Rep. Thomas Massie posted: “I’m heartbroken that we lost soldiers in Syria, but now is the time to ask: Why are we in Syria? I offered an amendment last week to defund foreign military groups in Syria. We should withdraw U.S. forces as well. This coming week I’ll sponsor legislation to repeal the 2001 AUMF [Authorization for Use of Military Force].”
DAVE DeCAMP, [email protected], @DecampDave
DeCamp is news editor of Antiwar.com and host of “Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp.” He just wrote the piece “Gunman Who Killed Three Americans in Syria Was Member of Syrian Government’s Security Forces,” which notes that President Trump and other U.S. officials “have called the incident an ‘ISIS attack’ and have left out” the fact “that the perpetrator was a member of the Syrian military, which the U.S. has allied itself with despite HTS’s al-Qaeda past, and as of Sunday, ISIS hasn’t taken credit for the shooting.
“’This was an ISIS attack against the U.S., and Syria, in a very dangerous part of Syria, that is not fully controlled by them,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“He added that Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa is ‘extremely angry’ about the attack. Trump recently hosted Sharaa at the White House despite his past as an al-Qaeda leader and ally of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the founder of ISIS.
“Both Trump and U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth vowed there would be retaliation for the attack, and according to the SOHR [Syrian Observatory for Human Rights], there’s been an escalation of U.S. operations in the region, including surveillance flights and arrests of people on suspicion of ‘affiliating with ISIS and/or adopting its ideology.’”
DeCamp also just wrote “Syria Attack Highlights Deployment of U.S. National Guard to Overseas Conflicts,” which notes: “An attack that targeted U.S. troops in central Syria on Saturday has drawn attention to the presence of National Guard soldiers in the country and their use in combat zones in the Middle East and Africa.
“The attack, perpetrated by a member of the Syrian government’s security forces, killed two members of the Iowa National Guard and a civilian interpreter. Another three members of the Iowa National Guard were injured.
“’Sending National Guard members to die in undeclared wars is a betrayal of both the Constitution and the people who serve,’ Dan McKnight, the founder of Bring Our Troops Home, wrote on X.
“Bring Our Troops Home leads a project called Defend the Guard, which promotes state-level legislation that would prohibit the federal government from deploying the state’s National Guard to a combat zone where Congress hasn’t officially declared war, something that hasn’t happened since World War II.
“’Syria proves the point again. The Guard exists for defense, not endless imperial drift. Defend the Guard,’ McKnight said.”