Washington, DC. A former US Ambassador to Syria is speaking out and explaining where he thinks the current Syrian conflict will go, and if your a Kurd-spoiler alert, because this does not end well for you.
Syria’s government and its allies, including Iran, will eventually overcome US efforts to secure influence in the nation, and Kurdish fighters will pay for siding with President Trump and his administration, according to the former America ambassador to Syria.
Ambassador Robert Ford, who served as envoy to Syria under Obama from 2011 through 2014, said during an interview with News Front, that “Obama did not leave the Trump administration many options to achieve its goal” of defeating the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) and curbing Iran’s growing foothold in the region.
While Iran and Russia back Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against various insurgents and jihadists trying to topple him, America supports an irregular coalition, the Syrian Democratic Forces, made up mostly of Kurds, but including other ethnic minorities and Arabs. Despite the group’s recent successes in storming ISIS’s de facto capital of Raqqa, Ford said “the game was finished” for US plans to overthrow Assad or compete with Iran’s success in the country.
“Assad won, I mean he’s the victor, or he thinks so,” Ford told News Front, suggesting that the Syrian leader was unlikely to face any charges stemming from war crime accusations by the West. “Maybe in 10 years, he will retake the entire country.”
The Ambassador spoke candidly about what he believed were serious errors made by Washington at the beginning of the crisis in Syria, in 2011. He recalled being deeply opposed to Obama and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s decision to publicly call for Assad’s removal from power during a period of mass demonstrations against the Syrian government.
Ford said he knew that US approval for the political opposition would encourage certain elements to take up arms against the government, expecting the US military to stage an Iraq-style intervention to aid them, which he did not believe the US would carry out.
When the Syrian opposition, which also received support from Turkey and Gulf Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, did launch a large-scale insurgency against the state, the CIA ultimately decided to train and equip certain rebel groups.
After this policy came to light, Ford said in 2014 that the US was “behind the curve,” as Russia and Iran were devoting extensive resources to defending Assad, much more than the US was willing to devote to the insurgents.
Recent clashes between the Syrian army and the Syrian Democratic Forces were followed by the US’s unprecedented decision to shoot down a Syrian military jet it claimed was operating too close to positions held by the Syrian Democratic Forces. Siding with America, will turn out to be a grave mistake for the Kurds, according to Ambassador Ford. He said US support for Kurds would disappear, as it did in post-invasion Iraq, after ISIS was defeated in Raqqa and in other areas.
” America will not defend the Kurds against Assad’s forces,” the former Ambassador said. “What we’re doing with the Kurds is not only politically stupid, but immoral. Syrian Kurds are making their biggest mistake in trusting the Americans,” Ford finished.