For a host of reasons, the long-suffering people of Syria are upbeat about the prospect of an immediate US withdrawal from their war-shattered country. They are hopeful this will mean the return of cities which the US backed its terror proxies and militants in taking to the population largely driven out by the fighting. Those in the Syrian government’s territory also clearly benefit, as while the US is entirely openly at war with them, US attacks are a big problem, and even in the best of times the US has tried to destabilize those areas in the name of regime change and democracy.
This meant the Syrian citizenry couldn’t trust the open sky, or any open street near to the gates of US base towers. It meant they couldn’t trust the future or have faith that the past would always be there. It meant they lived out their lives under US military rule and terror, and the constant threat of death, a quick death from a terror attack bullet or a rocket attack from an M16, or a suicide bombing. US occupation meant every day they died, and the world watched in silence.
This has also meant that in the grand scheme of things, US war-enthusiasts and proxy forces are the ones taking the dimmest view of this pullout, and who stand to lose the most. Within war-torn Syria, the US pullout mostly just amounts to one of the belligerent factions, one which has been bankrolling various different factions throughout the conflict, is simply being taken off the table going forward. Given the US resistance to peace deals that don’t conform to US demands, this can only be a good thing for compromise peace deals – if any.
However, the US war against Syria has gone nowhere. The regime-change campaign has been a disaster. The war has resulted in hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths and injuries as well six million people displaced within the country and five million people who have fled the country – not to mention the destabilization of the entire planet. The international civil society was right, and the US and terror proxy forces and allies were wrong. The war on Syria never should have happened and now it is ending - hopefully.
No doubt US withdrawal creates an opportunity to end the war on Syria and a chance for the United Nations to make peace a reality – although neocons, militarists, Israel and vassal regimes in the region continue to push for war and humanitarian destruction of Syria, based on new fake terror fears, and false chemical attack allegations et al.
Despite Netanyahu’s crazy claims, Iran has no military bases in Syria. Russia is drawing down its military activities too, with Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu reporting Russia is carrying out 100 to 110 flights per day at its peak and now they do no more than two to four flights per week, chiefly for reconnaissance purposes. Putin says ISIL has been defeated but casts doubt on Washington’s plans, saying, “We don’t see any signs of withdrawing US troops yet, but I concede that it is possible.”
This is unsurprising. The Pentagon regime says it will continue the air war in Syria. The Pentagon has not given any details on a withdrawal timeline, citing “force protection and operational security reasons.” This has to end too. There should be no plans for a long-term presence and air war in Syria.
In between, the US intelligence apparatus should also stop covert operations in the country as well. Trump has never said that his spy agencies should also stop their destructive operations in Syria after pullout. Such moves could prolong the counterproductive war in post-ISIL Syria. America has no economic or political stake in Syria. It has no "national interest" in Syria - or even in Yemen. That war has to end too. For almost 18 years, the US has had no national interest in Afghanistan. That endless war has to end too.
The bottom line is this: The War Party must leave Syria to be at peace with itself and its neighbours. Keeping several thousand US troops in Syria over the long-term is a bad idea. The people of Syria have lost their patience. The neighbouring countries no longer want to do anything with Syrian refugees. They all want American ground forces out of Syria immediately so that Syrian refugees can return and rebuild their shattered communities.
The blunt reality is that, on this specific question, President Donald Trump is, either purposefully or incidentally, doing the right thing, irrespective of his unstated motives. Irrespective of the political theatre in Washington, there is no US national-security interest in Syria. This has never been about eradicating ISIL. Everything else - forcing Iran to leave; playing peacekeeper between the Turks and the Kurds; pressuring Bashar al-Assad to negotiate his own surrender - are also distractions.
The War Party maintained its pressure on the Syrian population not simply for its own security, but because such pressure had for several years enabled it to maintain control over the terror-held areas - and, quite simply, because it encouraged Syrians to leave, and their neighbours to buy even more American weaponry.
The United Nations, international aid groups and human rights organizations should make explicitly clear that the open-ended US occupation has no security value and is meant to harass the population and prolong the misery. The neocon-Zionist idea is to make life hard not just for the Syrian citizenry but for the entire region. There is no operational objective and certainly no need for the presence of American forces in Syria. It’s about time they pack up and leave.