Just Gonna Do Some Light War To Syria, That Should Fix It

After announcing that our War on Terror has gone so well in Afghanistan, we're going to change our return flight and stay just a little bit longer, the White House announced Friday we're sending Special Operations troops to sprinkle democracy in Syria too, hooray!

The White House said that the number of Special Forces troops who would deploy to northern Syria would be “fewer than 50” and that their mission would be to help coordinate local ground forces and coalition efforts to counter the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.

Well, so long as it's only a few dozen troops, right? What could go wrong? In, out, done and DONE. ISIS will finally be defeated, Iraq will be even more mission accomplished than before, and John McCain will get some relief for his years-long Syria blue balls. [contextly_sidebar id="bjnLVM8oQbLYPvih82GFEiQlACcBfobh"]Or maybe he'll try to impeach the president for going to Syria. You never know with Sen. McCranky Pants. He's so fickle.

And before you start singing "War, what is it good for?" because you remember that we were not going to put combat boots on the ground in yet another country in the Middle East, chillax, brah, nothing to worry about:

“The president has been quite clear that there is no military solution” to the war in Syria, said Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary. “There is a political one.”

Mr. Earnest insisted that “our strategy in Syria hasn’t changed” and that “these forces do not have a combat mission.” But he also said that the deployment of even a few dozen troops could make a difference by helping local forces that are fighting the Islamic State.

So while our policy about combat forces in Syria is different than it was before, it is not a change, OK? They're not going to bomb some folks; they're just going to give a little friendly advice to whichever side is our current enemy of our enemy, that's all. And really, this is the last time we'll have to make any tweaks, and then we're all good. Sure, sometimes our troops get killed in the most hostile region in the United States of the World, but accidentally, see, for a good cause:

And just last week, an American soldier was killed in action in Iraq for the first time since the renewed military intervention last year, during a Kurdish and United States commando raid to free prisoners being held by Islamic State militants. Some 70 prisoners were freed, American and Iraqi officials said.

Iraq, remember that place? Where the war is over? Whatever, old news.

You may recall that for the past two years, our official editorial policy on Syria has been ???????? , and no that hasn't changed. We don't know what the answer is other than, hey, let's not invade Iraq in 2003 and make a big fucking mess all over the place. Unfortunately, the Obama administration hasn't figured out yet how to implement that solution. Maybe President Jeb can do it, hahahahaha OH GOD JUST KILL US NOW.

Anyway. We're thrilled to know that the "fewer than 50" combat troops heading to Syria aren't going for the express purpose of doing combat, or getting killed in combat. And if any of them happen to die over there, we'll be sure to thank them for making the Ultimate Sacrifice^TMof continuing to fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here. Or whatever the hell the current reason we are never getting out of there is supposed to be.

OK, you can go ahead and sing now.

[ NYT ]