The disaster unfolding tonight in Syria was predictable from the moment Trump made clear he wanted to leave. Here’s what I wrote in @washingtonpost after my resignation ten months ago. The four “hard truths” that should have immediately guided U.S. policy back then: 
You can read the entire op-ed here. I stand by every word.👇washingtonpost.com/outlook/trump-…
I provided much longer treatment in @ForeignAffairs (paywall removed). This article critiques what became the policy even after Trump said leave: e.g., that we’d still stay indefinitely albeit in less numbers and that SDF should not pursue alternatives. foreignaffairs.com/file/38197/dow…
Those suggesting the U.S missed some “road not taken” years ago to fight ISIS with Turkish-backed opposition forces are simply mistaken. We delayed the ISIS campaign by a year at least pursuing all of those those roads, spending hundreds of millions of dollars.
These opposition forces proved to be militarily ineffective for major ops and/or riddled with extremists as the world has witnessed over the last 72-hours. There were a few patriotic units, but even they gave U.S. equipment to al Qaeda in TR-backed areas.👇usatoday.com/story/news/wor…
As explained in Foreign Affairs, Trump himself was presented with two well developed options for taking Raqqa: 1) arm the Kurds or 2) deploy tens of thousands of US troops to support Turkish military forces and TR-backed opposition. He armed the Kurds.
Syria has been a humanitarian disaster on epic scale. Assad is a war criminal who deserves a bad accident. But the US over two administrations with a major inter-agency and international effort defeated the ISIS caliphate, and stabilized 1/3 of the country, at very low cost.
The deaths came from the SDF, nearly 11,000 total, and they were not just “fighting for their land” as Trump petulantly says. They were fighting where we asked them to fight based on a military campaign design to pressure and then defeat ISIS across two theaters.
Trump seems to believe it’s easy to raise an army and fight an enemy like ISIS. It’s not. It takes years of work and it may be impossible now as the world sees a historic success upended in six days after a call with a foreign leader and in the most careless and callous manner.
Bottom line: it’s shameful to leave partners to their fate and the mercies of hostile actors with no thought, plan or process in place. I wish my former SDF colleagues the best as they find new patrons. We won a war together. That’s something nobody can take away from us.
