Talk of Syria No-Fly Zone Underscores Urgency for Trump and Putin To Hold Summit

March 5, 2020 (EIRNS)—Talk of deploying U.S. Patriot air defense batteries to the Turkish border with Syria’s Idlib province and of imposing a no-fly zone over Idlib, as Turkey had proposed a week ago, underscores the necessity of a summit of U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, with others. News reports of the past several days have placed James Jeffrey, the State Department’s special envoy for Syria engagement, at the center of efforts to deploy Patriots to Turkey to enforce an Idlib no-fly zone. A Feb. 28 article in Politico reported that the Pentagon is opposed to such a deployment because of the global implications of possibly getting into a shooting match with Russian warplanes in Syria.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), frequently described in the press as a friend of President Trump’s, nonetheless called for this hyper-dangerous action on Feb. 27.

The call for a no-fly zone was also raised in Zagreb at the press conference following an informal meeting today of the European Union defense ministers, chaired by EU Commission Vice President and High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Josep Borrell, and joined by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Responding to a reporter’s question, Borrell said there was no official EU policy, because it has not yet been discussed among the 27 member states. But, he continued, “I can say that for me, as High Representative it is for sure a good initiative. Some member states have been proposing it. I agree that it should be supported by the European Union member states.”

All of these are, in effect, demands for a shooting war between the U.S. and Russia in Syria, a shooting war that would inevitably devolve into a global war with the risk that it would go nuclear. To avoid such a war, a summit between Trump and Putin is needed.