Syria/Turkey/Trump Talking Points

Following are Syria/Turkey/Trump talking points done in late December by Peace Action's executive director, Jon Rainwater. Although somewhat dated, they provide an important look at a broken foreign policy process. I have done some editing

1) Although U.S. troops do need to come out of Syria, it was heartless and impulsive for President Trump to give what appears to be a green light for the Turkish offensive into Syria. The suddenness of the shift in policy threatens the lives of civilians as well as the Kurdish forces. What was needed was a responsible withdrawal, closely coordinated with allies, that allowed for the protection of civilians in the area. This coordinated withdrawal should include ending U.S. airstrikes that often kill civilians, as well as a withdrawal of U.S. ground troops.

The president's announcement reflects a badly broken foreign policy process. At the same time, many Syria experts believe U.S. troop withdrawal is careless, the troops do need to come out and the U.S. couldn't ensure the Kurds' security in the long-term, and only diplomatic progress could do that.

2) Now that Trump's hasty decision on Syria has been followed by a Turkish military offensive, U.S. diplomats must work to mitigate the damage by pushing Turkey to de-escalate. The U.S. should join the EU in formally calling for Turkey to end its offensive. The United States should throw its full weight behind diplomatic efforts at the UN Security Council to replace the offensive with a ceasefire in northeast Syria. Turkey has key alliances with Europe. Russia and the U.S. who could all put pressure on Turkey.

3) The U.S. should back up its diplomacy with immediately cutting off all military assistance and weapons sales to Turkey. Once again, U.S. weapons will be harming civilians in the Middle East.

4) Urgent conflict mitigation initiatives are needed to supplement the call for a ceasefire including:
     - Humanitarian access for the UN and its partner NGOs to civilians in northeast Syria so that aid and medical care can be delivered.
     - Protecting civilians from any fighting until a ceasefire can be implemented.
     - Congress must also resume U.S. funding for Syria stabilization and encourage others to give generously to address this epic humanitarian disaster. Critical stabilization funds include rebuilding infrastructure for clean water and electricity, schools, and transportation that help restore stability and help prevent a region from slipping back into a war zone. The U.S. should do its fair share and admit more Syrian refugees, and help address the global Syrian refugee crisis.

5) U.S. politicians need to highlight the Trump administration's diplomatic failure and avoid portraying a few dozen U.S. troops in northeast Syria as a legitimate solution or a real peacekeeping force. The U.S. government -- alongside other actors -- have failed to do the hard diplomatic spade work necessary to avert escalation in northeast Syria. A UN peacekeeping force could be helpful at some point but U.S. officials made clear that this was not a peacekeeping force. A peacekeeping force would need a UN mandate and would need to be part of a diplomatic agreement that establishes the political underpinnings of a peace that the force can "keep."

6) Diplomacy between the Syrian Kurds and the Syrian government was the way to address concerns about the Kurds, and was not taken seriously enough. The former U.S. Ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford, told NPR "The Syrian Kurds are part of Syria, and they will have to come to an agreement with the Syrian government."

7) Despite having the last two years since the liberation of Raqqa from ISIS to work with, Trump failed to prioritize a diplomatic solution between two U.S. allies, Turkey and the Syrian Kurds --despite everyone knowing about the "ticking time bomb" between the two. Instead, Trump appears to be basing Turkey policy on his long-time personal relationship with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a relationship developed alongside decades of Trump family business dealings in Turkey.

8) Whether we are talking about Afghanistan or Syria, we should have learned by now that U.S. military forces -- whether a force of 60,000 troops or 60 troops -- can not stabilize a country or protect the people. It hasn't worked after 18 years in Afghanistan and it won't work in Syria. The international community has had 18 years to come up with a diplomatic approach to Syria, but instead key global and regional powers have tragically jockeyed for military advantage.

9) Instead of learning the lesson of decades of disastrous interventions, U.S. policymaking has focused obsessively on calibrating U.S. troop presence (a presence that in Syria is illegal), while failing to advance constructive, lasting solutions. What this situation points out is that we need increased resources for and attention to diplomacy, the State Department, funding for peacemaking and peacekeeping at the UN, as well as Syrian stabilization aid.

Turkey's intervention simply proves again the moral bankruptcy of the war on terror. Imitating the U.S. rhetoric and practice of unilateralism, President Erdogan cynically called the unilateral invasion "Operation Peace Spring" and said it was to "neutralize terror threats against Turkey." In the long run we need to build the international movement to press governments to abandon this penchant for exaggerating threats to justify unilateral and illegal military action that contravenes international law.