No Hunger for Change:

War Party Trudges into Syria, Wants Safe Zones

Rasa - President Barack Obama, who once ruled out sending ground troops to Syria, has now ordered the deployment of additional US troops to the war-torn country.

News ID: 422271

Date: 29 April 2016 - 16:35

RNA‌ - Obama claims the troops will train and assist “local forces” and build on momentum from Special Forces already on the ground in driving the terrorist group of ISIL out of key areas. In this new mission creep, he also claims there will be no full combat battalions, which is far from the truth.

Setting the tone for the worse, however, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is also calling for the establishment of “safe zones” inside northern Syria to house refugees. Betraying some basic European values and echoing plans which have been championed by Turkey for years, Merkel is presenting the idea as a way to keep Syria’s desperate refugees out of Fortress Europe.

Tragic enough, all this and more only adds to the speculations surrounding the US-led ISIL war, which started with President Obama vowing “no boots on the ground,” and now covers not just the troops in Syria but also a major escalation in Iraq - with over 5,000 US ground troops participating in direct combat operations.

Meaning, there is no hunger for change here. Whatever it is, the War Party and its rogue NATO partners smell alike. They have no intention to express their original ideas just yet, let alone end the war on Syria. But the unspoken reality is that establishing “safe zones” would require a full-scale military invasion to conquer that territory, and retaining that territory would keep significant numbers of ground troops (full combat battalions) there for years, if not decades.

In between, the regime changers are averse to house any more Syrian refugees in Europe, which goes against International Humanitarian Law. They plan to send the displaced souls back to Syria and turn it into an open prison, just like the Gaza Strip in occupied Palestine, in violation of Syria’s sovereignty and International Law.

To be clear, the plan to trap refugees in Syria and stay the course is not what the United Nation calls “humanitarian intervention”. Admittedly, it is largely a cover for a war for regime change against Damascus and its Russian and Iranian allies. It would accomplish far more harm than good. In fact, it would help the terrorist groups immeasurably in their recruitment efforts, particularly from Europe, prolong the suffering of the Syrian people, and delay their victory against foreign-backed terrorism and extremism.

Regardless, there is still the law of the United Nations for Washington and its NATO allies to follow. Considering the dire consequences of military escalation, they should support a new course that consists of using the new diplomatic process in Vienna to de-escalate the conflict on the basis of a cease-fire between the government and the opposition, intensify the campaign against ISIL and al-Qaeda, and establish an internal political process that would allow the Syrian people determine their own future - without troop deployments and certainly without refugee concentration camps.

Undoubtedly, a realistic policy as such could provide the best hope of bringing about peace and security to Syria and the rest of the region. The plus point is that it would have no surprise endings, and certainly no unexpected humanitarian, security, and geopolitical consequences.

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