CREDO Action & PressTV – 2017-03-19 02:04:44
https://act.credoaction.com/sign/no_endless_war?t=4&akid=22197.8309119.99XcOS
ACTION ALERT:
Tell Congress: No Endless War in Syria
CREDO Action Petition
(March 17, 2017) — The Petition to Congress reads:
“The US should not be putting ground troops in Syria. Support ”Prohibit Expansion of US Combat Troops into Syria Act,” Rep. Barbara Lee’s bill that would prohibit the Department of Defense from deploying soldiers or hiring private contractors to engage in ground combat in Syria, with the exception of rescue missions.”
Donald Trump recently escalated US involvement in Syria by sending in hundreds of Marines to risk their lives in combat. This is one in a series of rash, hawkish combat decisions that Trump has already made since taking office — including authorizing a disastrous, failed Special Ops mission in Yemen that led to the deaths of dozens of civilians, including an 8-year-old American girl and a Navy SEAL.
Now, the Trump administration is reportedly considering deploying 1,000 additional troops into northern Syria, a move that would “increase the potential for direct US combat involvement,” according to The Washington Post.1
Thankfully, progressive champion Rep. Barbara Lee has introduced legislation to prohibit the Department of Defense from deploying soldiers or hiring private contractors to engage in ground combat in Syria, with the exception of rescue missions.
Escalating the US military’s role will not improve the situation in Syria — it will make matters worse. We are calling on Congress to send Trump a loud and clear message: We will not support your endless wars.
Throughout Trump’s racist and misogynistic campaign, he tried to present himself as an anti-war candidate. Since his election, he has failed to invest in staff or strategies that will lead to anything other than American and civilian bloodshed.
Rather than working to counter terrorism and weaken ISIS, escalating our military entanglement in Middle Eastern countries — with the inevitable escalation of civilian casualties that comes with it — has been shown to actually help terrorists with recruitment.
When Trump and his administration are sloppy and reckless with foreign affairs, our troops and innocent civilians will suffer the consequences.2,3
The backward step of escalating ground troops in Syria is horrifying on multiple levels. It violates the current Authorization for Use of Military Force that was passed post-9/11. Not to mention Donald Trump has never articulated a vision or endgame for our involvement in Syria. He is putting our troops in harm’s way without a plan for getting them home — it is reckless and dangerous.
As humanitarians confronting the horror of the Syrian civil war, we must consider how we can best protect civilians and end the violence. Trump and his war-hawk cabinet have been careless and rash with American lives, and it’s clear that the only way he will stop is if Congress forces him to do so.
We have to speak out now to prevent the loss of more American lives and the United States from being dragged down a slippery slope to another endless war in the Middle East.
Tell Congress: Support Rep. Lee’s legislation to prohibit the deployment of US troops to engage in ground combat in Syria. Click the link below to sign the petition by clicking here.
Thank you for standing for peace,
Tessa Levine is the Campaign Manager for CREDO Action from Working Assets
References
1. Thomas Gibbons-Neff, ” US military likely to send as many as 1,000 more ground troops into Syria ahead of Raqqa offensive, officials say,” The Washington Post, March 15, 2017.
2. Loren Thompson, “Killing ISIS: Five Reasons American ‘Boots On The Ground’ Will Backfire,” Forbes, Nov. 20, 2015.
3. David Ignatius, “How ISIS Spread in the Middle East,” The Atlantic, Oct. 19, 2015.
Assad Is Correct in Calling
US Troops in Syria ‘Invaders’: Analyst
PressTV
(March 12, 2017) — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has correctly called the US troops in Syria invaders because under international law foreign governments can’t deploy troops to sovereign countries, senior analyst Ken Stone says.
Assad told Chinese TV station Phoenix on Saturday that “any foreign troops coming to Syria without our invitation . . . are invaders,” but indicated that there was still room for potential cooperation between Damascus and Washington.
The counter-terrorism fight “cannot be from the air, it should be in cooperation with the troops on the ground, that’s why the Russians succeeded,” Assad said.
Stone, a member of the Hamilton Coalition to Stop the War, told press TV on Saturday that “President Assad is absolutely correct in calling the US troops in Syria invaders because under international law foreign governments
* can’t station troops or build airfields in sovereign countries,
*they can’t overfly sovereign countries,
*they can’t level economic sanctions on their own without the approval of the UN Security Council, and
*they certainly can’t insert proxy armies to destabilize sovereign countries and try an effect regime changes.”
“So he is absolutely right,” he emphasized.
“Former US secretary of state John Kerry used to talk now and then about US plan B for Syria which was in fact a partition plan, because the US plan for regime change in Syria did not work for all of Syria,” the analyst stated.
“Trump has talked about changing US foreign policy from the policy that was enunciated by John Kerry under Obama. He talked about ending the regime change policies of the United States in the Middle East. He talked about cooperation with Russia to fight terrorism,” he added.
Stone said Trump “basically talked about detente and rapprochement with Russia. But in office he has been facing fiercest opposition from Democrats, the mainstream media, and US intelligence services. So it’s been an ugly situation in Washington since he was inaugurated. We are yet to see how that will turn out.”
“But in my opinion the US government under Trump should accept what is implicitly in President Assad’s statement, in his comments” that US military forces are “invaders” in Syria because they were not invited into the country, he argued.
“It’s an invitation to the United States to coordinate with the Syrian government against the terrorists in Syria. And I personally think President Trump would be wise to accept President Assad’s invitation,” he noted.
