Neocons' Noses Into the Syrian Tent

[unhappycamper]

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/robert-parry/58647/neocons-noses-into-the-syrian-tent

Neocons' Noses Into the Syrian Tent
Syria
by Robert Parry | September 30, 2014 - 8:44am

Now that President Barack Obama has begun airstrikes inside Syria against the terrorist Islamic State – with the tacit but not explicit approval of Syria’s government — Official Washington’s ever-influential neoconservatives hope they can pressure Obama into a major “mission creep,” to also attack and destroy the Syrian air force.

Like the proverbial camel with its nose into the tent, the neocons are trying to push beyond the U.S.-led attacks on the Islamic State and other Sunni extremist groups operating in Syria into a broader “regime change” operation against the government of President Bashar al-Assad, who has been a longtime target of the neocons.

For instance, Jackson Diehl, the deputy editorial-page editor of the neocon Washington Post, called the failure to attack Assad’s military “the hole in Obama’s strategy” and urged that Assad’s air defenses and air power be taken out by the U.S. military as a crucial step toward Assad’s ouster, even though Assad’s military has been the principal bulwark against the Islamic State and al-Qaeda’s affiliate, al-Nusra Front.

Diehl wrote on Monday: “The problem is that ignoring Assad is likely to lead to even worse consequences. Already, the regime and its spokesmen are exulting in the U.S. bombing raids and doing their best to portray the United States as a de facto ally, while Syrians in rebel-held areas are demonstrating against the U.S. strikes because they are seen to be weakening the resistance to Assad.