'Think Tanks' Like the Brookings Institution Heavily Influence US Decision-Making Policy

Listening to what people like Kenneth Pollack (former CIA intelligence analyst, Senior Fellow of the Centre for Middle East Policy for the Brookings Institute) have to say about Syria may be annoying, but it sure does shed light on future American policies.

An outline of what Pollack says has to be done in Syria can viewed In this video:

“(...)We have to basically go back to what general Dempsey outlined when he presented what was supposed to be the administration’s plan back in September 2014, but which the administration promptly walked away from.”

Build a new Syrian opposition army, train it outside of the country and then bring it back in when ready.

The key to this strategy is the combination of American Air Power, American Special Forces and a newly trained military force to beat the other players on the ground in Syria. This new army, doesn’t need be too strong since it would engage ISIS, Al Nusra and Assad’s army.

Pollack does note eventually that this new military power would have to be big, real, conventional, disciplined and able to hold territories.

Next would be to deploy it back into Syria, after a period of training, to deal with the political situation. It would have to fight and gain territories from Assad/IS/Al Nusra, receive support from the US and transform these new achievements into safe havens. In this way, they would be able to demonstrate that there is an alternative to Assad/Daesh/Al Nusra and that they can feed and protect their people. Finally, this new army/military would act as an ‘institution’ that can remain in Syria for years to “stabilize the situation”.

The end game being clearly to divide Syria into different ethnical parts, as Brookings has always pushed for, to destroy the Syrian Arab Republic and redraw its boundaries.