The Hill - America should not own another bad war

Op-Ed

By Rep. Curt Clawson

In recent years our country has been funding endless, bloody wars and backing untested allies, void of any vision of what success would look like in the end. After sacrificing far too much American blood and treasure, with thousands of our brave military men and women dead, and tens of thousands back home with permanent scars from these wars, we find situation after situation worse than when we began our involvement.

As we revisit the merits of the Iraq invasion in the presidential race, here's what we do know today. The blood and treasure invested in the region has yielded us little, and pulling out has resulted in continuous bloodshed with millions of civilians driven out of their homes and villages.

We have also found that when we arm untested allies, in the hopes of reducing or eliminating American boots-on-the-ground, some of the weapons we supply and some of the rebels we train eventually turn on us, or against our allies. As the ISIS threat emerges in the void we left in Iraq, we must not forget recent lessons learned. Weapons once used against Saddam Hussein are now in the hands of jihadists. Weapons once controlled by Gaddafi in Libya are now firing on chaotic Middle East killing-fields.

This week the Iraqi Army, heavily invested by the U.S., once again fled the battlefield, this time surrendering Ramadi to ISIS jihadists. ISIS fighters seized a large cache of weapons, including rocket-propelled grenades and heavy machine guns supplied by the U.S. and other nations. The more weapons we and others pump into the region, the more civilians wind up dead, injured, or displaced. This is a very tragic message to deliver to the thousands of brave Americans who lost lives and limbs liberating Anbar Province some eight years ago.

Last week, I offered an amendment to the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) to remove a requested additional $600 million to arm and train Syrian rebel forces. I asked that this $600 million instead be placed in the Overseas Contingency Operations account to support our own forces rather than unreliable rebels. The amendment was not accepted, and the final bill included war funds that I simply could not support.

Last September, President Obama first asked for an initial $500 million to train and arm 15,000 so-called "moderate" rebels. Eight months later, according to U.S. News & World Report, "3,750 Syrian fighters have volunteered for the training, and about 400 have completed the prescreening." Now the president has asked Congress for another $600 million. Congress needs to revisit the issue of the Syrian rebel funding immediately for an accounting of where the first $500 million was spent, a determination of what if anything has been accomplished, and an understanding of specific plans and goals for the next $600 million.

The same is true now as was true then. There is no real coalition of partners to provide the needed "boots-on-the-ground." With the questionable allegiances of the Syrian rebels, and an uncertain coalition of allies, it is only a matter of time before we might own this Syrian conflict. We must avoid any and all steps that could lead to this outcome.

Syria is a total mess. President Bashar al-Assad's atrocities have now cost 220,000 Syrian lives, with another 11.5 million civilians displaced. We still don't know specifically what the 60 nations in the so-called allied coalition have promised or are providing. The only coalition "boots-on-the-ground" seem to be U.S. Special Forces. Here we go again!

Meanwhile elements of the so-called moderate opposition have aligned themselves with jihadist groups like al-Qaeda and al-Nussra --more focused on going after Assad than ISIS.

Congress needs to revisit U.S. involvement in Syria. We might slow ISIS down with air attacks. And our brave Special Forces or drones might take out a few ISIS leaders. But we will never liberate Syria this way. What is the ultimate objective? Will Assad continue to rule? Will an Islamist extremist group, perhaps al-Qaeda or ISIS or an Iranian surrogate, take over? Will the civil war continue indefinitely? These are the questions that need to be answered for the American people.

More Americans dying in conflicts where there is no strategy and no definition of ultimate victory is unacceptable. We must always provide our brave Americans with whatever they need in their missions. They have preserved and will continue to preserve our liberties and fight for freedoms around the world. We owe them our prayers, our gratitude, and our unwavering support.

This is not a call for isolationism. This is a call for U.S. leadership in formulating strategies and goals to not just end ISIS, but to address the entire global scourge of Islamic extremism. We need a broad coalition, including Muslim nations, with specific shared commitments of funds and troops, all engaged for what will be a very long struggle. Unless and until we've got this strategy and team in place, we should not call upon our sons and daughters to make the ultimate sacrifice.

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