Do you think that sending troops into Syria to fight ISIS...

It is going to drag on for years and years either way. Only if/when there is a complete take over on either side does it come close to ending.

I don't know the answer

Sitting on the don't know bench with you both

I do not think it will help in the least bit. if we are going to get militarily involved I think the only solution is to blanket bomb Syria to the point nothing is left and no one is left alive;  Hiroshima and Nagasaki style. Then go after anyone who is muslim and dares raise an objection.  That is a very unsavory solution.  No one wants to think of innocents being killed (even me)

Every time we've supported local groups it has come back to bit us years later. The groups we train, arm and support later become the aggressors. ISIS is unusually organized and disciplined within it's ranks. It makes me suspect we used them in the past to support our aims. They are well trained in guerrilla tactics.  Putting our troops on the ground will just end up as a blood bath for our troops.

This is how I feel. 

No, I think that is exactly what they want. They want us there. I've read they want to kill our soldiers on their land.

I think we learned through the Iraq war that the democratic model or nation building does not work in the Middle East. These "peaceful" Muslims have been fighting with each other for 14 centuries since the death of the prophet Mohammed.

It has nothing to do with education or economics they are fighting an ideological religious war. 

Even if we kill Assad and destroy ISIS another group will rise up and take over where the last one left off. 

I think we should become energy independent. Let them keep their oil, eat dates, ride their camels and kill each other. 

Sometimes I feel that the wheels are already in motion and we at on the cusp of WW3.

^^^^ that.

No to boots on the ground. No, no, no.

We cannot win a military campaign against this type of enemy. If Vietnam didn't teach us that, then the last 14 years should. We need to get out of the Middle East and let them fight amongst themselves.

The involvement European and American powers in the region has planted seeds of hatred that will not die until we're out of there. They do not value democracy like we do because they have no allegiance to a country, only to their particular branch of Islam. It seems noble of us to want them to have the freedoms we enjoy. But our attempts to make them into our allies has backfired every time. We give billions of dollars to the very people to want us dead and finance terrorism against us.

Stop sending them financial aid, stop buying oil from them, stop sending troops to die in wars we have no business fighting.

With no regard for the innocent people who have not been able to leave? SMDH.

Blanket Bomb sounds sort of cozy, doesn't it? My knee jerk response lately is Nuke 'Em.

Not what I really believe, but .... something does need to be done.

Therein lies the problem. In guerrilla warfare there aren't training camps in the traditional sense. The training camps are in community centers, near schools, in apartment complexes, near shopping plazas. Leaders live and work within family compounds. We can't bomb the training camps without also bombing innocents. That leaves washing our hands of the mess and walking away.

A New York Times Reporter by the name of Rukmini Callimachi who's focusing on al-Qaeda and ISIL did a series of tweets about why we shouldn't send troops  & some issues with this fight against ISIL that I thought worth sharing.

1.  Obama has done his homework when he says ISIL wants us to start a ground war, and will use our occupation of a foreign land to recruit.
2.  ISIL propaganda is rife with references to scriptural prophecy regarding the last great battle of our times which will begin when.
3.  The "Romans" (us) invade Dabiq, a town that still exists today in Syria.   In scripture that battle sets the stage for the end of times.
4.  Leading to a showdown between "Muslims" (they think this refers only to them) and their enemies are vanquished.
5.  Remember it was Dabiq that ISIL killed US hostage Peter Kassig, a former US Army Ranger as a way to underscore this point.
6.  While it's hard to get your heads around this, I have spoken to enough ISIL fanboys & members by now to believe that they mean this
7.  ISIL wants US boots on the ground and wants them to engage them militarily.  It would do wonders for their recruitment pitch
8.  Question is can fight against this group be won from the air & via proxy forces on the ground, ones which are divided ethnically?
9.  Here is what I saw in Hasaka, Syria in July where I was embedded with YPG militia fighting ISIL & what I saw in Sinjar, Iraq last month.
10. Where I was embedded with the PKK and with Peshmarga, two more local forces fighting ISIL.  In both places ISIL folded quickly
11.  In Hasaka, I saw frontline jump several miles in a few days; in Sinjar, I saw air strikes & local forces take city in 48 hours.
12.  But there is a rub: The proxy forces "only" succeeded because of heavy US air support & air support will need to continue indefinitely
13.  If we let up the freed areas will be re-infiltrated.  Already there are reports that Hasaka, which was declared liberated when I was there
14.  Has been re-infiltrated by ISIL cells.  Second big problem: The proxy forces fighting ISIL are nearly all Kurdish (YPG, Peshmarga, PKK)
15.  And they will only fight for historically Kurdish areas.  Last month I went to a sandbagged position overlooking the city of Mosul, Iraq
16.  Mosul was so close, were I running shoes I could have jogged there and back.  But the Peshmarga commander holding the position
17.  Explained to me that when invasion of Mosul occurs (believed to be many months away) he would only fight to roughly halfway in to the city
18.  Why? Because that is the ethnic fault line, and as a Kurdish he did not think it would be appropriate to go further in
19.  The cities that need to be taken back (Mosul, Raqqa etc) are mostly Sunni, not Kurdish, and the US has yet to find a Sunni proxy force.

After reading this it's becoming clear it is really is a mess in the Middle East.  I'm beginning to think it's a no win situation.  Too bad the GOP candidates don't understand what is happening in the Middle East when they keep calling for thousands of US boots on the ground in Iraq and Syria. 

I think this reporter might have a point when she says that ISIL wants US/allies  troops to engage them in Syria and Iraq . ISIL just seems to go out of their way to taunt the West.  

 

I don't believe that IS can be defeated physically, they are fighting a war of ideology. Even if we did wipe out all the current IS fighters there will forever be more coming up who don't want our type of democracy. This isn't a war that can won in this way, or even one that we should be fighting perhaps, despite how terrifying their burgeoning growth and spread is. There needs to be a strong 'home grown' leader in the region to take/regain control.