02-21-2014, 02:42 PM
Obama's US Plans for Syria (short-term) Announced
![[Image: assad-obama-putin.jpg]](http://blogs.e-rockford.com/applesauce/files/2013/09/assad-obama-putin.jpg)
So, Obama has announced the current US plan in regards to Syria. It mentions nothing about a change in leadership there, but focuses on hopes for a diplomatic solution and increased aid to Syrian civilians.
Snip:
Wary of getting trapped in another war in another Muslim country, administration officials and President Barack Obama himself are moving cautiously ahead on a plan to augment and protect humanitarian aid to the millions of “internally displaced” and often starving citizens of Bashar al-Assad’s brutal regime.
At one White House meeting recently, the idea of using military resources to assure the flow of humanitarian aid was described as “the least-bad option,” according notes given to an official in a cabinet agency that would be involved in carrying out the proposal.
One option -- quickly dismissed –- called for using American airpower to help secure land routes into Syria. It was deemed too risky and too unpalatable to Pentagon brass.
According to high-ranking administration officials, the plan at this point calls for the U.S. to use land-based military assets in Turkey and Jordan, and perhaps Navy ships in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf, as staging areas to facilitate the flow of food and medicine.
The U.N. Security Council is scheduled on Saturday to vote on a resolution demanding the creation of safe, overland “direct routes” to beleaguered Syrian cities. Jordan, a member of the council, is a sponsor.
The resolution doesn’t mention airspace, but the wording wouldn’t seem to bar the use of aircraft to protect the routes.
With or without the backing of a new resolution, the augmented flow of aid would be distributed in country by a network of humanitarian organizations already on the ground, including various U.N. bodies, the Red Cross and Red Crescent, and volunteers from the Czech Republic, according to U.S. officials.
The administration clearly is trying to have it both ways: Showing concern by promising some added level of protection for the flow of relief supplies, yet unwilling to risk putting American forces in harm's way.
"The problem is that Syria is a very slippery slope," a former top Obama security aide told The Huffington Post. Russia, Syria’s key ally, is deeply suspicious of the humanitarian aid routes idea and is expected to veto the U.N. resolution. The Kremlin sees the resolution as a first step toward U.S. and European direct military involvement in what has been its key client state in the Middle East.
“Attempts are made, including through U.N. mechanisms, to build up tension around the humanitarian situation in Syria,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov publicly complained last month.
The aim, Lavrov said, is to create a “pretext to push forward the idea of so-called humanitarian corridors, no-fly zones and, eventually humanitarian intervention.”
Pentagon officials share Lavrov’s concerns -– at least about providing air cover for the corridors -– though of course from a completely different perspective.
“As the president has made clear,” Meehan said, “we are constantly looking at what options we can take to resolve the crisis in Syria. We are going to continue to work with all parties concerned to try to move forward on a diplomatic solution.”
Obama declared last week that the U.S. would do whatever it could to help ameliorate the humanitarian crisis in Syria short of “military action per se.” The key words may have been “per se.”
Military resources would be used, but in what the administration would insist was not a military way. Ideally, but perhaps unrealistically, the U.S. would like to move with allies under the auspices of a U.N. Security Council resolution.
The resolution cites cities that would be aided by the “direct routes”: Homs, Aleppo and a cluster of suburban and rural areas near Damascus. It “demands that all parties ... promptly allow rapid, safe and unhindered humanitarian access for UN humanitarian agencies and their implementing partners, including across conflict lines and across borders ...”
Assuming that Russia vetoes the resolution, the U.S. and its allies will have to decide whether and how to move aid into Syria without U.N. sanction. Besides Jordan and Turkey, another key U.S. ally is France, which has deep colonial and cultural ties to Syria. French President Francois Hollande has been outspoken about the situation in Syria, and may have more room to maneuver in terms of domestic politics than the U.S.’s erstwhile ally in such matters,
Full story: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/21...27166.html
So, Obama has announced the current US plan in regards to Syria. It mentions nothing about a change in leadership there, but focuses on hopes for a diplomatic solution and increased aid to Syrian civilians.
Snip:
Wary of getting trapped in another war in another Muslim country, administration officials and President Barack Obama himself are moving cautiously ahead on a plan to augment and protect humanitarian aid to the millions of “internally displaced” and often starving citizens of Bashar al-Assad’s brutal regime.
At one White House meeting recently, the idea of using military resources to assure the flow of humanitarian aid was described as “the least-bad option,” according notes given to an official in a cabinet agency that would be involved in carrying out the proposal.
One option -- quickly dismissed –- called for using American airpower to help secure land routes into Syria. It was deemed too risky and too unpalatable to Pentagon brass.
According to high-ranking administration officials, the plan at this point calls for the U.S. to use land-based military assets in Turkey and Jordan, and perhaps Navy ships in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf, as staging areas to facilitate the flow of food and medicine.
The U.N. Security Council is scheduled on Saturday to vote on a resolution demanding the creation of safe, overland “direct routes” to beleaguered Syrian cities. Jordan, a member of the council, is a sponsor.
The resolution doesn’t mention airspace, but the wording wouldn’t seem to bar the use of aircraft to protect the routes.
With or without the backing of a new resolution, the augmented flow of aid would be distributed in country by a network of humanitarian organizations already on the ground, including various U.N. bodies, the Red Cross and Red Crescent, and volunteers from the Czech Republic, according to U.S. officials.
The administration clearly is trying to have it both ways: Showing concern by promising some added level of protection for the flow of relief supplies, yet unwilling to risk putting American forces in harm's way.
"The problem is that Syria is a very slippery slope," a former top Obama security aide told The Huffington Post. Russia, Syria’s key ally, is deeply suspicious of the humanitarian aid routes idea and is expected to veto the U.N. resolution. The Kremlin sees the resolution as a first step toward U.S. and European direct military involvement in what has been its key client state in the Middle East.
“Attempts are made, including through U.N. mechanisms, to build up tension around the humanitarian situation in Syria,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov publicly complained last month.
The aim, Lavrov said, is to create a “pretext to push forward the idea of so-called humanitarian corridors, no-fly zones and, eventually humanitarian intervention.”
Pentagon officials share Lavrov’s concerns -– at least about providing air cover for the corridors -– though of course from a completely different perspective.
“As the president has made clear,” Meehan said, “we are constantly looking at what options we can take to resolve the crisis in Syria. We are going to continue to work with all parties concerned to try to move forward on a diplomatic solution.”
Obama declared last week that the U.S. would do whatever it could to help ameliorate the humanitarian crisis in Syria short of “military action per se.” The key words may have been “per se.”
Military resources would be used, but in what the administration would insist was not a military way. Ideally, but perhaps unrealistically, the U.S. would like to move with allies under the auspices of a U.N. Security Council resolution.
The resolution cites cities that would be aided by the “direct routes”: Homs, Aleppo and a cluster of suburban and rural areas near Damascus. It “demands that all parties ... promptly allow rapid, safe and unhindered humanitarian access for UN humanitarian agencies and their implementing partners, including across conflict lines and across borders ...”
Assuming that Russia vetoes the resolution, the U.S. and its allies will have to decide whether and how to move aid into Syria without U.N. sanction. Besides Jordan and Turkey, another key U.S. ally is France, which has deep colonial and cultural ties to Syria. French President Francois Hollande has been outspoken about the situation in Syria, and may have more room to maneuver in terms of domestic politics than the U.S.’s erstwhile ally in such matters,
Full story: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/21...27166.html