Trump is withdrawing US troops in northern Syria that have been protecting our ally, the Kurds, who have been fighting — and defeating — ISIS and the caliphate. Turkey will now move in to massacre the Kurds who say the United States has betrayed them according to Middle East journalist Richard Engel.
This is the treachery that former Secretary of Defense General Mattis feared and caused him to resign.
Trump is a despicable traitor and coward.
Please share widely!
Possible Trump motives by David Frum:
1) Protecting income flow from Trump Tower Istanbul
2) Payoff to Turkey to cover up recording of Khashoggi murder by Trump allies
3) Obeisance to Putin
4) Warning to House : if you impeach me, I’ll burn every American alliance and interest before I go.
He just tweeted what may be his most ridiculous and consequential (hopefully) tweet.
The tweet itself is impeachable.
Turkish fighter jets are attacking Kurdish targets in northern Syria. Trump has their blood on his hands.
The US has abandoned allies before; but never so quickly, so brazenly, and so arbitrarily as this. It also begs the questions Fred asks about what dirt Erdogan or his enablers has on Trump.
For any other President I would have assumed the above quotes were parody.
Evangelical Christians turning against Trump over Kurdgate : “Trump is in danger of losing his ‘mandate from heaven’ if he allows Turks to massacre Kurds.” Pat Robertson
Paul Krugman skewers Benedict Donald. So did Trump betray the Kurds because:
(a) He has business interests in Turkey
(b) Erdogan, being a brutal autocrat, is his kind of guy
(c) His boss Vladimir Putin told him to
Remarkable that all three stories are perfectly plausible.
Donald Trump’s behavior is indistinguishable from that of a puppet doing the bidding of Vladimir Putin.
I think Mr. Putin WANTS him impeached. Donald Trump has spent the last three years firing up his base, and they are heavily armed. The NRA has been a Russian asset since 2015, and has been providing military-grade weapons to the American insurgents for five years. An attempt to remove Mr. Trump from office is exactly the kind of trigger that Vladimir Putin would use to provoke a second American Civil War.
Mr. Trump’s retweet of that offensive tweet was no accident. Mr. Trump is neither erratic nor deranged. I think he’s following orders.
I expect Mr. Trump to do as much damage as possible and commit as many crimes as possible while he remains in office. I expect him to throw his GOP allies under the bus just as he’s throwing our overseas allies under the bus. That’s how he will accomplish Mr. Putin’s goal of provoking civil war. I expect him to be impeached or otherwise removed from office.
I also expect him to call for his base to rise up in arms against the “liberals” who are “attempting a coup”. I expect him to condemn Senate Republicans just as loudly and vociferously as he attacks Nancy Pelosi. I think Mr. Putin’s goal is to destroy America, and I think Donald Trump is his chosen agent.
I wonder what our government does when Donald Trump’s base starts roaming the streets with automatic weapons looking for “liberals” to kill. I wonder whether there are exceptions to the Posse Comitatus Act.
I think we are entering a very dark period of our history.
Amazing how many people on this blog are just dying to join up with Lindsey Graham and his ilk. In contrast to the many , many lies Trump has told, this time Trump is doing what he promised to do, which is to bring back our troops. The whining from the pro-war types rings pretty hollow; Trump tried to bring all the troops home before, months ago, and was talked out of it. So, the Pentagon, the State Department, and even our intelligence community knew that getting out of Syria was our goal. What have any of them done to implement this goal?
This will be a forever war if we let it be one. Are we really in favor of putting American Troops in harm’s way in perpetuity?
Who is in harms way?
11,00 Kurds dead; 10 Americans dead fighting ISIS in Syria.
Here is what follows from Donald Trump’s precipitous move:
1. We demonstrate to our allies that our commitment is worth NOTHING. This makes it difficult or impossible to build international coalitions to resolve future conflicts.
2. We drive the Kurds into an alliance with Iran in order to obtain the vital defense resources they need to avoid being slaughtered.
3. We send a message to dictators and tyrants the world over that Donald Trump Incorporated (formerly known as the USA) is open for business, so long as the price is right. There’s a new sheriff in town who wears a black hat and shows utter contempt for the rule of law.
4. We show the world that, as the world’s most powerful nation, we prefer warlords, organized crime, and gangs over legitimate governments.
These each benefit Vladimir Putin and Russia far more than they benefit either the US or any of our allies.
Are we really in favor of putting Russia and Vladimir Putin in control of the western world?
This makes America great again, how?
Trump pulled American troops out of northern Syria on Putin’s birthday.
I’m sure that was just a coincidence. Traitor.
Donald Trump’s behavior is indistinguishable from that of a Russian asset/puppet. The Syria betrayal certainly appears to be a birthday gift from Mr. Trump to Vladimir Putin.
If Trump goes against Turkey, a major NATO ally, he weakens NATO and Putin wins again. I guess Putin always wins.
I know you’re being sarcastic, but there’s at least a little bit of truth in your comment. Mr. Putin is very good at covering all his bets, and he is dead serious about taking us down.
The massacre of the Kurds by the Turks is underway as we have this exchange. Are you ok with that?
You do understand, I hope, that our betrayal of the Kurds drives them into the arms of Iran and Russia. We can expect the Kurds to join Russia and Iran in Russia’s fight against Turkey.
Donald Trump’s gift was to Vladimir Putin, not Mr. Erdogan.
“No Republican who supports Trump should be re-elected.” George Will
But it strengthens NATO. Not so long ago everyone was convinced that Trump’s indifferent attitude toward NATO was the main evidence that he was under Putin’s orders.
Now that Trump is putting the interests of our NATO ally ahead of our Kurd allies, you think that is evidence that Putin is calling the shots.
You clearly have a conclusion, and you are working your way backward to make the evidence fit it.
How does driving the Kurds into the arms of the Russians strengthen NATO? How does driving Turkey into a closer relationship with the Russians strengthen NATO?
The effect of this decision is to drive a wedge between the rest of NATO and the US. It inflames even otherwise Trumpist GOP Senators. How does that strengthen NATO?
Whatever the merits of this troop withdrawal, it does have the effect of strengthening NATO. It shows that this administration takes the concerns of its NATO ally seriously. If the Kurds are driven “into the arms of the Russians”, that drives a wedge between Russia and Turkey. We took Turkey’s side against the Kurds, and the Russians will have taken the Kurds against Turkey.
NATO, and its expansion into Turkey, has been one of the biggest concerns of Russia, by everyone’s account, since the breakup of the Soviet Union.
Frankly I’m not sure Erdogan’s Turkey should be a NATO ally.
Putin would agree with you, Christopher.
I think Erdogan is willing to play footsie with Putin and Iran to serve his regional agenda, even if the former starts funding the Kurds in our absence. I do agree with Bob we want to keep Turkey in NATO. My bigger issue is that we have stopped evaluating military alliances on a case by case basis for what serves America’s interest and have instead allowed powerful foreign lobbies to dictate our foreign policy. Not just Israel, but Saudi Arabia and Turkey (with disgraced Dick Gephardt as their key man in DC) have huge lobbying staffs. It’s shameful and it hurts our national security.
It strengthens Erdogan and his grip on Turkey. That’s entirely different from strengthening NATO. If I’m Ukraine I just saw the US abandon a key ally it’s supported to its military adversary on the whim of its compromised and unpredictable President. If I’m the Poles or Baltic states or any of the other NATO states adjacent to the Russians, I’m a lot more concerned after today. We will see how the Western Europe NATO allies feel when ISIS reconstitutes and sends fighters to terrorize their capitals again.
Turkey should be following our orders and not the other way around. They already accepted high level missiles from the Russians in violation of NATO policy. We could always threaten to expel them or cut their military aid. The US has way more leverage over Erdogan, the problem is, he has way more leverage over Trump.
I think Mr. Trump is working on orders from Mr. Putin. I think Mr. Putin’s goal is to break the alliance between the Kurds and America. I don’t think Mr. Putin or Mr. Trump care on iota about Mr. Erdogan or Turkey.
In my view, handing the Kurds over to Turkey is at least as bad — or worse — than Benedict Arnold’s plan to give West Point to the British.
I think we are surrounded by compelling evidence that Donald Trump is a traitor. I don’t understand why so few are willing to even talk about it.
I’d still like to know why Trump seems so willing to kowtow to Putin. Somehow the idea that he simply wants to maybe someday get Trump Tower Moscow built doesn’t seem an adequate explanation.
It seems to me that the most obvious explanation is that Mr. Trump has been deeply involved in organized crime for decades, and was elected as a direct result of illegal intervention by Mr. Putin, the Russians, and the Russian mafia. There is compelling evidence that Mr. Trump has been involved with the Russians in illegal money-laundering for years if not decades.
I think that Donald Trump knows that Vladimir Putin can make life VERY difficult for Mr. Trump, his family, and his associates. It appears to me that people in Mr. Putin’s orbit who attempt to resist him have a very strong tendency to be “accident” prone.
I think Mr. Trump is following orders because he is being compelled to do so.
Tom, how do you come to the conclusion that Russia cares one way or the other about the Kurds?
I agree with you that Mr. Putin doesn’t care one way or the other about the Kurds.
I think his goal is to wreak as much havoc and chaos as possible among America and our allies. I think the Kurds and Turkey are just pawns in his game.
“Havoc and chaos” for their own sake?
@”Havoc and chaos” for their own sake:
Of course not. Havoc and chaos for the US and western world, because it weakens the western world and therefore strengthens Russia.
Russia no longer has the economic ability to build or maintain a competitive military. Mr. Putin is therefore seeking alternative ways to accomplish his goals of strengthening Russia, expanding its influence and economy, and overcoming the sanctions imposed by the western world.
The American troops were under no fire and were a buffer between Turkey and the American allies who did the bulk of the fighting and dying to retake Syria from ISIL. This move makes it more likely than not actual American boots on the ground will be needed down the road to mop up this mess. It’s an unconscionable slaughter of a noble people who deserve a state. Second time America has stabbed the Kurds in the back, there won’t be a third.
“When you think of all the people Trump has betrayed in his presidency and his life including all of his wives, it’s all the more impressive that he has never betrayed Putin.” Lawrence O’Donnell
Strange bedfellows US and Russia just failed to sign a joint UN statement sponsored by our European allies — France, Germany, Belgium, the UK and Poland — condemning Turkey’s massacre of the Kurds in Syria.
E.U. suspending all weapons sales to Turkey. Seems to be this move is exacerbating wedges between Turkey and NATO….
We have 50 tactical nuclear missiles at our air base in Turkey.
Good luck removing those nukes now that Turkey has gone rogue.
Russian ground troops and Assads ground troops are now helping the Kurds by forming a buffer against the Turkish military. So we now may be in a position where our NATO ally is being drawn into a potential conflict with Russia and where it is being attacked by arms recently supplied by the US. This shift was so poorly planned that around 1,000 American troops were left behind Turkish lines and now need to be airlifted to avoid being fired upon by Turkish troops. There is also the situation of rescuing the nuclear weapons. All of which from one stupid phone call this President made without consulting anyone at the Pentagon or the State department.
Remember how much crap the right gave Obama over his red line? Trumps have been easily ignored by Erdogan.
I don’t believe that this was “one stupid phone call this President made…”
I think Mr. Trump acted intentionally and consciously to give Mr. Putin a birthday present. I think we’re looking at a crystal-clear example of the tribute always paid by mafia underlings to their superiors in the hierarchy.
I think this move is outright treason, as bad as anything Benedict Arnold did or planned.
Our government seems to remain paralyzed as this betrayal plays out.