Syria in 2017 (April-December)

[Azor]

Meanwhile, I would 'upgrade' this thesis to: 'he (and other Western cleptocrac... erm... 'governments') acted intentionally'.

Just like in Libya of 2011, and right from the start, the idea of most of our governments - and almost all the media - here in the West was that the uprising in Syria is one of 'al-Qaida against a secular government'.

Ever since, these governments and all the possible talking heads - and there are true armies of these, ranging from the likes of Oblablas and Steinmeiers, via all the Landis', Tamimis, Listers etc. - are tearing themselves and each other apart (and everybody who happens to pass by) with new 'revelations' about 'al-Qaida in Syria' and whatever else. Primarily because that's all they were ever interested in seeing in this conflict; sadly, also because that was of crucial importance for Israel, too (then, a democratic Syria was just the last thing all of them were ever curious to see, just like a democratic Libya... or even such Venezuela). For this purpose, out of an unimportant and anything else than 'influential' presence, they created a temporary parallel universe through exaggerating and pointing out - de-facto _advertising_ a few thugs. And then they continued repeating the same 'song' - until this became reality, first in the case of the Daesh, then in the case of this JAN/HTS comedy.

I'm no conspiracy theoretician - and feel free to call me 'naive' and 'idealist' as much as you like - but, if this is not reminding of well-known campaigns 'pro' US food- and tobacco-industries from the 1970s and 1980s (all of which where wholeheartedly supported by top experts from Harvard University - who, BTW - were all paid for by the same food- and tobacco-industries)... I do not know what else might ever do so.

All of this is now 'past tense'. Present times is that a pluralist revolution was successfully suppressed and replaced by gangs of extremists of all possible sorts, and that no solution for the stinking pile of BS so skilfully created in Syria is in sight.

The war can thus go on.

Congratulations everybody.

On the contrary, the relevant appointed public officials and P3 analysts are more than capable of understanding the nuances of each situation and recommending appropriate policies. However, the elected officials and representatives, the mainstream media and the electorate itself, are incapable of doing either.

The portrayal of the entire Syrian Arab rebellion as one of aggressive Sunni Arab Muslim supremacism on the order of Al Qaeda and Daesh is clearly false; so too the lionizing of the Kurds and the conflating of the KRG with the PKK/PYD. As for Assad and his allies, one’s opinion of the rebellion should not determine one’s opinion of his regime or its crimes both at war and at peace. Long before 2011, the Assad dynasty had acquired offensive chemical weapons and had attempted to develop nuclear ones as well, and these capabilities were far more threatening to the West and its interests than any Syrian rebels. The threats from Assad’s allies Iran and Hezbollah were well-known until recently, when certain governments decided to engage with the former and partner with both.

Despite all of these lies, errors and omissions, the facts are that:

• The secular/moderate rebels are not capable of winning the war, even with Turkish support
  
• Only the U.S. has the ability to oust foreign pro-Assad forces from Syria

A U.S. occupation and reconstruction of Syria would require:

• The forcible expulsion of more than 30,000 pro-Assad foreign forces
  
• Disarmament and internment of at least 200,000 Syrian combatants
  
• Clashes with Iranian and Russian forces with wider implications
  
• An occupation force of at least 410,000, and probably closer to 2,050,000*
  
• An additional 400,000 to 600,000 armed local auxiliaries*
  
• 4-7 years of occupation and reconstruction**
  
• An ongoing U.S. presence in Syria for more than 50 years as well as a deep bilateral relationship**

The Syrian Revolution began to eat its children years ago, as the revolutions in Libya, Egypt, Iran and Algeria already have. To this day, the center-left and left-wing revolutionaries who helped overthrow the Shah in Iran – and who faced much worse repression under Khomeini – propagate the myth that the CIA installed both leaders. Why? Because that myth is easier to swallow than the truth that the revolution was perverted from within. Contemporary Russians can be found who argued that Western financiers backed the Communist and National Socialist seizures of power in Russia and Germany, respectively.

You will recall that the Russian Revolution was incredibly “pluralist”, which was one of its problems. Note also that the more successful English Revolution of 1642 was not finally resolved until 1689 in England, and 1775 in the United States…

Like it or not, the Free Syrian Army needed overwhelming foreign support to win the war and then win the peace, and they did not fail to win due to a conspiracy hatched in Washington, Tel Aviv or Berlin.





*Based upon the forces committed to Operation Banner and the Second Chechen War
**Based upon the occupations of Germany and Japan

[CrowBat]

There is a nice verb in German, for which there is no translation to English.

It's called 'zerreden'.

It's the best description of such 'explanations' about Syria, like your's.

Example?

First let Assad detain and disappear 60.000-120.000 peaceful, secular activists; congratulate him for 'reforms' like letting 5,000 Islamists out of his jails, where these were extremised; then let Qatar, Kuwait and Turkey sponsor extremist gangs organized by these while doing whatever is possible to curb foreign support for secular armed groups (including taking away all of their MANPADs)...add plenty of such nonsense like 'Turkey is supporting moderate Syrian insurgents', 'CIA is doing the same too'...preferably while establishing a close alliance with Marxist/Maoist terrorist group that's completely foreign to the country in question - and then declare the entire affair for 'no matter of national interest', before, finally, concluding it just couldn't work.

Then, sigh, fighting a war for... well, gauging by Afghanistan: meanwhile it's 40+ years and there's no end in sight... is, what: 'cheaper'?

Than what?

(Disclaimer: and of course, there's no conspiracy; then any similarities to earlier, well-known and well-documented cases - are pure coincidence.)

[Azor]

There is a nice verb in German, for which there is no translation to English.

It's called 'zerreden'.

It's the best description of such 'explanations' about Syria, like your's.

Example?

First let Assad detain and disappear 60.000-120.000 peaceful, secular activists; congratulate him for 'reforms' like letting 5,000 Islamists out of his jails, where these were extremised; then let Qatar, Kuwait and Turkey sponsor extremist gangs organized by these while doing whatever is possible to curb foreign support for secular armed groups (including taking away all of their MANPADs)...add plenty of such nonsense like 'Turkey is supporting moderate Syrian insurgents', 'CIA is doing the same too'...preferably while establishing a close alliance with Marxist/Maoist terrorist group that's completely foreign to the country in question - and then declare the entire affair for 'no matter of national interest', before, finally, concluding it just couldn't work.

Then, sigh, fighting a war for... well, gauging by Afghanistan: meanwhile it's 40+ years and there's no end in sight... is, what: 'cheaper'?

Than what?

(Disclaimer: and of course, there's no conspiracy; then any similarities to earlier, well-known and well-documented cases - are pure coincidence.)

There are two words in English that may still have some currency in your stomping grounds: Western betrayal.

If we must still suffer hearing about the incomparable bravery of a handful of people with clandestine printing presses in Copenhagen and Brussels, and about how the Free French Forces were the fourth-largest of the Allies in 1945, then I suggest you get used to hearing about how the YPG fighters are liberal, democratic and pluralistic heroes.

Firstly, where did you arrive at this figure? Is it pre-Civil War? Even the lower bound would be more than four times higher than the non-political prison population. Assad was not “congratulated” for detaining some 200,000 people during the course of the war and murdering more than 10,000 of them.

Secondly, where do Saudi Arabia and Jordan fit in among the foreign sponsors? You are actually confirming my argument that direct U.S. intervention was necessary rather than “leading from behind”. One can infer that given the lessons of Operation Cyclone, the U.S. objective was never to establish a strong, liberal democratic state in Syria, but to set it ablaze and make it ungovernable by Assad and Khamenei. If the objective was the latter, then Operation Timber Sycamore was the most efficient means of doing so.

Thirdly, the primary Western interest in the Syrian Civil War is preventing spillover, including Islamist terrorism. The PKK/PYD has made itself very useful in that regard, by establishing a truce of sorts with Assad, and fighting Daesh. Of course, we will reap the whirlwind of an ethnic war for Kurdish independence, a political struggle for leadership of the Kurds whether independent or not, continued sectarian war between Sunni and Shia, and a struggle between the unitary states in question and the centrifugal forces of autonomy and outright secession.

As Americans made clear in 1918 and 1945, they care little for unfinished business so long as they are protected by two great oceans. As the British learned over a period of centuries, dabbling in “offshore balancing” not only worsens the carnage and destruction, but it usually opens the gates to the next existential threat.

As for Afghanistan, “victory” is possible so long as the definition of that victory is restricted. There will be no strong and friendly state in Afghanistan (there never was a strong Afghan state to begin with), but there can be an autonomous client region in the north, not unlike the KRG in Iraq.

Lastly, none of your points alter the fact that the liberation of Syria and its reconstitution as a liberal democracy, would have required a major U.S. national commitment on the order of those it has made to France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea. You will note that the Special Operations Executive or its post-1945 iterations did not liberate Europe from either of its 1939 occupiers.

I would enjoy seeing the relative success in Tunisia be replicated beyond its borders, but it may well be short-lived and due to unique local factors.

[davidbfpo]

External intervention in a civil war is never easy.

Syria is no exception, sadly for its people there is little prospect of peace after over six years of war (Wiki refers to the start as March 15, 2011). It is easy to foresee the Syrian diaspora being quite large (bigger than the Palestinian) and with "camps" scattered around its periphery.

Once the Assad regime decided to bludgeon the protestors the die was cast. I do not think there was ever a chance the regime would reform itself. There was a potent "witches cauldron", with a fair amount of external advice and training. Having "kept the lid" on protests and repressing the Homs / Hama revolt in 1982, why would it think the trusted, reliable methods wouldn't work once more?

Yes the "West" has an interest in the region, Syria was rather low down the list of priorities. The USA's interest had a large complicating factor, the defence of Israel - I do find it curious how careful and guarded Israel has been, almost as if the conflict suited it's interests.

Were the policies followed by the USA wise, let alone practical? I am unsure if other Western countries had much impact on the USA, with the exception of France.

Was there a "golden hour / day /month" when external intervention could have ended the civil war? No.

[Azor]

External intervention in a civil war is never easy.

No, it isn’t, but by the same token, few civil wars have occurred without external intervention.

The Syrian Civil War is hopelessly intertwined with the Iraqi Civil War as well as the other anti-authoritarian popular uprisings throughout the Arab world. It is as much a Gordian knot in our time, as the Thirty Years War was for 17th Century Europe.

Once the Assad regime decided to bludgeon the protestors the die was cast. I do not think there was ever a chance the regime would reform itself. There was a potent "witches cauldron", with a fair amount of external advice and training. Having "kept the lid" on protests and repressing the Homs / Hama revolt in 1982, why would it think the trusted, reliable methods wouldn't work once more?

I disagree that the repressions of 1979-1982 informed Assad’s course of action in 2011. The former uprising was largely a militant Islamist one led by the Muslim Brotherhood whereas the latter uprising was peaceful, popular and anti-authoritarian. Whereas Hafez al-Assad could rely upon the Soviets and other allies to prevent foreign intervention on behalf of the Islamist rebellion, his son was much more isolated in 2011 and had seen the Western response to the uprisings in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia already.

I strongly believed that Assad was following the advice of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, who suppressed the uprising in Iran in 2009-2010, and who had assumed that they could achieve the same success in Syria. Yet Syria is not Iran…

Was there a "golden hour / day /month" when external intervention could have ended the civil war? No.

I completely agree. As I have said to Outlaw and CrowBat many times, the reconstruction of Syria as a liberal democracy would have required a major and enduring U.S. or Western commitment.

[davidbfpo]

Somehow the regime has managed this relief operation:

The Syrian military has broken a siege of the eastern city of Deir al-Zour, surrounded for years by so-called Islamic State, state media say. An estimated 93,000 civilians have been trapped in an enclave on the western bank of the River Euphrates since 2015.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-41162683


A recent map from IHS Conflict Monitor:

[CrowBat]

Somehow the regime...

It wasn't 'the regime', but Hezbollah. Look whom Zahreddine (commander of the former southern pocket) thanked as first when interviewed on the TV.

... has managed this relief operation:Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-41162683...

...which is the usual nonsense spread about this war by the Western MSM.

Namely, the only party 'besieged' there was the Assadist garrison, and people besieged by it. For details see SiegeWatch.org's entry on Dayr az-Zawr.

Note the entry about WFP's airdrops: run by Russian aircraft, these airdrops functioned as supplies for the garrison, not for civilians. Namely, the thugs commanding the garrison have either taken them away, or even sold them to civilians they are besieging there.

With other words, and as tragic as it sounds: even the Daesh treated the population of Dayr az-Zawr better than Assadists.

But, why should anybody in the West care...

[CrowBat]

Firstly, where did you arrive at this figure? Is it pre-Civil War? Even the lower bound would be more than four times higher than the non-political prison population. Assad was not “congratulated” for detaining some 200,000 people during the course of the war and murdering more than 10,000 of them.

Ah yes, excuse me: 60,000 disappeared and 200,000 others detained...

No wonder I concluded it's pointless do discuss this war with you, long ago.

[Azor]

Ah yes, excuse me: 60,000 disappeared and 200,000 others detained...

No wonder I concluded it's pointless do discuss this war with you, long ago.

I'm afraid that you sometimes play fast and loose with the timeline and the facts in Syria, conflating Bashar's and Hafez's policies, as well as the pre-war and wartime periods. All I asked was for clarification...