Clearest and Briefest Possible Summary of the Situation in Syria
June 17th, 2012 - 10:46 am
There are three possible outcomes to the Syrian civil war:
1. Assad continues in power. This is bad as he is allied with Iran and Hizballah and attacks Israel through Lebanon. On the plus side, however, the regime will continue to be weak and unlikely to attack Israel directly. The regime will also continue to be anti-American in every way.
2. Assad is overthrown by the Muslim Brotherhood which sets up a Sunni Islamist dominated government. This is worse. Such a regime is likely to believe–mistakenly–that it can attack U.S. interests and Israel with impunity. The positive side is that this would constitute a major defeat for Iran.
3. Assad is overthrown by forces that lead to a regime of moderates, led by Sunni liberals, allied with Druze and Kurdish nationalists and with Christians. That would be better. Remember that only 60 percent of Syrians are Sunni Muslim Arabs and the Brotherhood has always been far weaker in Syria than in Egypt.
The most likely outcome: 1, continuation of status quo.
What should West do? Try for 3.
What is the West, and especially the United States, doing? Vacillating between 1, don’t give Assad too hard a time, and 3, let Turkey–which favors option 2–take the lead and support the pro-Islamist Syrian National Council (SNC).
Does saying the West should go for 3 and help the moderates do any harm? No, because the Obama Administration isn’t going to pay attention and by the time the next president of the United States is inaugurated even if that is Mitt Romney it will probably be too late.
So let’s tell the truth about the situation that exists and call for the best policy but be totally aware that this isn’t going to happen.
Note 1: If your view is, “Let them kill each other forever,” aside from the moral implications of cheering the deaths of thousands of civilians and a lot of people who really want a moderate democracy, this civil war won’t last forever.
Note 2: If your view is, “They’re all Islamists so let Assad stay in power,” you’ll probably get your wish.
Note 3: If your view is that Assad is better because his regime is “secular” you are ten years out of date. Sure, Assad isn’t an Islamist but his policy has been to do everything possible to support Hamas, Hizballah, Iran. He also encouraged the rise of radical Sunni Islamist preachers at home. Read any of his speeches and they portray him as the leader of the Arab “resistance,” all of whose forces nowadays outside Syria are Islamists.
The democratic forces in Syria are weak and poorly organized – and are subject to tremendous Assad regime repression.
The best option would be to encourage the breakup of Syria into several weak states based on ethnic lines. This would make it impossible for Islamists to pose a threat to Israel or try to subvert the rest of the Middle East.
A Syrian democracy would be the second best policy option for the West but its unlikely to happen.
As a result, we will probably be stuck with the Assad regime for the foreseeable future because it has demonstrated that ruthlessness, mass murder and having foreign patrons to keep it in power works. Killing your enemies works a lot better in the Arab Middle East than holding free elections and other Arab leaders are likely to take note.
The West is unlikely to challenge Russian hegemony over Syria so we will continue to have a radical Arab dictatorship firmly in power, that while not Islamist, will continue to back Islamist forces throughout the Middle East, make life difficult for the West and seek to undermine Israel.
That is where things stand with the Syrian situation almost 15 months after the Syrian uprising broke out in February 2011.
Option 4. Syria, being less monolithically Islam than many of its neighbors, is a good target to hear about an alternative Islamic narrative.
One, if not the major, problem facing the ME nations is Islam itself. Islam does not offer an internal counter-narrative to the barbarism inherent in the Koran. It is impossible to change the religion of a billion or so souls. It is possible, however, to offer them an alternative narrative within the existing framework.
I suggest that the archeological data found on OBL’s computer saying that the real Mohammed was murdered on the road to Medina and replaced by a follower of the Arabian fertility goddess allah, who then corrupted the Koran is a good start. Tell the story often enough and load enough while offering a revised version of the book and things will change. I only hope we do not get a thirty years war…wait we already have that.
The psy-ops boys and good holly(bolly)wood writers can do the work in short order.
ta
Prof. Rubin,
Thank you for this effort.
I would be helpful if you would provide a slightly more detailed assessment of the relative strengths of the contending power-groups, especially “Sunni-Islamist” and “moderate, etc.” I met last week in a small group with a liberal Democratic congressman who is a fairly strong defense hawk. He was reluctant to support the Syrian rebels (including Syria Freedom Support Act (HR 2016)) because he sees them as almost entirely MB/Islamist. I would be happy to pass along to his staff a strong analytical product you may have which argues the opposite.
1. Black Swan: Assad remains in power AND concludes a defense treaty with Iran, allowing an Iranian military and naval presence on the Eastern Mediterranean. Alters regional power balance.
2. Syria fragments.
Understanding Syria in six easy steps (or how reductio ad absurdum leads to enlightenment):
1. Syria is an idea that must be held together by force.
2. Take away the force, take away the idea.
3. If you take away the idea, Syria fragments.
4. If Syria fragments, the Alawis become independant.
5. If the Alawis become independent, Israel becomes their natural ally.
6. Since Arab nationalists will never countenance the acceptance of Israel, go back to step one.
The article lists only (3) possible outcomes.
There is IMHO a fourth possibility, which is also highly likely; that the country slide into a sectarian civil war that doesn’t get resolved for a long long time.
Alawis will kill Sunnis.
Sunnis will kill Alawites.
They both will kill Christians.
Kurds will be wild card.
Country completely ripped apart for a decade or so, much like Lebanon in 80′s.
The train has left the station, and this is the track it is on.