One of the central complaints of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and subsequent presidency is that America’s NATO allies (Turkey included) don’t pay their share for the protection they enjoy from the United States military. Yet in the Middle East, there is a group that has paid its share in blood — blood that they shed to minimize our losses while defeating our enemies — and Trump threw them away.
It is often said that the Kurds are pro-American, but that is an understatement. To say that the Kurds love America is still an understatement. The Bible says “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13 KJV), and in this case that love is multiplied more than a thousand fold.
According to The Washington Post, in the battle against ISIS: “Syrian Kurdish fighters have served as the primary ground force against the Islamic State, with the United States providing logistical and air support. The Kurds have suffered more than 10,000 casualties in the fight. Four American service members have been killed in combat in Syria since 2014.” The loss of any American soldier breaks the heart of every patriot, but ISIS wants to kill every American man, woman, or child who will not bow to their dictates. If we are to continue to live safe and free, ISIS had to be defeated sooner or later — and it was done with very few American casualties, thanks to the sacrifices of the Kurds.
The president likes to say that there were only 50 troops in northern Syria supporting the Kurds. For those 50 troops, the United States had a battle-tested fighting force of 100,000 reliable friends — something quite rare in the Middle East — that the U.S. could call upon in case of an ISIS resurgence.
Terrorists arise, thrive, and can resurface in areas of instability. Until a few days ago, the threat of such a resurfacing of ISIS was low — thanks to the stability of the area governed by the Kurds. According to Thomas S. Kaplan and Bernard-Henri Lévy, who work directly with the Kurds, “Even as they [the Kurds] have waged a years-long war against the Islamic State in northeastern Syria, they have governed a population of about 2 million people with a degree of respect for religious freedom, gender equality and minority rights unknown in that part of the world.” (Last year, former Daily Wire correspondent Kassy Dillon, traveled to northern Iraq and saw first-hand what an area governed by the Kurds looks like. “I spent several day[s] with the Kurds last year and I was the only woman,” she tweeted. “I was treated respectfully and had the opportunity to visit their front lines.” One of the Kurdish fighters she met, Mo, wears an American flag on his uniform “to honor all of the Americans who fought beside him against ISIS.”)
All of this is now being squandered by the president — and for what? What national security benefits did the unreliable, unstable, anti-American dictator of Turkey promise that convinced the president to abandon some of America’s most stalwart allies in the Middle East?
It’s a real shame. Alliances are built on trust. The Kurds trusted us and did their part. Next time the president complains about allies who don’t do their part, he should take a long, hard look in the mirror.