What happens next is anybody’s guess…perhaps prediction is a fool’s errand.

What is much more important for the United States is to learn from this debacle. It isn’t about leading from the front or from behind. The lesson should be to avoid making naïve interventions into fluid and complex systems—especially if one is unwilling or unable to commit the necessary manpower and resources over sufficient time to render a “good” outcome viable in the aftermath. Washington should bear this in mind as it continues its ill-fated campaign against Syria.

Musa al-Gharbi is a research fellow with the Southwest Initiative for the Study of Middle East Conflicts (SISMEC), where his work in social epistemology highlights how misinformation, disinformation and ignorance adversely affect policy in the geopolitical and tactical spheres. Readers can connect to the author’s social media accounts and body of research through his website: www.fiatsophia.org

Image: Wikimedia Commons/Via de Gaspari. CC BY-SA 3.0.