Aided by Russian air power Aleppo has fallen to the Syrian government.

For the most part we  remained on the sidelines (we did make, along with other nations, air strike against ISIS).

Did the United States miss an opportunity by not getting involved long ago?  Will Trump get us involved? How else is going to fulfill his bombast  to “wipe  ISIS off the face of the earth.”

I am deeply concerned.

In Syria we have another Iraq only even more  complex.

In Iraq, prior to our “going  on to Bagdad”,  they had a Sunni Muslim dictator (Hussain)  ruling a Shite Muslim majority and   some Kurds (and no weapons of mass destruction).

Bush’s stated goal was to establish a democracy.

What do we have after 15 years of war and countless  billions of dollars, and thousands of dead  and maimed soldiers including, not incidentally, some 100,000 dead Iraqis.

Whereas in Iraq there are only Sunnis, Shites  and Kurds in the mix, in Syria the mix is more complex:  Syrian government troops, the Russians, two  rebel groups, the  Kurds  and ISIS.

Any “hawk” who thinks our intervention would or can solve any of the  continuing  problems in that troubled area is indeed  a crackpot.

Or worse still a hawk who  still thinks   military involvement  solves problems.

You remember “mission accomplished”  don’t you.

We  Americans  have an unrealistic  belief  that once you get rid of a dictator democracy will  arise almost spontaneously.

We forget that fewer than 20 percent of the nations of the world have a relatively clean democracy.

Even were we able to get rid of Bashar al-Assad  in Syria do you think a democracy would arise?

Nearly everyone agrees that dictatorship is not the best form of government and that we should assist nations in their attempts to depose dictators.

We intervened  in Iraq and Libya.

In both cases the results were dismal, that is to say  even worse than before.

Have we  finally learned  that we can not be  the policemen to the world.

Except where our national security is directly involved we must stay out of these regional, often religious  conflicts.

President Obama kept us out of  major war commitments. This was the right thing to do.

I am fearful of Trump.

He believes in force (intervention) and worse still he “shoots from the hip”. (His shutting off immigration from seven nations was poorly thought out causing  massive confusion).

There is no telling what he might do. I am sure he is going to  be confronted by the world powers and that much of what he thinks he can do (with trade imbalance for example) might even backfire.

I am hopeful that this is the least trouble he gets us into.

Trump has  repeatedly promised that Mexico will pay for the wall.

Now some  “adjustments”  are surfacing such as  we may well pay for the  wall first and they will pay us back (lots of luck).

Or we may put a 20 percent tax on imported Mexican goods.

This  will increase the cost of their products  and guess who will be hurt.  The American consumer of course.

Have we gone from Mexico will pay to the American consumer will pay?

Theodore Theodorsen

Manhasset