The mental gymnastics the liberal establishment has used to oppose Trump's decision to pull out of Syria is stunning. Consider The Atlantic.

These articles are from last year and earlier this year.





Now let's look at today's headline.



The Trump administration has unexpectedly decided to rapidly withdraw U.S. forces from Syria, where they have been fighting ISIS. This decision, which demonstrates that the president’s National Security Strategy does not govern his policies, will have deleterious effects across the strategic waterfront: throwing Syria policy into chaos; rewarding Iranian regional destabilization and Russian intervention; alarming Kurdish forces and American allies fighting in the region, as well as countries to which jihadists might return; and calling into question America’s commitment to stabilizing Iraq and Afghanistan.

All of these priorities have been capriciously sacrificed by President Trump for no apparent reason other than that he campaigned on withdrawal and wants it to happen now. There has been no precipitating event to drive a policy change.

"No apparent reason"?

What happened to "unconstitutional and illegal"? Those reasons alone are a full-stop.

We don't need a single other reason.

But let's not stop there. Let's look at "throwing Syria policy into chaos".



Kurdish forces in Syria, Iraq, and Turkey will be immediately and negatively affected by the decision.

The Kurdish forces being mentioned are separatists!

I sympathize with the Kurds, but let's be honest here. Armed separatist rebellions create chaos. Not the other way around.

And then there is this gem.



For if Syria can be so lightly written off, the fight arbitrarily declared won, what is the argument for continuing to assist Iraq—where ISIS is even more defeated?

???Even more defeated???

What exactly are you trying to prove? How pointless it is for us to be there?

Let's not forget that the Iraqi government wants us to leave!

Now let's look at the jihadists, the one item that everyone talks about, because they haven't completely ceased to exist. Let's look at headlines from last year.

The Nation: Why Does the US Continue to Arm Terrorists in Syria?



Incredibly, after nearly six years of war, the US government continues to fund rebel groups that, far from being moderate, often subscribe to an Islamist ideology long funded and propagated by the Gulf State tyrannies Saudi Arabia and Qatar—with, in recent years, a healthy assist from Erdogan’s Turkey.

WashPost: Why is the Trump administration empowering al-Qaeda in Syria?



“Current US strategy empowers al-Qaeda, which has an army in Syria, is preparing to replace ISIS . . . [and] is more dangerous than ISIS,” says a recent report from the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the American Enterprise Institute’s Critical Threats Project (CTP). Our approach, the report declares, “is inadvertently fueling the global Salafi-jihadi insurgency” because Sunnis see the United States as working with their mortal enemies. Al-Qaeda is taking advantage of this perception to build support among Sunni tribes, portraying itself as the defender of Sunni Arabs against a U.S.-Russo-Iranian axis intent on subjugating and destroying them.

Right. Like we are "fighting terrorism" in Syria.

If your GWOT is helping terrorism then you need to stop what you are doing.

And yet liberals use even dumber reasons to oppose a withdrawal from Syria.

Syria is not a "gift" that can be "given" to Putin, despite the blinkered American political climate which places everything in that asinine context. It's a country over which the United States has no legal authority, and never did, despite years of casualties and billions spent pic.twitter.com/7WztDNedt5 — Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 19, 2018

As soon as Trump announced via Twitter his intent to withdraw troops from Syria, everyone has been losing their minds. Virtually every liberal media outlet has reacted hysterically, with the New York Times editorial board condemning the decision, along with multiple CNN and MSNBC releases and Rachel Maddow going full Rachel Maddow but with Turkey this time. Senators Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio, Jeanne Shaheen, Tom Cotton, Angus King and Joni Ernst wrote Trump a bipartisan letter warning that a US withdrawal “may embolden Bashar al Assad to take further actions to solidify his power” inside the country he is the president of. Hollywood celebrities like Bette Midler, Mia Farrow and Cher burst out of their dust pods of irrelevance to scream at everyone that limitless US military expansionism is glorious and desirable. Max Boot, the legendary Man Who Is Always Wrong About Everything, declared that Trump is giving a “gift to Iran, Russia, ISIS, and Assad” by exiting

Trump gave Putin a big Christmas present this year: Syria. — Joe Scarborough (@JoeNBC) December 19, 2018

Here's an idea: Let's say Russia pulls out of Syria. Using the same logic, Russia leaving would be a "gift" to al-Qaeda. Is that what we want?

Then there is the fact that our troops are stuck between the Syrian Kurds and the Turkish military. Do we really want to go to war with our NATO ally?

Speaking of war, we already have fought Russian mercenaries, Syrian militias, and Iraqi militias. So exactly what did we hope to achieve? To take on everyone in an illegal war?

Is this what it means to #Resist?