A Quote by Anthony Zinni
If you put two brigades on the ground right now with U.S. forces, they would push ISIS back into Syria in a heartbeat.
Related Quotes
I think we have to knock out ISIS. Right now Syria is fighting ISIS. We have people who want to fight both at the same time. But Syria is no longer Syria; Syria is Russia and Iran, who she made strong, and Kerry and Obama made into a very powerful nation and very rich nation very, very quickly. Very, very quickly. I believe we have to get ISIS.
It's quite clear the Syrian regime in Syria, as the Iraqi regime in Iraq is benefiting from America's effort to destroy opposition forces in both countries. And there aren't any other rebel forces that one can foresee on the horizon that will be able to take Eastern Syria that's now occupied by ISIS.
We have two thousand nuclear weapons on the trigger alert right now and Hillary Clinton wants to start an air war with Russia, a nuclear-armed power, over Syria as the means of addressing ISIS and the crisis in Syria.
Having western, Russian or Iranian forces providing the ground defeat of Isis would certainly work militarily, but would be the least attractive option as it might help reinforce the Isis myth.
ISIS is a formidable foe, but the counter forces to it have only just begun and if these forces, the Iraqi army, the Kurdish Peshmerga, American air power, the Syrian Free Army, work in a coordinated fashion, it will start losing ground. Also, please keep in mind that ISIS does not actually hold as much ground as the many maps flashed on television keep showing. Large parts of those territories that ISIS supposedly controls are vacant desert.
The other thing I said is the great irony is you will be back fighting against your own weapons. Had [Bashar] Assad been bombed when he used chemical weapons two years ago, ISIS would be in charge of all of Syria now.
I think Syria is now the training ground for the world... These rebel forces are more of a threat than anything.
The minute Mr. Putin decided to put his military forces in Syria, I went to see him. And I said, "Look, here's what I'm doing. I'm not intervening in Syria. But at the same time, if Syria tries to intervene with us, if Iran tries to use Syria to attack us, we'll stop it.
We are not putting ground troops into Iraq ever again. And we're not putting ground troops into Syria. We're going to defeat ISIS without committing American ground troops.
The United States wanted to send its trained rebel groups to Syria to fight ISIS. Out of twenty-five hundred rebels they had trained, only seventy accepted to go to Syria to fight ISIS. Everybody else wanted to go to Syria to fight the government. So you've got to wake up and smell the coffee. . . . The rebel groups have not fired a shot against ISIS.
The United States wanted to send its trained rebel groups to Syria to fight ISIS. Out of twenty-five hundred rebels they had trained, only seventy accepted to go to Syria to fight ISIS. Everybody else wanted to go to Syria to fight the government. So you've got to wake up and smell the coffee... The rebel groups have not fired a shot against ISIS.
I would not use American ground forces in Syria. I think that would be a very serious mistake. I don't think American troops should be holding territory, which is what they would have to do as an occupying force. I don't think that is a smart strategy.
I would only go to Syria to destroy ISIS. I would not use U.S. troops to depose Assad. But I would support the rebels there. It's okay to support those people who share your view. But for the United States to be embroiled in a civil war in Syria against [Bashr] Assad I think is a big mistake.
If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is ISIS's ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have been president because this would not have happened. ISIS would have been eradicated, unlike what is happening now with our all-talk-no-action politicians.
Most ISIS members are irreconcilable. Once they've bitten that bug, that cultish bug, they would prefer to die. They're going to be given the opportunity, no one's going to get out alive from Iraq and Syria now. They make sure everyone's a suicide bomber now.
When the air forces of the U.S., Russia, France, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and others are already engaged with Isis in Syria, it's a shortage of targets rather than of aircraft that is the coalition's principal military constraint.
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