Army Spends $500 Million to Train Syrians, by Mark Erickson

Last night while watching neutral Al-Jazeera TV, I saw a clip about the US Army having committed $500 million to train Syrians to fight ISIL. The clip was a Senate Armed Service Committee hearing chaired by Senator John McCain. General Austin testified about the program that strove to train 15,000 Syrians to fight. General Austin also said that the program has currently “four or five” Syrians fighting against ISIL.

http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2015/09/only-4-or-5-us-trained-rebels-are-still-fighting-syria/121136/

Millions per fighter. Your wasted money.

Major news outlets have picked up the story.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/general-austin-us-trained-syrian-rebels-fighting-isis/story?id=33802596

Today’s Chicago Tribune devoted 14 sentences to the abject Syrian failure, which was printed on page 14. By contrast, the redesigned Lucas Museum of Narrative Art (that is, George Lucas for non-Illinois folk) made the front page, and contained diagrams and pictures as it spilled over to the entire sixth page.

Mark Erickson