Syrian Scenarios: Jonathan Spyer, Jerusalem Post, Jan. 6, 2017— The latest reports from Syria indicate that the cease-fire brokered by Russia and Turkey in Syria is already in trouble.
How Iran Got Stuck in the Syria Quagmire: Heshmat Alavi, American Thinker, Jan. 7, 2017— Iran, known for its unbridled sectarian meddling in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon, is currently facing an unwanted quagmire and dead-end in the Levant.
It's Time for Realism in Syria, President-Elect Donald Trump: Gregg Roman and Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi, The Hill, Dec. 23, 2016— As investigators rush to connect the dots between the recent spate of tragic terrorist attacks…
Aleppo and American Decline: Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post, Dec. 22, 2016— The fall of Aleppo just weeks before Barack Obama leaves office is a fitting stamp on his Middle East policy of retreat and withdrawal.
Israeli Foreign Ministry: Iran Played ‘Pivotal Role’ in Aleppo Offensive, Mass Executions and Humanitarian Crisis: Barney Breen-Portnoy, Algemeiner, Dec. 30, 2016
After Mosul, Will Iraq’s Shiite Militias Head to Syria?: Yaroslav Trofimov, Wall Street Journal, Dec, 29, 2016
Syria Will Stain Obama’s Legacy Forever: David Greenberg, Foreign Policy, Dec. 29, 2016
The Sorrow and the Pity in Syria: Clifford D. May, Washington Times, Dec. 20, 2016
Jonathan Spyer
Jerusalem Post, Jan. 6, 2017
The latest reports from Syria indicate that the cease-fire brokered by Russia and Turkey in Syria is already in trouble. Fighting has continued in the Wadi Barada area northwest of Damascus, as regime forces and Hezbollah seek to pry the rebels out of this area. Clashes have also taken place in the southern Aleppo and Deraa areas. The shaky cease-fire places a question mark over whether the planned mid-January talks in the Kazakhstan capital, Astana, between rebels and the regime will in fact take place.
More fundamentally, however, the direction of events in Syria raises a number of questions about the current diplomacy of the Syrian war, questions that have possible implications far beyond Syria itself. These relate primarily to the intentions of Russia in the Syrian conflict, and also to the stance that the new US administration will take after January 20.
Regarding Russia, the question is what Vladimir Putin is looking for in Syria – how do the Russians see the endgame? A cloud of misinformation and contradiction surrounds this point. There are, in effect, two possibilities. The first is that by preserving the existence of the Assad regime, safeguarding Russia’s naval assets in Tartus and Latakia, and showing the lethal efficacy of Russian air power, Putin now sees himself as having proved his point.
In this scenario, the recent cease-fire is intended as a prelude to a deal that will largely leave the current balance of forces in Syria in place on the ground. Give or take some final clearing out of rebel pockets close to Damascus and in the northwest, any agreement that follows the cease-fire would usher in a loose, federal arrangement for an essentially divided Syria, leaving Alawis, Sunni Arabs and Kurds with their own de facto entities.
Such an approach is quite imaginable. Putin’s behavior in Ukraine and elsewhere in Eastern Europe indicates that he has no problem with ongoing, semi-frozen conflicts in which the Russian client is alive and on the board. Indeed, he appears to well understand the value of such situations as instruments for pressure on the hapless West, making himself an indispensable part of any discussion. Russian statements regarding an imminent reduction of forces in Syria and suggestions by Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov last February that Moscow might favor a federal solution in Syria are evidence in favor of this scenario. In the Syrian context, such an outcome would run entirely against the wishes of the other members of the pro-Russian alliance. The determined desire of the Assad regime, as expressed both by the dictator himself and by various mouthpieces of his in the Western media, is to reunite Syria under his own exclusive rule.
Iran clearly also wants all opponents of the regime destroyed – though Tehran differs from Assad in preferring a weak regime in which the independently controlled Iranian interest can continue to operate according to its desire. But these forces are too weak to achieve the goal of total victory without the involvement of Russian air power and special forces. So the Russians effectively have a veto on any such effort. This is why the Russian decision is crucial.
The second possibility is that the Russians have themselves adopted the goal of complete regime victory. If this is the case, the current diplomacy is merely chatter beneath which the effort at military conquest will continue, stage by stage. One way in which this might take place would be for ongoing efforts by the regime against the remains of the rebellion in Idlib and Deraa provinces. At the same time, the US-supported Syrian Democratic Forces would be permitted to continue to grind down Islamic State in the east of the country. Once these processes are complete – that is, the rebellion and Islamic State are destroyed or pushed to the margins – Moscow would present the US and the West with the fait accompli of the defeated rebellion, and suggest that with the war against Islamic State now complete, coalition air power could be withdrawn.
Once that has taken place, the Kurdish dominated SDF would then be presented with the choice of cooperating with the regime and its allies or being destroyed by them. Vitaly Naumkin, a Russian expert on Syria who is regarded as close to the government, hinted at a Russian preference for the reunification of Syria under Assad in a statement this week. Naumkin told the pro-Putin Sputnik news agency that “Moscow has made some concessions to Ankara by reacting very gently to the de facto establishment of a buffer zone in the north of Syria. There was no harsh reaction from Russia, but it does not mean that Moscow… will accept that some part of Syria is occupied by a foreign state for a long time, regardless of which state it is.”
In the event that the first scenario accurately reflects reality, we are into the realm of deal-making which the US president-elect evidently favors, and there is a chance for the Syrian war to wind down, or at least decline sharply in intensity and significance. If the second scenario turns out to more accurately reflect Russian thinking and intentions, however, there is trouble ahead. A complete victory for the Assad/ Iranian side in the Syrian war, under Russian tutelage, would genuinely give rise to a new strategic dispensation in the region. It would leave the Iranians in control of a huge swath of contiguous territory, from the Iraq-Iran border to the Mediterranean, all made possible because of Russian patronage and in the face of a flailing, accommodating, retreating US.
In this scenario, there cannot be two winners, and there would be no deals to be made. The new US administration would have the choice of accommodating to the Russian/Iranian strategy, at the cost of US humiliation and growing irrelevance, or sharply resisting it. Either way, the implications would be grave: either the birth of a new, Iran-dominated dispensation in the northern Levant, or the chance of a face-off between major global powers.
Which choice a president Trump would choose in such a situation is impossible to know. The president-elect combines a conciliatory approach to Russia with a sharp desire to curb Iranian influence, and an isolationist streak with an apparently strong, instinctive, street-type knowledge that rolling over and then cleverly justifying it is not the way for a superpower to behave. Who knows which element would win out at such a moment? It may well be that Putin favors the first scenario. He is interested in power projection and influence building, but not in any way in the triumph of Shi’a political Islam. On the other hand, he has grown used to an absence of serious consequences for his actions. This is a process that was learned and will need to be unlearned if the US wishes to return as a force of consequence in Middle Eastern affairs. Will Syria prove to be the arena in which this takes place? The months ahead will tell.
HOW IRAN GOT STUCK IN THE SYRIA QUAGMIRE
Heshmat Alavi
American Thinker, Jan. 7, 2017
Iran, known for its unbridled sectarian meddling in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon, is currently facing an unwanted quagmire and dead-end in the Levant. We cannot limit Iran’s role and its meddling across the Middle East to 2016 alone. There is an ongoing war in the region, resulting from Iran’s escalating interventions. Iran’s ultimate objective is to completely restructure the region’s entire fabric, pursuing a truly destructive and very dangerous policy in this regard. The war in Syria is one of the pillars of this initiative, also continuing in Iraq and Lebanon.
Former Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, known for his close relations with Tehran, was the byproduct of Iran’s policies in that country. Iraq under Maliki back in 2010 was oppressing the Sunni community, leading to a major revolt by this vital sector of Mesopotamia. Iraq continues to suffer from such atrocities.
Iran sustained its warmongering and expansionist ambitions in lands far away, such as Yemen. This initiative is also facing major difficulties, with Oman — known for its warm relations with Iran — recently joining the Saudi-led coalition against the Iran-backed Shiite Houthis in Yemen…
Syria, despite the heavy Iranian influence, is now becoming a colossal challenge for Tehran. As U.S. President Barack Obama failed to live up to expectations, Russia and Turkey have taken the helm, sidelining Iran as a result. While Syria comprises the backbone of Iran’s expansionist adventure in the region, one cannot truly claim Tehran has made significant advances. The Aleppo war made it clear Iran’s aim is to occupy Syria. There is no Assad army in Syria and Iran-backed Shiite militia groups are rampant across the country. By falling to Russia’s knees to intervene in Syria, Iran accepted the harsh reality of Assad no longer governing what is left of the country.
Currently Iran is no longer considered Russia’s partner in Syria. Moscow has its own interests, not necessarily in line with those of Tehran. The Free Syrian Army, a major wing of the Syrian opposition, suspended its participation in the Astana negotiations in response to continuous military attacks by Iran and Assad against the Wadi Barda region near Damascus. This has prompted Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu to demand that Iran rein in the Shiite militias and Assad from violating the so-called ceasefire.
“Turkey is working with Russia on the question of sanctions for those who violate the ceasefire deal, which was brokered by Ankara and Moscow,” Reuters reported citing Cavusoglu. This is a vivid show of how Iran has been sidelined in Syria. It is quite obvious that Iran has no intention of allowing a political solution evolve and reach tangible results in Syria. Iran thrives on lasting crises and this is the mullahs’ very policy to maintain Assad as their puppet in Damascus.
Tehran is furious over the fact that Russia and Turkey signed an agreement with a variety of armed Syrian opposition groups, inviting them to the Astana talks. To add insult to injury, Ankara has made demands “requiring all foreign forces to withdraw from Syria, before a diplomatic solution is reached or even discussed.”
Of course, Iran giving in to such demands is highly unlikely after feeling shelved in the wake of the recent Ankara/Moscow initiative. It has, is and always will be in Iran’s nature a continued desire and need to inflame the entire region in turmoil. This is a vital lifeline for Iran. Following close to six years of disastrous warfare, nearly half a million innocent Syrians killed and more than 11 million displaced, it is high time to reach a final and lasting solution.
“The regime in Tehran is the source of crisis in the region and killings in Syria; it has played the greatest role in the expansion and continuation of ISIS. Peace and tranquility in the region can only be achieved by evicting this regime from the region,” said Iranian opposition leader Maryam Rajavi, President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran. The People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), the main NCRI member, has played a pivotal role in alerting the global community of Iran’s human rights violations, terrorism, and meddling across the region, and the mullahs’ clandestine nuclear weapons drive. These revelations have further plunged Iran into its current crises. After decades of appeasement by the West have proven a dismal failure, Tehran must be approached by a determined and firm international community.
IT'S TIME FOR REALISM IN SYRIA,
Gregg Roman and Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi The Hill, Dec. 23, 2016
As investigators rush to connect the dots between the recent spate of tragic terrorist attacks in Istanbul, Berlin, Ankara, Zurich and Karak – we must not lose sight of the fact that in one month, President-elect Donald Trump will come face-to- face with one of greatest man-made humanitarian disasters of the modern era. Nearly half a million people have died, millions have been wounded, and half the population of Syria displaced in five years of civil war, while the flood of hundreds of thousands of refugees into Europe has profoundly shaken the security and political climate of the continent.
To make matters worse, the president-elect is taking over from an administration whose Syria policy was not merely a resounding failure, but was so middling and contradictory that the most important takeaway isn't self-evident. Trump should jettison the assumption that ISIS & like-minded jihadists constitute the paramount threat to U.S. interests in Syria. Put simply, the Trump administration should jettison the Obama administration's assumption that the Islamic State (ISIS), Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (formerly known as the Al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra), and like-minded Salafi-jihadist groups in Syria constitute the paramount threat to American interests in the country.
While ISIS has directed a multitude of deadly terror attacks in Western countries over the past two years, this capability hinged on its direct access to Syria's long northern border with Turkey — more a result of U.S. diplomatic failure vis-à- vis Ankara than of the innate strength of ISIS. Now that the border has been closed, the ability of ISIS to dispatch operatives to the West and bring in recruits from abroad has been seriously hampered. Though some operatives have no doubt already been planted in Europe and more still can be recruited from refugee populations there, lack of easy access combined with improved domestic intelligence and border controls mean that the ISIS assault on Europe has probably passed its high-water mark.
Another reason for patience in reducing the remaining strongholds of ISIS in Raqqa and eastern Syria is that there is not yet a credible local force to take over those areas. While the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have proven to be a useful ally in fighting ISIS in Syria, they should not be forced into operations to retake these predominantly Arab areas, which will be deeply hostile to a Kurdish military presence.
The Obama administration's obsession with fighting ISIS and slow progress toward that goal ultimately led to its acquiescence in Russian military intervention on behalf of the Iranian-Syrian regime axis. This amounts to a de facto alignment with Iran, which remains deeply hostile to U.S. interests in the region – a much bigger threat in this regard than the Islamic State – and is committed to Israel's destruction. The U.S. response has largely focused on futile diplomatic gestures in the hope that the regime and its backers would see the wisdom of a broader political settlement with moderate rebels so as to forge a united front against ISIS. Even those counseling greater American intervention have argued that increasing support to the rebels and thus putting military pressure on the regime will facilitate such a settlement.
But prospects for a negotiated political settlement in Syria have long since evaporated. Simply put, the regime will not compromise on Assad's continuation as head of state, while all major political and military opposition groups representing the country's Sunni majority refuse to contemplate a settlement that doesn't end the political dominance of his minority Alawite Sect. Recent regime successes have sharpened this divide, as the rebellion looks set to become a chronic peripheral rural insurgency – unable to threaten regime control of the most important urban centers but capable of defying Assad's bid to fully reconquer Syria for years to come.
Rather than obsessing over driving the last nails in the coffin of ISIS or modulating its involvement in Syria to advance some chimerical peace plan, the Trump administration must focus its attention on more realistic aims. While it is perhaps too late to challenge Russia's presence in a country Vladimir Putin sees as the cornerstone of his expanding zone of influence in the region, neither should Washington accept it. Though there have been hints from the incoming administration of ending support for rebel groups. It would make better sense to continue the support and perhaps increase it, not in the belief that one can bring about a political settlement, but rather to bog down the regime and its allies and minimize the future threat they may pose to U.S. interests in the region.
Charles Krauthammer
Washington Post, Dec. 22, 2016
The fall of Aleppo just weeks before Barack Obama leaves office is a fitting stamp on his Middle East policy of retreat and withdrawal. The pitiable pictures from the devastated city showed the true cost of Obama’s abdication. For which he seems to have few regrets, however. In his end-of-year news conference, Obama defended U.S. inaction with his familiar false choice: It was either stand aside or order a massive Iraq-style ground invasion.
This is a transparent fiction designed to stifle debate. At the beginning of the civil war, the popular uprising was ascendant. What kept a rough equilibrium was regime control of the skies. At that point, the United States, at little risk and cost, could have declared Syria a no-fly zone, much as it did Iraqi Kurdistan for a dozen years after the Gulf War of 1991. The U.S. could easily have destroyed the regime’s planes and helicopters on the ground and so cratered its airfields as to make them unusable. That would have altered the strategic equation for the rest of the war. And would have deterred the Russians from injecting their own air force — they would have had to challenge ours for air superiority. Facing no U.S. deterrent, Russia stepped in and decisively altered the balance, pounding the rebels in Aleppo to oblivion. The Russians were particularly adept at hitting hospitals and other civilian targets, leaving the rebels with the choice between annihilation and surrender.
Obama has never appreciated that the role of a superpower in a local conflict is not necessarily to intervene on the ground, but to deter a rival global power from stepping in and altering the course of the war. That’s what we did during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, when Moscow threatened to send troops to support Egypt and President Nixon countered by raising America’s nuclear alert status to Defcon 3. Russia stood down. Less dramatically but just as effectively, American threats of retaliation are what kept West Germany, South Korea and Taiwan free and independent through half a century of Cold War.
It’s called deterrence. Yet Obama never had the credibility to deter anything or anyone. In the end, the world’s greatest power was reduced to bitter speeches at the United Nations. “Are you truly incapable of shame?” thundered U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power at the butchers of Aleppo. As if we don’t know the answer. Indeed the shame is on us for terminal naivete, sending our secretary of state chasing the Russians to negotiate one humiliating pretend cease-fire after another.
Even now, however, the Syria debate is not encouraging. The tone is anguished and emotional, portrayed exclusively in moral terms. Much less appreciated is the cold strategic cost. Assad was never a friend. But today he’s not even a free agent. He’s been effectively restored to his throne, but as the puppet of Iran and Russia. Syria is now a platform, a forward base, from which both these revisionist regimes can project power in the region.
Iran will use Syria to advance its drive to dominate the Arab Middle East. Russia will use its naval and air bases to bully the Sunni Arab states, and to shut out American influence. It’s already happening. The foreign and defense ministers of Russia, Iran and Turkey convened in Moscow this week to begin settling the fate of Syria. Notice who wasn’t there. For the first time in four decades, the United States, the once dominant power in the region, is an irrelevance.
With Aleppo gone and the rebels scattered, we have a long road ahead to rebuild the influence squandered over the past eight years. President-elect Donald Trump is talking about creating safe zones. He should tread carefully. It does no good to try to do now what we should have done five years ago. Conditions are much worse. Russia and Iran rule. Maintaining the safety of safe zones will be expensive and dangerous. It will require extensive ground deployments, and it risks military confrontation with Russia.
And why? Guilty conscience is not a good reason. Interventions that are purely humanitarian — from Somalia to Libya — tend to end badly. We may proclaim a “responsibility to protect,” but when no American interests are at stake, the engagement becomes impossible to sustain. At the first losses, we go home. In Aleppo, the damage is done, the city destroyed, the inhabitants ethnically cleansed. For us, there is no post-facto option. If we are to regain the honor lost in Aleppo, it will have to be on a very different battlefield.
Israeli Foreign Ministry: Iran Played ‘Pivotal Role’ in Aleppo Offensive, Mass Executions and Humanitarian Crisis: Barney Breen-Portnoy, Algemeiner, Dec. 30, 2016—Iranian-backed Shi’ite fighters played a “pivotal role” in the recent offensive in the Syrian city of Aleppo and the consequent humanitarian crisis there, the Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a report published on Thursday.
After Mosul, Will Iraq’s Shiite Militias Head to Syria?: Yaroslav Trofimov, Wall Street Journal, Dec, 29, 2016—When Islamic State collapses in Iraq, a lot will ride on whether the Iraqi Shiite militias taking part in that campaign will stop at the international border or will cross into Syria and open a new phase of that country’s war.
Syria Will Stain Obama’s Legacy Forever: David Greenberg, Foreign Policy, Dec. 29, 2016—Barack Obama’s impending departure from the White House has put many Americans in an elegiac mood. Despite an average approval rating of only 48 percent — the lowest, surprisingly, of our last five presidents — he has always been beloved, if not revered, by the scribbling classes. Just as many prematurely deemed Bush the worst president ever, so many are now ready to enshrine Obama as one of the all-time greats. Or at least they were until the fall of Aleppo.
The Sorrow and the Pity in Syria: Clifford D. May, Washington Times, Dec. 20, 2016—Over the last five years, Syria has been descending into a hell on Earth. Over the last four months, the lowest depths of the inferno have been on display in Aleppo, an ancient city, once among the most diverse and dynamic in the Middle East. On Friday, in the final press conference of his presidency, Barack Obama addressed this still-unfolding humanitarian and strategic catastrophe.
