not cutting a deal with Trump.
Citing Mattis or other four-star generals, like Gen. Stanley McChrystal, opposed to Trump’s Mideast policy doesn’t make the case that Trump’s wrong wanting to end U.S. involvement in Syria. Trump heeded Graham’s concerns especially about Iran’s growing influence in Syria, delaying the withdrawal of U.S. advisers. “We ought to ask what kind of commander in chief he had that Jim Mattis that, you know, the good marine, felt he had to walk away,” said McChrystal, not admitting that Mattis was due to retire in February 2019. Whatever Mattis’s beef with Trump, McChrystal should control his anti-Trump political instincts, rather than be exploited by the anti-Trump media. Whatever the reasons for Mattis’s resignation, Trump has a right to work with Pentagon personnel that share his vision of ending U.S. Mideast entanglements, including current troop deployments in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.
