Top Biden advisor says Democrats will continue Trump's policy in Syria.

Tony Blinken says Biden would:
- Keep US troops in Syria
- Deny Assad oil
- Keep Idlib for rebels
- Refuse to negotiate w Damascus until US "effectuates more positive outcome"

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/transcript-joe-biden-foreign-policy-adviser-antony-blinken-on-covid-shortfalls-failures-in-syria/

Why is Biden's Syria policy bad news for Syrians?
1. The US has no tools to effectuate a more positive outcome in Syria.
2. The US cannot exploit Syria's oil legally or efficiently w/o sending it to Syria's refineries.
3. The US cannot create an independent Idlib or Kurdistan.

Because the US cannot change the regime in Damascus, which it failed to do in 9 years of war, it will simply be preventing reconstruction and extending sanctions. This policy makes one conclude that the US is pursuing policy of spite.

Jim Jeffery, America's Special Envoy to Syria, calls it a policy of "quagmire," designed to mire Russia and Iran in a poverty stricken and divided Syria. https://twitter.com/joshua_landis/status/1260342637221027847

I call it a Dog-in-the -Manger policy after Aesop's Fable.
There was a dog in a manger full of hay. When cattle came & wanted to eat, the dog barred their way, baring his teeth. The cattle said to the dog, 'You'r being unfair by begrudging us something we need that is useless 2 U

Dog in the Manger seems to be an adaptation of criticism of the Pharisees in the Gospel of Matthew (23.13): "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men's faces; you do not enter yourselves, nor will you let others enter."

Naturally, those who approve of the US policy of sanctions and partition, will argue that it punishes Assad, which it does do, undoubtedly. But does it not punish the weak and innocent more? Doesn't keeping Syrians poor and divided defeat most stated US policy goals?

- Defeating ISIS & terrorist groups such as HTS, Herras ad-Din, TIP, etc.
- Return of refugees
- Regional Stability
- Only by rebuilding a middle class that is educated, will the U.S. achieve the sort of transformation in the region that it claims to want.

The US does not have a positive policy for Syria that can effect a better outcome. Its present policy promises only a worse outcome.

Joe Biden may not be as keen as his adviser Bliken to help the Idlib rebels.

Here's his Harvard talk in which he explains why the notion that the US could've fixed Syria by early, forceful action is "a fiction" b/c rebel militias had no "moderate center"