Quote Originally Posted by Bill Moore View Post
..As for spending a few million dollars, we have certainly done that.
I'm sorry, but I haven't seen a single dollar of any kind of official US aid (except relief supplies for refugees) reaching insurgents.

All I've seen is plenty of babbling in the media, sure, but there are no bucks, and thus no 'Buck Rogers'.

Yes, the WH is telling Saudis, Emiratis, Kuwaitis, Qataris, Turks and whoever else, 'do it yourself' - but then meddling through 'interventions from highest points' (WH) whenever things develop the way 'USA' (WH, again) don't like them.

Furthermore, several Arab nations have provided millions in support to different groups. While money is important, it is of relative importance since others are providing it.
In the case of Saudi Arabia, it's rather something like few billions - most of it meanwhile squandered because of Qatari 'interventions' (usually either ignored, or wholeheartedly supported by the WH).

If we want a specific group or groups to win I think we would have to provide direct military assistance like we did in Libya, but I don't think those groups would be able to stabilize the country after Assad fell if we did that. Do you? If you do, how do you see that happening?
Sigh... again: Syria is so piss-poor, that any money is making difference. Saudis had it easy to build up the IF: sure, from the US standpoint, that organization has 'wrong' religion, and seems not the least curious to make any promises about 'peace with Israel'; but hell, one can't really expect the Syrian Sunnis to convert to Christianity as 'thanks', can one? And expecting anybody in Syria to make promises about some sort of future peace with Israel... come on... that's fantasy.

Anyway, even few Syrian private businessmen found it relatively easy to build up the SF and SRF, which are presently major recipients of Saudi aid.

The problem in all these cases is always the same: lack of management skills, which results in plenty of money (and other 'stuff') ending in wrong hands and being squandered for no profit in return. And even more so: Qatari interventions through 'direct donations' to specific commanders (usually those that eventually sided with the JAN or the ISIS), which in turn caused quarrels and then loss of influence of major politico-military alliances, like the FSyA and then the SNC.

A strict control and relatively simple disciplinary measures - plus a 'muzzle' over Qatari noses, of course - could've been imposed. One could've followed the Pakistani example from dealing with 'seven parties' of Mujaheddin in Afghanistan of the 1980s and say, 'bring me a video showing you've used what I've provided; no video, no beans, bullets and gas'.

Not only ironically, but 'idiotically', the US-run 'control rooms' never acted in that fashion. If they moved at all, then to stop the flow of supplies to insurgent groups during specific of regime's offensives. Obviously, this did little to 'bolster' Saudi or Emirati influence.

So, investing into 2-3 groups (the Farouq Brigade and various of its franchises that began emerging in 2012 and 2013 would be one of good examples; ever since, the once powerful and influential Farouq was largely destroyed by a combination of regime's and ISIS' attacks), and thus provoking a 'snowball' effect in sense of 'others' seeing that these 2-3 groups are 'flourishing' and 'well-supplied', was one of very promising ideas.

For those who are now going to say, 'But Tom, you can't possibly predict the future or know what would have happened', all I can say is 'shut up, that's precisely how the Islamists and then the ISIS did it too'.

Namely, when one asks them, major reason why various insurgent groups began joining Islamists, and then even Jihadists, was a) disappointment over lack of support from the West, and especially b) they saw that these (Islamists and Jihadists) are better supplied and thus better organized too.

They had the money, beans and bullets; moderates not. And so, gradually, after 'winning' enough people to their side - or killing anybody opposing them (or letting the regime kill the people in question) - the ISIS was left to spread in Syria.

Guess, that's 'evidence' that my ideas in this case wouldn't work, right?