Four Americans killed in Syria victims of supreme US international crime

It Is the height of US arrogance, stupidity, indeed international criminality that congressmen, the military and the pundit class are using deaths of 4 Americans in Syria as a reason to keep troops there rather than withdraw them as Trump announced December 19. Alas, Trump gave the perpetual war proponents the ammo they needed to demand US canon fodder stay in Syria by foolishly declaring the reason: the US had defeated ISIS in Syria. There are two problems with that non-starter reason. First, ISIS, al-Qaeda, Al Nursa Front or whatever you call the rag-tag insurgents fighting established governments in the Middle East can never be wiped out; they simply recede from areas where US bombs drop and fight somewhere else. They blew up a restaurant with 4 Americans to make that point. Second, and more important, the US has no congressional authorization or justification under international law to be fighting ISIS or anyone else in Syria. Our presence constitutes an illegal act of criminal war against a country neither attacking nor even threatening our precious homeland. How convenient the US ignores the dictate of the Nuremberg war crime tribunals which we set up after WWII to prevent future criminal wars by declaring unjust war "the supreme international crime".

Trump might have gotten less pushback from the US war party if he simply declared we're withdrawing from Syria to end our criminal involvement and to comply with international law. He's too ignorant and immoral to even consider that.

Using American deaths to continue illegal, perpetual war is disgusting. Tragically for mankind, there is no check either at home or abroad to end US perpetual war in the Middle East and Africa. The proponents of perpetual war might as well be saying 'we've got to keep Americans dying overseas to keep the power and profits from perpetual war rolling in.'