Less than one month ago the USA was leaving the Middle East.
HELLO!
There is no way any additional actions by the USA to escalate any conflict was expected. There was nothing in the ACTIONS of Trump's White House to indicate there was going to be additional anything by the USA.
ADDITIONALLY, there was every expectation other foreign military presence would move into the areas once occupied by USA forces, including the military of Iraq. There was every expectation that Iranian General Soleimani was going to become a greater presence in the region. THAT FACT was known when Trump decided to pull troops out of Iraq.
Russia moved into Raqqa (click here). Everyone should know Raqqa was the Daesh capital. The reason Russia moved their troops into Raqqa is because the USA was abandoning any presence there and it was the first place Daesh would seek to re-establish it's forces.
None of these troop movements and/or presence of leadership was a surprise and was expected to help stabilize the region while Trump was leaving. Just that simple. When a significant military presence is removed from a region it is an absolute decision. This is not a ping pong game! The presence of Daesh is life and death to the people of the region. The idea an Iranian General, who particularly dislikes the USA, was going to demand the entire mess Trump was dealing was to end is not surprising. What is surprising is Trump's idea of political pawns, namely Iranian generals that conveniently died before his impeachment trial.
The sudden and unannounced reversal of Trump's decision not only shocked many, but, changed the perceived posture of the USA when it comes to it's military presence. One day it is out of a region and within the next 24 hours all that changes. That is not the way the USA handles it's military deployments. There is no knee jerk reactions when it comes to military involvement anywhere in the world, but, Trump is the exception and he has no excuse.
AN OPPORTUNITY to kill Iranian generals is appropriate for the Middle East? That's the rhetoric regarding this mess? I don't think so.
December 9, 2019
Moscow - Russian forces have entered Raqqa, (click here) the former de facto capital of the Islamic State caliphate, in one of the starkest examples yet of how Moscow has filled the vacuum created by President Donald Trump’s decision to pull U.S. forces from northern Syria.
Russian troops were shown in footage on the defense ministry’s Zvezda TV channel shaking hands with Syrian children and unloading humanitarian aid bundles with the slogan “Russia is with you” from the back of trucks.
Raqqa was captured two years ago by U.S. troops and their Kurdish-led Syrian allies in the biggest victory of Washington’s campaign against Islamic State in Syria. But since Trump abruptly ordered a pull-out in October, Moscow has swiftly advanced into territory where U.S. troops had operated.
Russia is a close battlefield ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government, which was invited by the Kurds into territory they controlled after Trump pulled his forces out of the way of a Turkish assault against Kurdish-held areas....
