... jihadists by helping Shiite Alawite Assad massacre mainly Sunni rebels and civilians with the help of Shiite Hezbollah and Shiite Iran just for Russia's having a naval base on Syria’s coast and a few new bases inside Syria as well as a client ... ... Iran, and Hezbollah and that Egypt’s own explosive and volatile domestic security situation with its own people and an ISIS franchise running amok in the Sinai (one which apparently was able to blow up a Russian airliner) will not be major liabilities....
... increase Russia’s global power by
a.) framing the intervention as Russia taking a responsible and leading role in combating ISIS and preserving state sovereignty/the world order; this in turn can hopefully
b.) Relieve pressure/sanctions regarding Russian ... ... that is a small minority in Syria) Bashar al-Assad and is controlled mainly by Alawate Shiites. It is backed by Shiite Persian Iranians and the Arab Shiite Lebanese militia Hezbollah. Sunni Muslims, in general, do not like Shiites, and that is an understatement; ...
... largest and deadliest. Here, as in other situations, we have a crisis in which we must be careful not to blame Obama too much but ... ... and, unlike Qaddafi’s, had strong patrons in Russia and Iran who would complicate and increase the costs of any Western ... ... publicly by several major Western governments (including that of the United States), Human Rights Watch, and later by the United Nations.... ... support, it would empower him that much more in the public and politics senses. And yet, Obama’s putting so much power and ...
... January 2009 and America was not in the midst of the worst economic and financial crisis since the Great Depression. Still even more amusing and amazing are that many of... ... Hosni Mubarak in Egypt to Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel, from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran to (the recently departed) King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and also from the actions... ... that, having spent blood and treasure to give Iraqi politicians breathing room to make politics work—the explicit stated objective of the “Surge”—while...
... Arabia, Qatar, and other Gulf states comes back to haunt us: though Joe Biden recently got in trouble for saying so, support for ISIS and other Islamic extremists and terrorists from very wealthy individuals motivated by the Saudi state-sponsored and ever-present-throughout-the-Gulf ... ... into being an apartheid-like political pariah within the Western world.
4.) There’s a good chance for a thaw/deal with Iran in the near future.
More than any president since the Iranian Revolution in 1979, Obama has shown an energy and a willingness ...
... groups calling themselves first the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria/the Levant/al-Sham (ISIS or ISIL) and now just Islamic State (IS) might possibly have been the worst, most... ... world. U.S. support would also strengthen an Iraqi government that was in line with Iran in many ways and had resisted accommodating the U.S. government when it came to... ... reckless and violent onslaught and possible formal disintegration?
The Solution: Local Politics First, or No Cavalry
Obama brilliantly approved and executed a plan that...