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The cost of indecisiveness

Apr 26,2016 - Last updated at Apr 26,2016

US President Barack Obama is sending conflicting signals about his position on the Syrian war by ruling out a military solution to the country’s fighting, a position he has held ever since the Syrian civil war started, but at the same time deciding to deploy about 250 additional Special Forces members in the country, adding them to the 50 already there, ostensibly to fight Daesh by training and supporting the moderate Syrian opposition forces fighting this terrorist faction.

In a BBC television interview held Sunday in London, Obama emphatically dismissed the military option for Syria, calling the use of force to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad from power a non starter.

But are the US ground forces in Syria fighting only Daesh or are they staunchly on the side of the opposition forces and, as such, fighting government troops?

The US president also poured cold water on German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s proposal to create a safe zone in the north of Syria to serve as a sanctuary for Syrians fleeing the war, considering it too difficult to realise.

The US administration’s policy on Syria could be described as one steady and uncompromising in favour of a continued search for a peaceful resolution to the crisis even though such a quest remains and elusive for lack of the necessary foundation to attain it.

A bit Quixotic, that is.

The best test of the success or failure of a political and military stance is its outcome.

After five years of a war that led to the death of nearly 400,000 and the flight of about 4 million Syrians to neighbouring countries and beyond, the conflict is nowhere near solution and the balance of power see-saws.

That should be enough for all outside forces supporting this or that faction in Syria, the US included, to realise that their positions and “help” are a failure and it is time to change tack.

Yet, they all cling to their intransigent stances, at a high cost for Syrians.

Due to the US timid or indecisive policy on Syria for nearly five years, heavy Russian military intervention by air, sea and ground was made possible, leaving Washington with few options.

It still is not enough, it seems for the US to change course.

The outcome: continued war, more death and destruction in the country, more refugees unwelcome to Europe and the country that boasted the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, Damascus, rendered rubble and uninhabitable.

 

All this in plain view of the international community in the 21st century. Are we ever going to learn?

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