It's

 kinda what we been doing 

since Vietnam if you isn't noticed by now.

Meanwhile with all eyes on Iran.

America Is Planning to Withdraw From Syria—

and Create a Disaster

The create a disaster part that is.

Rev 13:2-4

The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority. One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast. 4 People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?”

(Isis?

Trump?

Take your pick at this point 

what does it matter?

Point is its an evil that every time you try and kill it off 

it keeps coming back because it's not done fulfilling Gods plan.

So take your pick, 

It's here.

And Thats the point.

"The Islamic State has regained its momentum, and the Biden administration might inadvertently give it another boost."

(Well of course, lord knows we need to create another war so we can run some munition stocks down some more so some defense contractors can make some more $ getting contracts to fill them back up etc just ad infinitum at this point...who we kidding anymore?)

"By Charles Lister, a senior fellow 

and director of 

the Syria and Counterterrorism and Extremism programs 

at the Middle East Institute."

"Since Hamas’s brutal attack against Israel on Oct. 7 and the resulting Israeli military campaign in the Gaza Strip, tensions and hostilities across the Middle East have reached fever pitch. And with such a complex regional crisis playing out, it should not come as a surprise that the Biden administration is reconsidering its military priorities in the region."

"It should be cause for significant concern, however, that this could involve a full withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria. While no definitive decision has been made to leave, four sources within the Defense and State departments said the White House is no longer invested in sustaining a mission that it perceives as unnecessary. Active internal discussions are now underway to determine how and when a withdrawal may take place."

"Notwithstanding the catastrophic effect that a withdrawal would have on U.S. and allied influence over the unresolved and acutely volatile crisis in Syria, it would also be a gift to the Islamic State. While significantly weakened, the group is in fact primed for a resurgence in Syria, if given the space to do so."

The unprecedented international intervention launched in 2014 by the United States and more than 80 partner nations to defeat the terror group’s so-called territorial state was remarkably successful, with the final pocket of territory in Syria liberated in early 2019.

But the situation in neighboring Syria is more complex. With approximately 900 troops on the ground, the United States is playing an instrumental role in containing and degrading a persistent Islamic State insurgency in northeastern Syria, 

(See Rev 13:2-4 listed above.)

working alongside its local partners, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

"Yet the threat remains. Early on Jan. 16, an Islamic State rocket attack was launched on an SDF-administered prison holding as many as 5,000 Islamic State prisoners, triggering a mass breakout attempt. While that operation was ultimately foiled, the U.S. deployment also plays a vital role in stabilizing an area in which 10,000 battle-hardened Islamic State militants are detained within at least 20 makeshift prisons and a further 50,000 associated women and children are held in secured camps. As the U.S. Central Command has repeatedly warned, keeping the Islamic State’s “army in waiting” and its “next generation” secured is a vital U.S. national security interest.

(Cause thats something everybody knows about.)

"While U.S. troops and their SDF partners have managed to contain the Islamic State’s recovery in Syria’s northeast, the situation is far more concerning to the west—on the other side of the Euphrates River, where the Syrian regime is in control, at least on paper."

"In this vast expanse of desert, the Islamic State has been engaged in a slow but methodical recovery, 

(See Rev 13:2-4 again)

exploiting regime indifference and its inability to challenge a fluid desert-based insurgency. In the past few years, 

the terrorist group has also reestablished 

an operational presence in regime-held Daraa 

(See Rev 13:2-4 again)

in southern Syria and 

markedly expanded the scale, scope, and sophistication of its operations throughout the central desert, temporarily capturing populated territory, seizing and holding gas facilities, and exerting considerable pressure around the strategic town of Palmyra.

(See Rev 13:2-4 again)

"In eastern and central Syria, the Islamic State’s shadow influence has returned. The group has reestablished a complex extortion operation, extracting so-called taxes from everyone from doctors and shopkeepers to farmers and truck drivers. With increasing frequency, the Islamic State is issuing them bespoke extortion demands based on acquired knowledge of local business revenue streams. In some cases, Islamic State-branded receipts are issued and when required, and threats are sent to cell phones and relatives."

"While much of this activity was initially focused on rural Syria, it is now urban, and in many rural areas, the Islamic State is increasingly recognized as a shadow authority. These far less visible activities may not make media headlines, but they are the core ingredients for a resilient and deeply embedded terrorist insurgency.

(Do I even have to say it at this point?)

"While the Islamic State remains far from where it was in 2013 and 2014, the group retains concerning capabilities, plenty of confidence, and a newfound sense of momentum. War in Gaza and a spiraling regional crisis are adding fuel to its fire and creating opportunities for the terror group to exploit the situation for its own advantage."

"While there is little that U.S. forces can do to alter Islamic State activities within the regime-controlled regions of Syria, U.S. troops are the glue holding together the only meaningful challenge to the Islamic State within a third of Syrian territory. Were that glue to disappear, a significant resurgence in Syria would be all but guaranteed, and a destabilizing spillover into Iraq a certainty."

"With Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani now publicly pushing for a U.S. withdrawal in his own country, some hope remains that the U.S. military’s presence in Iraqi Kurdistan could sustain counter-Islamic State operations, including next door in Syria. This may explain why Iran’s proxies have so frequently targeted U.S. forces stationed at Erbil International Airport in recent weeks."

"However, shifting counter-Islamic State coordination from Baghdad to Erbil would present its own complications, sharpening intra-Kurdish tensions between the regional government of Masoud Barzani and the PKK-linked SDF administration in northeast Syria, likely triggering unfavorable Turkish interference. Emboldened by a sense of victory in Iraq-proper, Iran and its proxies in this scenario would then undoubtedly sharpen their attacks on U.S. troops in Syria, seeking their withdrawal too."

"Ultimately, events since October have placed the U.S. deployment in northeast Syria on a fraying thread—hence recent internal consideration of a Syria withdrawal. Given the disastrous consequences of the hurried exit from Afghanistan in 2021 and the impending U.S. election later this year, it is hard to grasp why the Biden administration would be considering a withdrawal from Syria. No matter how such a withdrawal was conducted, it would trigger chaos and a swift surge in terror threats. But there can be no denying the clear sense in policy circles that it is being actively considered—and that it has been accepted as an eventual inevitability."

"Some within the U.S. government are currently proposing a collaborative arrangement between the SDF and Syria’s regime to counter the Islamic State as an apparent path towards a U.S. withdrawal. That would not only be a phenomenal boon to the Islamic State, but simply impossible on its own terms. Part of the SDF may have periodic contact with Assad’s regime, but they are far from natural allies. The regime would never allow the SDF to sustain itself, and Turkey would do everything possible to kill what remained."

"The last time that the Islamic State surged in Syria, in 2014, it transformed international security in profoundly negative ways. Should a U.S. withdrawal precipitate a return to Islamic State chaos, we will be relegated to mere observers, unable to return to a region that we will have placed squarely under the control of a pariah regime and its Russian and Iranian allies."