Voices from Congress speak out to end US occupation of Syria

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Newsweek
13 Mar 2023 23:43
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Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna confesses that "Syria is a prime example of America's flawed foreign policy status quo, kept alive by warmongers on both the Right and Left."

Syrian schoolchildren walk as US troops patrol near the Turkish border in Al-Hasakah, November 4, 2018. (Reuters)

In an opinion piece for Newsweek, Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna -- who serves as the Representative for Florida's Thirteenth Congressional District. Rep. -- lashed out at the foundations of US foreign policy, calling for redirecting “US's foreign policy away from a failed internationalist foreign policy consensus.”

This comes shortly after The Intercept highlighted in a new report that the Obama administration's senate representative, a strong advocate in support of aggressively challenging Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, is now backing a push by Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla. to force the US to leave the country within 180 days.

The Republican's introduction of the resolution, most notably with such a short timetable that would doom it to a lopsided defeat, sparked a flurry of lobbying to turn it into a bipartisan coalition, including progressive groups like Just Foreign Policy and Demand Progress, as well as conservative groups like FreedomWorks, Concerned Veterans for America, and Citizens for Renewing America.

Opposition to US meddling in Syria has been bipartisan since the beginning of the war. In 2013, Daily Kos and HuffPost produced whip counts before an Obama-called vote to authorize the use of force, urging progressives to vote no. Before Obama pulled the legislation from the floor, HuffPost counted 243 members of Congress who planned to vote no or lean toward no.

The Congresswoman openly backs Gaetz's proposal, arguing that the policy of "keeping Americans overseas is necessary for stopping terrorist attacks is absurd."

"Frankly I'm tired of hearing, if we don't fight them there, they'll come here," she said.

Luna acknowledged that "Syria is a prime example of America's flawed foreign policy status quo, kept alive by warmongers on both the Right and Left."

She blamed former US President Barack Obama for what she described as a "naive campaign for regime change in the Middle East which fundamentally misunderstood the region at large and was a futile experiment."

"Obama's half-hearted slogan, "Assad must go," raised false hopes among a certain section of Syrians that only extended the civil war. Worse, it resulted in a civil war which directly resulted in the rise of ISIS."

The Congresswoman also asserted that distant countries pose no existential threat to the United States and can be adequately managed through long-distance capabilities and cautious alliance policies.

She also criticized the US Congress urging its members to genuinely worry about "terrorists in America."

"We need to focus on the two problems our foreign policy pundits have consistently ignored, misread, and downplayed: our nonexistent southern border and the influx of terrorists coming into our own country, and the rise of a peer rival in China".

In her opinion piece, she also raised the following questions: "Why aren't the billions of dollars spent in the Middle East being invested in guarding our own border? Why are American forces patrolling distant nations yet not our own, which is under threat? Why was the equipment left behind during our botched withdrawal from Afghanistan not sold or shipped to Taiwan?"

Luna further confessed that the US' "nation-building" in the Middle East was not "a prudent policy."

The Congresswoman explained that the US grabbed billions of dollars from taxpayers and diverted them to NGOs, the military, failed governance projects, and foreign assistance waste while leaving many places in shambles.

"All that has resulted from this failed mission is the Middle East emerging as a region of permanent protectorates, with zero upsides and no measurable benefit to the United States. In fact, it has only increased local hostility."

She also warned that China has been benefiting while the US has been meddling in the affairs of countries in the Middle East, most notably Syria.

The Congresswoman stressed that "the era of utopian foreign policy ideas based on faulty theories is over," although Gaetz's resolution to withdraw soldiers from Syria did not pass. Luna further hailed that one in every four of our Congress members backed the proposal from both the Republicans and Democrats.

"Members of Congress don't swear an oath to the people of Syria, Ukraine, or anywhere else. They swear an oath to the people of the United States," she concluded.

Why does the US continue to station troops in Syria?

Since ISIS has been defeated in Syria and Iraq, many analysts argued that the reasons for the US to remain stationed in Syrian territory have been left unclear.

The US frequently loots oil from Syrian gas fields and transports them to other occupation bases in Iraq via illegal crossings. Syrian news agency SANA reported last Saturday that US occupation troops have looted a new batch of oil from Syria's Al-Jazeera fields. The convoy was on its way to US military bases in Iraq via the illegal Al-Mahmudiya crossing in Al-Yarubiya region.

According to civilian sources, the convoy comprises 23 vehicles and includes covered trucks and tanks filled with stolen oil. The sources further added that an additional convoy made up of 34 trucks exited the illegal Al-Walid crossing in Al-Yarubiya.

The last time US troops plundered Syrian oil was on February 27. The oil was looted from the same Al-Jazeera fields and was transported to Iraq via illegal crossings. US troops claim to be occupying the area in order to rid the region of terrorists, yet the US has strategically implanted itself there for the purposes of stealing Syria's oil, as well as destabilizing President Bashar Al-Assad's government.

In December of 2022, Syria's Foreign Ministry said the US occupation forces and their affiliated military groups' systematic lootings of Syrian oil, wheat, and other national resources have amounted to direct losses valued at $25.9 billion and indirect losses valued at over $86 billion.

It further estimated the total value of the Syrian oil sector losses to amount to $111.9 billion.