The United States, according to the duo, has to establish and enforce no-fly zones in Syria, prevent the Damascus Air Force from carrying out counterterrorism missions and "impose real costs on Russia" for the alleged targeting of so-called moderate opposition rebel groups, which many believe do not exist at all.
"There is nothing coherent about this, unless the goal is to get the US into as many simultaneous conflicts with as many different parties as possible. For the sake of defending proxies that have proved themselves to be useless, McCain and Graham want the US to risk open war with Russia," Larison lamented.
Larison maintains that such a force would be exclusively manned by US troops, since few other nations would be eager to take part in the initiative. They will also operate in a much more dangerous environment and will likely become a target for the subsequent insurgency.
"The comparison to Bosnia and Kosovo is wildly misleading, not least since most of the people in those countries wanted a US/NATO presence and Syrians will not," he added.
In the end, the strategy, outlined by McCain and Graham, will only lead to yet another prolonged military engagement in a region tired of the US military's presence.
