Syria: a civil war (closed)

[Uboat509]

Russia says it won't intervene militarily in Syria.



Regards

Mike

You never know when you might need your military forces to "shore up" public support for the regime. Just sayin'...

[Uboat509]

The more I think about it the more I think that US (or any other Western state) intervention in Syria would be a gift to Iran. That would potentially allow them to play the anti-imperialist/anti-crusader (or take your pick) card and take a more direct role in supporting the Assad regime. I very much doubt that they would risk a full scale invasion but they certainly could be more overt about sending materials and "volunteers" with less risk of a backlash in Sunni Arab opinion. That is a potential catfight we do not need to get dragged into right now (or ever really). The Arab Spring has shown Arabs that these authoritarian regimes can be over thrown. Assad's forces may clear an area but as soon as they leave the rebels come back. That is not a sustainable position for the regime, not indefinitely. If the rebels could somehow convince Syria's minorities, such as the Christians that they would be protected from a Sunni backlash after the fall of the regime it would hugely undermine Assad's support. Unfortunately, that is probably an academic argument. I am not so sure that they can be protected, even if the leadership of the rebellion wants to. Even if they could be protected I am also not so sure that those minority groups could be convinced that they would be protected. The fact that two thirds of Iraq's pre-war Christian population has fled Iraq does not set a particularly encouraging precedent.

[davidbfpo]

Looking for information on Syria yesterday I found this Us-hosted website:

The Syrian Center for Political and Strategic Studies (SCPSS) is an independent nongovernmental studies center. SCPSS mission is to educate readers and activists about the Syrian Arab Republic from political, economic, social and strategic perspectives.

Link:http://www.scpss.org/index.php?pid=1

Another blogsite is:http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/

[Tukhachevskii]

Sorry, that should be RUSI

Hama Rules: the resilience of the Syrian Army

What Ends a War? The Limits of Bosnia-Syria Parallels


Popular Uprising in Syria: Beware of the Henchmen from Within

[BayonetBrant]

Did you guys see where the Russians are now sending troops to Syria?

http://grognews.blogspot.com/2012/03...-to-syria.html

[Rex Brynen]

Did you guys see where the Russians are now sending troops to Syria?

It looks like it is a tiny protection detail for the tanker. To me it signals that the Russians don't feel entirely safe in Tartous (which may be sensible, given that the FSA has started attacks against some military facilities, sabotage, "sniping" with AT-13s and AT-14s, etc).

[davidbfpo]

the rebellion goes on, for longer than a year now and linked is the latest IISS commentary by their Middle East (Syria) expert following the Istanbul Conference:http://iissvoicesblog.wordpress.com/...till-hesitant/

Some acute phrasing:

Feeding the narrative of Assad’s impending doom (in effect, winning the propaganda war) would do more to encourage defections.