syria Archives

Friday

February 13, 2026

US troops finally leave Syria

In December 2018, to the shock of pretty much everybody in the US national security establishment at the time, President Donald Trump publicly ordered the withdrawal of all US troops from Syria. The announcement caused a panic within the Defense Department, State Department and National Security Council, whose officials teamed up to dissuade Trump from going through with it. A similar story unfolded ten months later, in October 2019. Again, the bureaucracy pushed back; in October 2019, the House went so far as to pass a resolution opposing a US withdrawal, with senior Republican lawmakers signing onto the measure. Fast-forward more than six years later, and the US troop withdrawal

Sunday

February 1, 2026

John McHugo

Can Syria’s Kurds trust Ahmed al-Sharaa?

Recent weeks have seen a political and military earthquake in Syria. Nearly 14 months after driving Bashar al Assad from Damascus, President Ahmad al-Sharaa is on the point of extending his transitional government’s complete control over the third of Syria east of the Euphrates. For all practical purposes, this will mean the end of the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which had been the West’s allies against Isis. Time is being called on the semi-independent and self-declared autonomous Kurdish province of Rojava which has been created by the SDF during Syria’s civil war. In a swift campaign lasting only a few days, the Syrian army unexpectedly swept the SDF out

Tuesday

January 20, 2026

Cockburn

Playing ball with Team Trump

The State Department has a “secret playbook for using sports to advance Trump’s agenda,” according to Politico. Foggy Bottom has a tough assignment ahead. Witness the opening ceremonies of Sunday’s NBA game in London between the Memphis Grizzlies and Orlando Magic, the first NBA game in the UK in six years. As Vanessa Williams sang the National Anthem, someone shouted “Leave Greenland alone,” which the arena cheered. Cockburn doesn’t think Williams is much of a threat to Greenland. President Trump’s appearance last night at the College Football Championship – along with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Ivanka and Jared, Kai Trump and Steve Witkoff – went without a hitch. The real