U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley on Sunday said that “regime change is something that” President Donald Trump’s administration thinks will take place in Syria, days after Trump approved a military strike against a Syrian air field.
“We don’t see a peaceful Syria with Assad in there,” Haley said on CNN’s “State of the Union,” referring to Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.
Haley said that Trump’s administration has “multiple priorities” and “getting Assad out is not the only priority.”
“A political solution is going to have to happen but we know that there is not any sort of option where a political solution is going to happen with Assad at the head of the regime,” she said. “If you look at his actions, if you look at his situation, it’s going to be hard to see a government that’s peaceful and stable with Assad.”
“Is it the position of the Trump administration that he cannot be ruler of Syria anymore?” Jake Tapper asked. “Regime change is the policy?”
“Regime change is something that we think is going to happen,” Haley replied.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer declined to answer on Friday whether Trump’s decision to order the missile strike on Thursday indicated that he thought Assad should relinquish power.
On NBC News’ “Meet the Press,” Haley said that the strike sent a message to Russia and other countries that support Assad’s regime, including Iran.
“This is something to let Russia know, you know what? We’re not going to have you cover for this regime anymore,” she said. “And we’re not going to allow things like this to happen to innocent people.”
.@nikkihaley on #CNNSOTU w/ @jaketapper on Assad : “regime change is something that we think is going to happen.” pic.twitter.com/DW5BSXeIBG
— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) April 8, 2017
This is going to go badly when Russia accidentally shoots down an American plane.
“I’m not really a diplomat, but I did eat at an International House of Pancakes once.”
"Once upon a time, Donald J. Trump, the New York City businessman-turned-president, berated then-President Barack Obama back in September 2013 about the fallacy of an American military strike against Syria. At that time, the United States was considering the use of force against Syria in response to allegations (since largely disproven) that the regime of President Bashar al-Assad had used chemical weapons against civilians in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta. Trump, via tweet, declared “to our very foolish leader, do not attack Syria – if you do many very bad things will happen & from that fight the U.S. gets nothing!”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/syria-chemical-attack-al-qaeda-played-donald-trump_us_58ea226fe4b058f0a02fca4d?
One week ago the policy articulated by this administration was that Syria was a problem that Syrians had to resolve by themselves. The fact that the Syrian government had been committing chemical (mustard gas and calorie gas) on civilian populations made no difference. The policy went further to prohibit any Syrian refugees from coming into the USA.
This was our policy until it was not. It appears that the administrations “need” was to do something to improve their job approval numbers. It will not be too long before Little Donnie Trump will see a need to "adjust his poll numbers again with another military action be it consistent with the publicly stated policy of the USA or not.
This is a recipe for disaster.
Trump’s priorities aren’t just “multiple”-- they’re random, which means they’re not really “priorities” in the usual human sense of the word.