Welcome to pushback. I'm Aaron Mate. This month marks the 10th anniversary of the war in Syria.

After a decade, hundreds of thousands have been killed, millions displaced, and the country is still in crisis.

The UN says that 60% of Syrians are at risk of famine in the coming year.

Well, joining me is Robert Ford.

He is a retired U.S. diplomat who served as the U.S. ambassador to Syria from 2011 to 2014.

Robert Ford, welcome to pushback.

Nice to be with you.

I want to get into your recollections and reflections on the 10-year anniversary of the war.

But before we get into the past, I want to talk about the present.

The current U.S. strategy in Syria is one of a military occupation in about a third of

Syria and also crippling sanctions that are

preventing Syria from rebuilding. You recently wrote a piece called U.S. strategy in Syria has failed.

How would you describe the U.S. strategy in Syria today, and what do you make of it?

I think since 2015 and the importance of ISIS to the United States, the U.S. has had two key interests in Syria.

One, and most important, was destroying the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, ISIS.

And there was a second but less important goal, which was to try to pressure the Assad government in Damascus, to make enough reforms to make a political solution to the broader Syrian

civil war possible. The Americans actually did pretty well on goal number one. ISIS has been

pretty much defeated. It upholds new territory and it has many fewer fighters. It's February 2021, Pentagon report says that it's no longer able to attack from Syria to

outside of Syria, to places like Western Europe or the United States.

So that's all very good.

But on the second goal of helping to resolve the Syrian civil war to promote a political

settlement, there I think the Americans have failed and failed badly.

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