Unsurprisingly, President Trump’s critics breathlessly lambasted his decision to withdraw a minuscule contingent of American troops and military observers from Syria. One loyal congressional Trump ally called this move “sickening.”
Based on mainstream media accounts, one would think a massive troop withdrawal is underway; this is astonishingly inaccurate news. The commander in chief is redeploying an insignificant 50 personnel out of northern Syria. We are not completely withdrawing from Syria as of yet.
Like it or not, President Trump campaigned on a promise to withdraw American troops from endless Middle Eastern wars. In fact, he might be the first president to boldly challenge the military-industrial complex, a powerful force that ensnared our nation in ceaseless foreign conflicts, cost hundreds of thousands of lives and wildly expended trillions of dollars in American capital. They cannot even successfully conclude other theaters of war (e.g., Afghanistan), and yet they ravenously crave increased troop deployments to new hostile war zones.
As we can behold from the hyperbolic responses, the military-industrial complex enjoys broad bipartisan support.
As he prepared to depart the Oval Office in 1961, President Dwight Eisenhower warned Americans of the dangers of this hazardous force in American society: “We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”
Those who oppose endless warfare should be grateful President Trump occupies the Oval Office. Perhaps he is the “stable genius” after all.
Benjamin Holmes
Peaks Island and San Diego, Calif.
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