The U.S. has been attempting to train supposedly “vetted” Syrian rebels, that are deemed “moderate” enough to back, to combat ISIS. The stark reality is that these rebel groups are without a doubt intermingled with islamic extremists and jihadist groups. Vetted they might be, there is no way to fully support the rebels without inadvertently supplying aid to the very enemy Americans are supposed to be fighting. Supporters of Obama’s policy have conceded as much, admitting that some weapons will find their way into the hands of ISIS supporters.
“There’s going to be mistakes. We understand some people are going to get arms that should not be getting arms. But we still should be doing everything we can to support the free Syrian opposition.” -Sen. Bob Corker, Tennessee Republican
Unfortunately more than just some ended up in ISIS hands, and not by accident. They were willingly handed over, along with their vehicles, by the second class of trainees produced by the U.S. funded 500 million dollar rebel training program.
The first class of American trained Syrian rebels, named Division 30, were apparently ill-equipped and 
poorly trained, and suffered the consequences. Upon the groups entrance onto the Syrian battlefield, al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate kidnapped the rebels’ leader and attacked the disheveled remains. A number of those rebels remain in al-Qaeda’s hands, no doubt revealing what little information they might have had on the U.S. training program. General Lloyd Austin, the head of United States Central Command, testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee admitting that the pro-U.S. Syrian rebel faction, dubbed the New Syrian Force (NSF), was almost completely gone, with virtually everyone either killed or having fled. According to the New York Times:
“The rebels were ill-prepared for an enemy attack and were sent back into Syria in too small numbers. They had no local support from the population and had poor intelligence about their foes.”
General Austin went on to say that the next two classes of NSF fighters were still being trained, though that training too was falling behind schedule. The indications were that these classes weren’t much bigger, 100-120 fighters all told.
In the weeks to follow, the second class had been bolstered up to almost 75 trainees and was once again sent into enemy territory. The second class entered Syria by way of Turkey and reports claim that they immediately took their weapons and vehicles to al-Qaeda territory and surrendered them all to enemy forces. According to a statement from al-Qaeda’s Syria branch, the group’s membership had agreed to give them everything in return for “safe passage,” and that the leader of the second class, Anas Ibrahim Obeid, plans to issue a statement repudiating the U.S. training strategy. Obeid reportedly told al-Qaeda that he tricked the U.S. coalition because he “wanted their weapons.” Obeid would have been the top ranking NSF commander after the previous Lt. Col. Mohammad al-Dhaher resigned, complaining that the rebel training program was “not serious.”
In a time of crippling economic struggles, and the fight to remain relevant in the global financial game, spending half a billion dollars to train rebels of obviously uncertain loyalty seems a dramatic misallocation of funds. Most importantly, this entire operation has absolutely nothing to do with the United States of America. It would seem that the face value of this Syrian venture might be no more than a cleverly shrouded facade of the need to keep the country safe from terrorists. A recently declassified US Defense Intelligence Agency report obtained from Judicial Watch confirms that the US and other western governments have in fact allied themselves with al-Qaeda and other Islamic extremist groups in order to topple the Syrian dictator Bashir al-Assad’s regime. The U.S. has an uncanny ability to deal out destruction when that is its true intention; so to see such a militaristic blunder, as well as documented agreements that contradict the public outline, makes one consider alternative theories to the ultimate Syrian end-game.
The unfortunate fact is that ISIS was born of Western intervention in Iraq and covert action in Syria. The recent actions of this country are classic examples of the destructive American imperial hubris that has long-standing consequences. In the 1980s, the U.S. sent weapons to the mujahideen to support the Muslim Afghan warriors in the Soviet war in Afghanistan. This gave birth to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. In the 1990s, the U.S. bombed Serbia and the result has been an extremist Islamic state in the Balkans. This country’s invasion and occupation of Iraq has led to disaster, turning Mesopotamia into a giant safe haven for countless jihadists.
Americans need to open their eyes to the lasting effects that invasive militaristic action into a foreign country can have for many years to follow. The people of this country are led to believe that the United States is morally obligated to step in and play parental figure in the event of a geo-political catastrophe; that being the sole purpose of many of the historic interventions and all-out wars America has been a part of in the past and present. That is not the case. That is in fact the “beautiful magicians assistant” that is distracting the crowd from the real trick, and the real trick is already underway.
Sources: http://news.antiwar.com/2015/09/16/us-has-four-or-five-syrians-left-fighting-against-isis/, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/07/world/middleeast/us-to-revamp-training-program-to-fight-isis.html, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/sep/20/kuhner-how-obama-arms-al-qaeda/, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/17/world/middleeast/isis-isil-syrians-senate-armed-services-committee.html, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/11882195/US-trained-Division-30-rebels-betrayed-US-and-hand-weapons-over-to-al-Qaedas-affiliate-in-Syria.html
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