NO AMERICAN BOOTS

As the fog of war begins to lift and military/intelligence analysts are able to make more accurate assessments as to the strength/will of ISIS forces operating in Syria and Iraq, one thing is becoming very clear: Any coalition hoping to stem the tide of ISIS operations will have to employ a large ground force.

As is the case per any large ground force, an experienced command & control operation will be a necessity. It will have to be logistically sound, schooled in the art of mobile, quick-strike combat, supplied with heavy artillery as well as the light weapons essential to urban warfare and supported by superior air power that is itself supported by solid intelligence assets. Furthermore, it will have to engage offensive as well as defensive operations. And, finally, it will of necessity have to plan for an extended occupation and rebuilding of those lands fought for and won.

In other words, this ground force will have to do well what American ground forces do well.

But it cannot---must not---be an American ground force.

The role of the United States should---must---be limited to providing military advisors to a coalition of Arab/Muslim ground units, providing logistical support and intelligence assets, arming those coalition forces with heavy as well as light weaponry and supporting ground operations with both strategic and tactical air power.

Put simply, the role of the United States should---must---be limited to supporting an Arab/Muslim coalition ground force such that it is given every opportunity to be successful.

But, no American “boots on the ground.” And, were it left to me to decide, there would be no European “boots on the ground,” either; though, quite frankly, that’s not an issue that much of anyone, including me, thinks will become much of an issue.

It is time for the United States to stop serving as a proxy for oppressive, oil-rich, corruption-ridden middle eastern oil states that support and/or encourage jihadist activity while demanding that American blood and treasure be expended to protect them from it.

If those kingdoms and governments are not willing to ask their own people to go to war to protect themselves and their countries, then they will fall/fail and will have no one to blame for it other than themselves.

If the people of those kingdoms and countries are not willing to answer the call to go to war to protect themselves and their countries, then they will live under jihadi rule and have no one to blame for it other than themselves.

The United States has been policing the middle-east for decades---a testament to the muscle of Big Oil in American policymaking. Long after smarter European powers pulled out of middle eastern affairs and thus put a tourniquet on their bleeding, we continued to open our veins and gush blood and treasure in order to insure the obscene profits of Big Oil and the semi-stability of those sheiks and rulers who profit the most from the profiteering of Big Oil. Indeed, we financed, with that blood and treasure, the very sectarian cultural/religious sniping and killing that diverted their attention from the dark clouds gathering on the far horizon.

Well, the dark clouds are no longer on the far horizon. They are directly overhead and a storm of pathological punks clad in black-pajamas are bringing the thunder and the lightning to the very borders of our middle eastern “friends.”

Our “friends” are, of course, once again looking to the United States for shelter. I think it in our own interest to provide them with the materials they need to construct that which would protect them from the elements. But it must be up to them to transcend their old sectarian grudges and together build it.

We have a long history of trying to build it for them---an effort that is bound to fail every time it is attempted.

No more.