Why Should Anybody Trust Us?

Foreign Policy’s “Situation Report” newsletter reported this on Syria yesterday:

“For real this time, we swear.  American officials are once again threatening to send more and more-sophisticated weapons to Syrian rebels now that Russia has walked away from talks on a ceasefire in the city of Aleppo.  Anonymous officials whisper to Reuters that the joint Syrian government and Russian assault on the city has the Obama administration considering options ranging from increased weapons shipments to rebels, to humanitarian airdrops in rebel-held areas, to air strikes on Assad regime air assets.  Despite the rhetoric, the consideration so far hasn't reached higher levels and the State Department has yet to officially give up on the diplomatic track, much less embrace an alternative.”¹

The Wall Street Journal reported much the same on Thursday: 

“The Obama administration threatened to pull out of talks with Russia over a collapsed cease-fire in Syria and has renewed an internal debate over giving rebels more firepower to fend off a stepped-up Russian and Syrian assault on their Aleppo stronghold, U.S. officials said.”

Except why should Syria/Russia worry about the United States actually providing more and/or better weapons to rebels in Syria?  We talk about this not infrequently – or at least it is reported that lower level people are talking about it.  But it never seems to happen.  It gets waylaid, or it’s rejected when it gets high enough up.

But even if we decided to do something, why would anybody trust us to follow through on it and stay the course?  Hasn’t the recent past provided enough examples of our lack of trustworthiness:

• In late 2006/early 2007, we rallied Sunnis in Iraq to beat back the insurgency in the Sunni Awakening.  But in 2009, a new President took office and stopped caring as much.  In 2011, we left.  Democrats like to say George W. Bush agreed to the date, but Barack Obama never seriously tried to change it.  After we left, Prime Minister Maliki reverted to a pro-Shia, anti-Sunni policy, leaving the Sunnis who cooperated with us high and dry.
• In 2011, President Obama said it was time for Bashar al-Assad to go.  In 2013, he announced a redline on the use of chemical weapons by Syria.  While President Obama says he achieved a great success in getting Syria to agree to give up its chemical weapons without using force, I wonder how the Syrian people feel about that.  Bashar al-Assad is still in power, stronger than before, and Syria is still using chemical weapons (just different types). 
• We are slow-walking visa applications for people who helped us in Afghanistan and Iraq, like interpreters, etc., even though they are being targeted by the Taliban, etc.

Then there are the presidential candidates we have this year.  Donald Trump has said he would follow through on our obligations to defend other members of NATO against foreign attacks only if they were spending what he thought was enough money on defense.  And he has come close to saying he would withdraw our nuclear umbrella from South Korea and Japan.  As for Hillary Clinton, she was Secretary of State when we left Iraq.  Also, look at the results of the Obama administration’s bomb-and-leave policy in Libya, once again while Secretary Clinton was there.²

All in all, you have to wonder why should anybody overseas, perhaps especially in the Middle East or Asia, would ever rely on us or trust us.  Even if one president means what he or she says, will the next one follow through?  Or will they dump our obligation like day-old bread?  If anybody does cooperate us, don’t they need to be constantly watching their backs, viewing everything we say with a skeptical eye and wondering if – or when – we are going to bug out?  And making sure they have an escape route if we do.

I remember a saying when I was in grade school:  “A friend in need is a friend indeed.”  More importantly, I remember the concept of “a man’s/person’s word is his/their bond.”  It would be nice if we could elect people who would govern like that.
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¹ Probably the most telling sentence in this article is the first one: “For real this time, we swear.”  Sure.  Except why should anybody believe us?  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me.
² If Secretary Clinton disagreed with those decisions, let her say so.  Let her tell us what President Obama did wrong and how she would do it differently.
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UPDATE (10/1/16 9:10 pm): Corrected a typo in footnote 2.