Assad's latest stupidity

The outright stupidity of some world leaders beggars belief. First, we have Donald Trump announcing to the world five days ago that he wanted to pull out all American troops from Syria as soon as possible. Never mind that there are still pockets of resilient, reengaging Isis militants trying to establish themselves as an insurgency force and launching asymetric attacks. Giving notice of withdrawal to the enemy is like saying, "Help yourself, you can do what you like now." Obama learnt that lesson when he announced his troop surge to Afghanistan but then told the Taliban that they would only stay there for a limited period and would then all be told to get out. So the Taliban smiled and waited. In the Trump/Syria case, the response was almost immediate, not from Isis but from Bashar Assad. Overnight he launched a chemical weapons attack on Douma, the last rebel-held district of eastern Ghouta in the surburbs of Damascus, killing 70 men, women and children. The coincidence of the timing is overwhlemingly obvious. Of course he saw Trump's tweet about pulling troops out of Syria, probably rang Putin to say "Whoopee", and then ordered his air force to put chemical munitions onto their aircraft and poison anyone around in Douma. Assad's decision was not just stupid, it was outrageous, murderous and prosecutable in any court brave enough to put him on trial. I've said it before, decisions/announcements/tweets (in Trump's case) have consequences. Social media declarations are not a game when they are being used by the president of the United States to project his views and ideas. People actually notice and take them on board. Assad clearly did. He must have thought he could get away with this latest atrocity because Trump was no longer interested. Now of course Trump is outraged and talking of "big penalties" for Syria. But if Trump orders another round of Tomahawk cruise missiles to hit Syrian airbases, it will bring the smile to his face but will achieve precisely nothing, unless he makes it clear that the US troops doing a brilliant job in Syria will stay for as long as they are needed and that the US will from now insist on participating in the decision-making over Syria's future. The Mafia-godfather-style meetings between the former KGB colonel, Vladimir Putin, the odious President Erdogan of Turkey, the not-to-be-underestimated cleric, President Hassan Rouhani of Iran, and the chemical weapons enthusiast Bashar Assad of Syria are supposed to be bringing peace to the region!! They represent probably the nastiest club of leaders created in modern times. The fact that the US is not in any kind of power-brokering role is staggering. But then Trump wants to get out of Syria. Presumably he doesn't care that Assad, backed by Russia and Hezbollah, is going to rule for life. So, unless the US gets more involved in Syria rather than just killing off the last remnants of Isis, I predict more chemical attacks and more devastating suffering for the Syrian people.