t yet another GOP debate, there was a foreign policy section, which Fox News predictably put under the heading of “terrorism.”
Brett Baier asked Marco Rubio about Daesh (ISIL, ISIS), noting that Rubio has proposed “sending a larger number of American ground troops to help defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq…”
Rubio was annoyed that Baier only thought Rubio would invade two countries. Rubio replied, “That’s correct, and Libya.”
Rubio went on about Daesh:
“So they need to be targeted wherever they have an operating space. They do need to be defeated on the ground by a ground force made up primarily of Sunni Arabs themselves. This is a radical Sunni movement. They can only be defeated if they are driven out and the territory is held by Sunni Arabs. But it will require a specific number of American special operators, in combination with an increase in air strikes. And that will include, if necessary, operating spaces in Libya, which, in fact, they are using to project into the Sinai against Egypt and ultimately into Europe, as well.
So Rubio wants US ground troops wherever there is a Daesh cell- now he is adding Libya and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. That’s 4 wars he is pledging. There will be US casualties in these wars.
Rubio’s notion of a Sunni alliance against Daesh shows ignorance of the region. No Sunni state sees Daesh or ISIL as the primary threat, the way Washington does. Turkey obsesses about the Kurds. Saudi Arabia is focused on Iran and Shiites. The most effective fighters against Daesh so far have been Shiites and leftist or secular Kurds.
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