There never was an organized Moderate opposition group in Syria worth supporting. Groups should prove they can organize and become popular with the locals BEFORE we decide to help them.
Proponents of arming the rebels overlook two major problems with that policy:
A) there's no guarantee that the groups we arm will effectively use the weapons and win on the battlefield
B) there's a good chance that the weapons will end up in the wrong hands
In the case of Syria, both of those worst case scenarios played out in real life. On a larger scale in Iraq, their incompetent Army let millions of dollars worth of arms fall into the hands of ISIS.
At some point, Americans must accept that our ability to control events in foreign countries is severely limited and not every political problem can be solved with weapons proliferation and/or airstrikes.
What went wrong?
There never was an organized Moderate opposition group in Syria worth supporting. Groups should prove they can organize and become popular with the locals BEFORE we decide to help them.
Proponents of arming the rebels overlook two major problems with that policy:
A) there's no guarantee that the groups we arm will effectively use the weapons and win on the battlefield
B) there's a good chance that the weapons will end up in the wrong hands
In the case of Syria, both of those worst case scenarios played out in real life. On a larger scale in Iraq, their incompetent Army let millions of dollars worth of arms fall into the hands of ISIS.
At some point, Americans must accept that our ability to control events in foreign countries is severely limited and not every political problem can be solved with weapons proliferation and/or airstrikes.