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Did Obama's Forgien Policy in Syria Fail?

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/424873/syria-russia-iran-united-states-enemies-obama

Well of course it's failed- the moderates never got any power and the Russians have the next move.

The wider issue with what you are getting at here, though, is that you are seeing this constant pattern of US failure and the success of its enemies. But that's a nonsense- the US is still flying high ahead of the others.

At the same time Russia is putting resources into Syria, it is virtually pulling out of Ukraine whilst attention is elsewhere. The Ukraine situation is in of itself a demonstration of a massive failure of Russian foreign policy (and US success) that dwarves a failed Syria intervention. Russia's foreign policy in Europe was to keep Eastern Europe on-side- instead it's fallen so totally into the western arena that with Ukraine going, the west was almost up to the Russian border. Their military intervention there was a desperate flail to try and hang onto any of it- long-term, most of it is gone forever.

Stop looking at individual things. Big picture, the US' foreign policy is still on top. They are still the ones everyone else fears; the giant of the world.

Take this case- consider the possibility that as soon as Russia offered to get strongly involved, everyone dropped their opposition to Assad. That's because if Russia does the heavy lifting, that takes a hell of a lot of pressure away from us. Western nations are war averse and significant intervention in Syria was near impossible. Now the Russians will do it, and if it turns nasty, it's Russia that will get drawn into a war.

I know Russia has withdrawn troops in Ukraine, but I don't know if that's a failure? Unless they are losing Crimea it seems like a success to me. They got what they wanted. Now they see oil and getting Iraq and Iran and Syria under their grasp.

How long before you think Iran and Russia head into Iraq?

No, what they wanted was all of Ukraine, and more. What they have is the one tiny scrap they could save, at a massive cost of foreign goodwill. Having to intervene in the first place was the failure- they lost Ukraine politically. I know it is popular to see Russia these days as this aggressive tyrant, but it's actually a very stressed and unhappy nation that sees itself as a threatened underdog desperately trying to protect its own.

I don't know on the latter- what Russia wants now is for all opposition in Syria to Assad to be ISIS, then the issue becomes greatly simplified. We'll see if that works. Iran already has boots in the ground, of course, but we'll see where the pieces fall regarding a full scale move

If Iran and Syria and Russia move on Iraq, it would be interesting to see. I wonder if this will be their Afghanistan again. It would also be interesting to see if ISIS can be beaten back, I assume if they move on them ISIS recruitment would go through the roof.

I do see them making a play for that oil. Putin wants it. If he is going to prop up Assad he has to deal with the rebels and Isis. I wonder if ISIS and the and the anti Assad rebels and Kurds would band together as well as Sunni and others.

Not the Kurds, but the others will, assuming Russia leaves any other opposition standing.

Taking out ISIS is easy in theory- it's just a manpower issue, and the west is not going to risk manpower in that sort of mess. Russia is at least nearby and more willing to take some casualties, Obviously they'll want to avoid an Afghanistan repeat, but that's never impossibke.

Originally posted by Ushgarak
Not the Kurds, but the others will, assuming Russia leaves any other opposition standing.

Taking out ISIS is easy in theory- it's just a manpower issue, and the west is not going to risk manpower in that sort of mess. Russia is at least nearby and more willing to take some casualties, Obviously they'll want to avoid an Afghanistan repeat, but that's never impossibke.

Do you think Assad rebels will join with ISIS?

Did you hear about the 150,000 mercenaries he just added to the military?

This mentiones some stuff about ISIS rallying.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34419003

Originally posted by Time-Immemorial
Do you think Assad rebels will join with ISIS?

Did you hear about the 150,000 mercenaries he just added to the military?
What's more likely is that the non-ISIS rebels may eventually collapse, leaving only ISIS.

Sounds horrible

Yeah Russia's policy is shortsighted. What they and Iran aren't recognizing right now is that the less radical rebels are a buffer between ISIS and the Syrian government. In basically every engagement between the Syrian Army and IS, IS has eaten the Syrians alive. The Syrian Army is exhausted, Hezbollah isn't built for a long distance offensive against ISIS, and it would take thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of Iranian troops to defeat ISIS in a ground war. As gungho as Iran can be, I somewhat doubt their willingness to commit those kinds of forces to Syria. Russia seems even less likely to do so.

Originally posted by Time-Immemorial
I know Russia has withdrawn troops in Ukraine, but I don't know if that's a failure? Unless they are losing Crimea it seems like a success to me. They got what they wanted. Now they see oil and getting Iraq and Iran and Syria under their grasp.

How long before you think Iran and Russia head into Iraq?

Iran already have several commanders running the Iraqi army.