Took Obama a while, of course. It always does.
“The White House has tasked the Joint Chiefs of Staff to plan for a no-fly zone inside Syria, that would be done on a multilateral basis with countries such as France and Britain,” said Newsweek/The Daily Beast’s senior correspondent Josh Rogin.
Mind you, if the President had set one of those up back in November of 2011 – which is when then-candidate Rick Perry suggested that we do this – then maybe the Syrian rebels today would look less like the Taliban, and more like the Iraqi Kurds. But don’t take my word for it: ask that notorious bastion of neoconservative thinking more commonly known as the New York Times.
When the armed rebellion began, defectors from the government’s staunchly secular army formed the vanguard. The rebel movement has since grown to include fighters with a wide range of views, including Qaeda-aligned jihadis seeking to establish an Islamic emirate, political Islamists inspired by the Muslim Brotherhood and others who want an Islamic-influenced legal code like that found in many Arab states.
“My sense is that there are no seculars,” said Elizabeth O’Bagy, of the Institute for the Study of War, who has made numerous trips to Syria in recent months to interview rebel commanders.
I guess, better late than never?
Moe Lane
PS: God damn that back surgery.
We shouldn’t be doing this in my opinion. Assad is a safer enemy than radical jihadis, so better late than never I think doesn’t apply. Let the Radicals and Assad bleed themselves dry, but a No-Fly Zone is better than boots on the ground.
As a wise and cunning man once said: “It’s a pity they can’t both lose.”
All Syria would prove is John McCain and Barack Obama didn’t learn a darn thing from Libya and Egypt. Muslim Brotherhood is interested in Democracy in the same way Adolf Hitler was interested in Democracy: as a path to power that didn’t get you shot at (then you take over the country using the Government bureaucracy). MB = Muslim Fascist all the way.