Fighting inside Syria began almost a decade ago. At first, Sunni Muslims marched in protest against the Assad government as part of the Arab Spring. The Assad response was to put snipers on top of nearby buildings and to pick off a few protesters at random. The hope was to break up the protests, but the result was huge anger at Assad and a rebellion/civil war inside Syria. President Obama did nothing. Thousands were killed in the fighting. Then things escalated. Hundreds of thousands of people died and millions had to flee their homes. At one point there were six million Syrian refugees deposited around the region. All that time, Obama did nothing with one exception: he warned Assad not to use chemical weapons in the conflict. Of course, Assad dropped chemical weapons on the rebels, killing thousands. At that point, Obama still did nothing. By that time, at least a quarter of a million Syrians were dead in the conflict.
As the fighting continued in Syria, the more moderate factions among the Sunnis were replaced by those affiliated with terrorists. The al Nusra front (an affiliate of al Qaeda) took the lead in many areas. They got that position because they were able to get weapons to fight the Assad troops. The Russians came in to support Assad and so did the Iranians and their proxies, the terrorists of Hezbollah. Then ISIS appeared in the region. The ISIS terrorists took over about a third of Syria and brought the levels of killing to new heights. ISIS killed tens of thousands of civilians because they were not Sunni Arab Muslims. Yazidis, Christians and Kurds were slaughtered. Obama still did nothing until ISIS started televising their beheadings of prisoners. Finally, Obama allowed some effort by US forces against ISIS. By that time, something like 600,000 people had been killed in the fighting in Syria.
It's worth stopping here to remember the reaction of America's mainstream media to all of this. There was some minor coverage of the fighting in Syria, but the slaughter went on and on and on with essentially no outrage and no reports on the death by the media.
Then President Trump took office. He took the restrictions off of American forces confronting ISIS. The coalition fighting against ISIS included the Kurds who fought valiantly against the ISIS terrorists. With wholehearted US support, especially in the air, ISIS was destroyed. No portion of the ISIS caliphate remains under ISIS control. The killing in Syria finally mostly stopped.
There were problems that remained in Syria, however. One was the animosity between the Kurdish militia that had done much of the fighting in northern Syria and the Turks. The Turkish government in Ankara views the Kurdish militia as a terrorist group because of many attacks that group carried out inside Turkey over the last 25 years. To be clear, you should know that the USA also labelled the Kurdish militia in question, the PKK, as a terrorist group because of those same attacks in Turkey. Nevertheless, we fought with the PKK against ISIS as one of the Kurdish groups in our coalition. That alliance against ISIS removed American opposition to the PKK, but it didn't satisfy the Turks whose country had been the target of PKK attacks in the past.
Two weeks ago, the Turkish president told America that it was about to launch a cross-border assault into Syria to push the PKK away from the border with Turkey. The USA did not have forces in the region that could have resisted such a Turkish invasion, and there were tens of thousands of US military stationed in Turkey and huge numbers of US civilians inside that country as well. President Trump pulled out our 50 or so special operations forces that were in the zone that the Turks said they would attack. He also ordered all American forces pulled back from northern Syria. That move affected about 300 US troops.
When the Turks attacked, there were Kurdish casualties. Estimates so far vary widely, but at most there are a few hundred who have been killed or wounded. The response from the mainstream media has been enormous. This is a "catastrophe" we are told. It's a wholesale slaughter of the Kurds, we are told by the mainstream media. It's a foreign policy disaster for the USA. Russian officers are inspecting the bases that US forces abandoned, according to the mainstream media.
Think about that. When 600,000 Syrians died and Obama sat by and did nothing, the media barely noticed. When Assad used chemical weapons to kill thousands, the mainstream media did nothing until video of an attack was smuggled out of Syria and broadcast on Fox News. Obama's foreign policy did nothing to protect these poor Syrians, but the mainstream media didn't care. Then ISIS came to the fore and again Obama did nothing. The mainstream media didn't criticize him; they provided a little coverage of the outrages of ISIS, but they didn't criticize Obama's failure to stop them. Now, however, Trump has moved a few hundred US troops and the media acts as if it is akin to a second Pearl Harbor or 9-11 as a US disaster. A few hundred casualties among the Kurds are treated as if they are earth-shaking even though 600,000 dead and millions wounded among the Syrians was given essentially no coverage.
Don't get me wrong. I do not like US policy that has let the Turks inflict casualties on the Kurds. It would have been preferable to arrange some sort of deal between the two sides that could have avoided the fighting. Nevertheless, the hypocrisy of the mainstream media in the way it covered the Syrian civil war and the gross failures by Obama compared to the current relatively minor fighting and how President Trump handled it is overwhelming.
It gets worse though. This afternoon, vice president Pence announced that as a result of a meeting he held in Ankara this afternoon with the Turks, Turkey would stop fighting for five days to allow the PKK time to pull out of the area. If the PKK pulls back, the Turks say that they will not resume fighting. The reaction from the mainstream media has been "too little, too late." Unbelievable!
As the fighting continued in Syria, the more moderate factions among the Sunnis were replaced by those affiliated with terrorists. The al Nusra front (an affiliate of al Qaeda) took the lead in many areas. They got that position because they were able to get weapons to fight the Assad troops. The Russians came in to support Assad and so did the Iranians and their proxies, the terrorists of Hezbollah. Then ISIS appeared in the region. The ISIS terrorists took over about a third of Syria and brought the levels of killing to new heights. ISIS killed tens of thousands of civilians because they were not Sunni Arab Muslims. Yazidis, Christians and Kurds were slaughtered. Obama still did nothing until ISIS started televising their beheadings of prisoners. Finally, Obama allowed some effort by US forces against ISIS. By that time, something like 600,000 people had been killed in the fighting in Syria.
It's worth stopping here to remember the reaction of America's mainstream media to all of this. There was some minor coverage of the fighting in Syria, but the slaughter went on and on and on with essentially no outrage and no reports on the death by the media.
Then President Trump took office. He took the restrictions off of American forces confronting ISIS. The coalition fighting against ISIS included the Kurds who fought valiantly against the ISIS terrorists. With wholehearted US support, especially in the air, ISIS was destroyed. No portion of the ISIS caliphate remains under ISIS control. The killing in Syria finally mostly stopped.
There were problems that remained in Syria, however. One was the animosity between the Kurdish militia that had done much of the fighting in northern Syria and the Turks. The Turkish government in Ankara views the Kurdish militia as a terrorist group because of many attacks that group carried out inside Turkey over the last 25 years. To be clear, you should know that the USA also labelled the Kurdish militia in question, the PKK, as a terrorist group because of those same attacks in Turkey. Nevertheless, we fought with the PKK against ISIS as one of the Kurdish groups in our coalition. That alliance against ISIS removed American opposition to the PKK, but it didn't satisfy the Turks whose country had been the target of PKK attacks in the past.
Two weeks ago, the Turkish president told America that it was about to launch a cross-border assault into Syria to push the PKK away from the border with Turkey. The USA did not have forces in the region that could have resisted such a Turkish invasion, and there were tens of thousands of US military stationed in Turkey and huge numbers of US civilians inside that country as well. President Trump pulled out our 50 or so special operations forces that were in the zone that the Turks said they would attack. He also ordered all American forces pulled back from northern Syria. That move affected about 300 US troops.
When the Turks attacked, there were Kurdish casualties. Estimates so far vary widely, but at most there are a few hundred who have been killed or wounded. The response from the mainstream media has been enormous. This is a "catastrophe" we are told. It's a wholesale slaughter of the Kurds, we are told by the mainstream media. It's a foreign policy disaster for the USA. Russian officers are inspecting the bases that US forces abandoned, according to the mainstream media.
Think about that. When 600,000 Syrians died and Obama sat by and did nothing, the media barely noticed. When Assad used chemical weapons to kill thousands, the mainstream media did nothing until video of an attack was smuggled out of Syria and broadcast on Fox News. Obama's foreign policy did nothing to protect these poor Syrians, but the mainstream media didn't care. Then ISIS came to the fore and again Obama did nothing. The mainstream media didn't criticize him; they provided a little coverage of the outrages of ISIS, but they didn't criticize Obama's failure to stop them. Now, however, Trump has moved a few hundred US troops and the media acts as if it is akin to a second Pearl Harbor or 9-11 as a US disaster. A few hundred casualties among the Kurds are treated as if they are earth-shaking even though 600,000 dead and millions wounded among the Syrians was given essentially no coverage.
Don't get me wrong. I do not like US policy that has let the Turks inflict casualties on the Kurds. It would have been preferable to arrange some sort of deal between the two sides that could have avoided the fighting. Nevertheless, the hypocrisy of the mainstream media in the way it covered the Syrian civil war and the gross failures by Obama compared to the current relatively minor fighting and how President Trump handled it is overwhelming.
It gets worse though. This afternoon, vice president Pence announced that as a result of a meeting he held in Ankara this afternoon with the Turks, Turkey would stop fighting for five days to allow the PKK time to pull out of the area. If the PKK pulls back, the Turks say that they will not resume fighting. The reaction from the mainstream media has been "too little, too late." Unbelievable!
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