Expect more jihadist terror

US withdrawal from Syria an exercise in self-interest

It is amusing to read David Flint justifying and defending Donald Trump’s decision on US involvement in Syria (“Trump’s keeping a promise he made”, 31/12). It is ironic to read Flint, the great believer in tradition (such as the monarchy), defending a politician who has no respect for tradition or moral values.

Trump’s decision to get US troops out of Syria appears to have been made purely for self-interest, to be able to boast that he has kept his promise, without any other considerations of long-term policy, of the western allies and of those dependent on the US forces for their safety.

The US decision is a bad precedent for at least three reasons. First, the US went into Syria as the leader of a western coalition of nine nations, to suppress and destroy Islamic State. For the leading nation of that coalition to suddenly withdraw with minimal notice to its partners will destroy trust the next time that the US asks for support. Second, the US coalition also went in to Syria to assist and protect several minority groups, in particular the Yazidis, who were threatened with slaughter or enslavement. The Yazidis were, in fact, rescued first by the Kurds, and subsequently the US forces have fought alongside the Kurds. Trump’s action raises the danger for all of those groups who believed that the US could be trusted to provide support and protection.

Third, winning the war or battle with an enemy is only the first part of winning any struggle, and if the winning nation is not around to secure and maintain the peace, then the problem will almost inevitably come back. Syria is going to continue to be divided up by other forces, in particular Russia, Turkey and Iranian-backed militias, with ongoing conflict. New radical jihadist groups will form in the chaos and destruction and may well become very dangerous to the West.

Andrew Cochrane, Essendon, Vic

David Flint may have valid points, but he completely ignores the plight of the Kurds, who have done a lot of the heavy lifting in combating Islamic State. The post-World War I redrawing of boundaries in the Middle East has created many problems. Why is Kurdistan not a country? Blind Freddie could see this should be the case. Turkey should allow this and at the same time remove their insurgency problem.

The US is abandoning its allies and leaving the Kurds to face an Islamist ratbag, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Wayne Pearson, Grafton, NSW

It is obvious from the websites dedicated to the blow-by-blow reporting of the war in Syria that Australia does not have the military capability to eliminate the brutal and ruthless Islamic State in their last pocket (25km by 5km) east of the Euphrates River. Russia and Syria cannot eliminate Islamic State as it wages a guerrilla war on the west bank. The Kurds can't do it without American artillery and coalition air power.

Trump is pulling out the artillery and special forces commanding it, leaving the CIA as the on-ground capability. Trump appears to have left it to his Russian friends, Iran and Turkey, to sort out at the expense of the Kurds and Israelis. Never has the US appeared weaker and stood for less.

Peter Egan, Artarmon, NSW

So, predictably, Turkey and Russia are poised to attack the Kurds as US forces withdraw from Syria. Thus Trump might soon add genocide to what Greg Sheridan recently called his foreign policy “accomplishments”.

Derek Allan, Southport, Qld

Trump’s withdrawal of US troops from Syria, fulfilling a promise, continues to invoke comment. Yet far more deserving of criticism is Trump’s claim that Islamic State have been defeated. They have not and never will be. No matter how horrific their actions — beheadings, burning Christians alive in cages, massacres in western cities — it is undeniable that in their own minds they are carrying out the irrevocable dictates of the Koran. Regard for their own lives is totally subservient to the immutable decrees of their belief.

Short of total annihilation, an enemy composed entirely of members prepared to fight to the death will never be defeated.

Peter Troy, Kingston, Tas

If Donald Trump got it so right to withdraw his troops from Syria and elsewhere, then how come military experts and intelligence organisations got it so wrong?

Henry Herzog, St Kilda East, Vic