FROM EIR DAILY ALERT

---

Retired Army Lt. Col. Daniel Davis Explains Why Trump Is Right on Syria

Dec. 28, 2018 (EIRNS )—In an opinion piece in The Hill Dec. 28, retired Army Lt. Col. Daniel Davis, now with the Defense Priorities organization argued that President Trump is absolutely right to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria.

Davis, who completed four combat deployments in the Southwest Asia, wrote that the hysterical responses from the “Washington swamp” to the President’s decision and to his Christmas Day visit to Iraq, “are unsurprisingly, laced with fear”; but, “what they should be concerned about ... is a fear that without changes in American strategy, we’ll remain mired in Middle Eastern chaos indefinitely.”

Colonel Davis offered details on the evolution of events in the Southwest Asia theater, and the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS), which, he argued, had nothing to do with the failure of U.S. troops to remain, but rather with the actions of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s destruction of his Sunni opposition. Withdrawal of U.S. troops now “won’t allow ISIS to rise again there either,” he admonished, given the continued presence of Russia in the area, and NATO ally Turkey’s strategic role, among other factors.

The U.S. can “maintain our interests in the region far more effectively and efficiently by employing diplomatic and economic measures and not trying to rely on military power,” Davis argued. Historically, he continued, basing efforts on deploying active combat forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Africa “have failed strategically, because we refuse to recognize that we can’t solve political problems with military power.” The best Christmas gift Trump could give the American people “and our selfless service members, then, is a promise to withdraw our combat troops from the Middle East so we can better defend our country.”