Stupid Pet Tricks, Part Deux

As ISIL continues to roil, as the Iraqi Army continues to fall short, as NATO-player Turkey hovers in the background (even attacking PKK-affiliated Kurds, some of whom are fighting ISIL in Kobani) and as the boots on the ground seem to be almost all ISIL’s with only a sprinkling of fierce Kurdish Peshmerga counter-combatants, it seems pretty clear that ISIL is not exactly facing meaningful containment by anything the allied forces have deployed to date. As much as Turkey wants us to help take down the al-Assad regime in Syria with a direct assault, unleashing the resultant “new nation” on ISIL, our fears are, simply, “blowback” combined with incompetence.

We no more know the allegiance of local Syrian rebels that we can stop Americans from slipping away and joining ISIL. Even gentle Canada got a shock to the system as a recent-radicalized Muslim citizen stepped into Parliament and began shooting. Still, we are beginning a plan to train 5,000 or more Syrian rebels to join the fight against ISIL.

But we haven’t a clue if these rebels are dedicated simply to the fall of Assad or, for example, they are a part of the ultra-extreme new al Qaeda faction, al-Nusra, pledged to fight the West with devastation as their clear goal. We crave boots on the ground, the only way to contain the ISIL threat in the end. Despite regional help from local Muslim powers, finding and deploying of those friendly boots are the most complex problem that appear to lead to the inevitable deployment of U.S. ground troops right there. What is it going to take? More atrocities? Scattered attacks on American targets around the world? One or more attacks within the United States itself?

So we fear arming Syrian rebels, thinking that they could use those weapons against us or our allies someday, but we need to generate some real ground forces or ISIL will look at our attacks from above, and like the Vietnamese decades before, they are learning how to hide their facilities, hiding from even smart bombs/missiles, then deploying their soldiers in close to their opponents, surrounded with innocent civilians (read: human shields), to advance… rarely being turned back.

One more factor: we’ve watched Iraqi forces – troops we trained – disintegrate in battle. Is that what we can expect if we are and train our “screened” (read: damn, we hope they’re really moderates) Syrian rebels? There just has to be a way to minimize blowback and turn-and-run soldiers.

So some bright group within our intelligence and military communities has come up with a foolproof plan for us to have our cake and eat it too. We’ll only train those rebels to defend their territory, not to attack and expand their holdings. Maybe we can give them smart weapons that can only be used when you are pulling the trigger to defend but not if you are going to attack?! Genius bullets!!!

“The Syrian opposition force to be recruited by the U.S. military and its coalition partners will be trained to defend territory, rather than to seize it back from the Islamic State, according to senior U.S. and allied officials, some of whom are concerned that the approach is flawed.

“Although moderate Syrian fighters are deemed essential to defeating the Islamic State under the Obama administration’s strategy, officials do not believe the newly assembled units will be capable of capturing key towns from militants without the help of forward-deployed U.S. combat teams, which President Obama has so far ruled out. The Syrian rebel force will be tasked instead with trying to prevent the Islamic State from extending its reach beyond the large stretches of territory it already controls.

“‘We have a big disconnect within our strategy. We need a credible, moderate Syrian force, but we have not been willing to commit what it takes to build that force,’ said a senior U.S. official involved in Syria and Iraq operations who, like others cited in this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the training program.

“Military commanders are reluctant to push Syrian fighters into full-scale battles with well-armed militants if they cannot summon close air support and medical evacuations, mindful of how fledgling forces in Iraq and Afghanistan crumbled without that assistance during the early years of the wars in those nations. But U.S. military aircraft cannot provide that aid without American or allied troops in close proximity to provide accurate targeting information on secure radio channels.” Washington Post, October 22^nd.

“Big disconnect”?! I’m looking at all this, and I really can’t believe what I am reading! Is this really a plan of action that, despite the affront to our common sense, our government leaders think can work?! Really?! And does fumbling with such stupid pet tricks only allow ISIL to get stronger, take more land and commit more atrocities while Rome burns?

I’m Peter Dekom, and if we need an excuse to retire some senior military strategists with amazingly unworkable plans, we seem to have it!