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Getting Serious About Syria (By Bush Doctrine Standards, Syria is a Hostile Regime)
The Weekly Standard ^ | 12/10/04 | William Kristol

Posted on 12/11/2004 11:35:30 AM PST by mojito

"WE WILL pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make: Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime." George W. Bush, Address to Congress, September 20, 2001

THE STORY was in the December 2, 2004, London Daily Telegraph, on page 14, by Jack Fairweather, datelined Damascus. Its headline: "All aboard the terrorists' bus to Iraq. Mujahideen mosques are springing up all over Syria to arm militants and send them across the border to do battle with the hated Americans."

Here are the highlights:

WHEN not in Iraq, Abdullah cuts meat for a living. He is a Syrian cook at the Kingdom of God restaurant in Damascus, in a bustling suburb dominated by Iraqi exiles. For the past year, Abdullah has also been on the payroll of Iraqi resistance forces fighting American troops. . . .

In April, the 23-year-old boarded a convoy of American GMCs in Aleppo, northern Syria, with 10 other fighters from the area.

He had been recruited at a mosque 30 miles south of Aleppo, built last year by a local sheikh with business interests in Iraq and strong sympathies with the resistance. It is brazenly entitled the Mujahideen Mosque.

Abdullah, originally from the Aleppo area, and the other fighters, were provided with Iraqi passports and weapons. Abdullah was given a bazooka to carry.

They were told they would be relieving Syrian mujahideen already in Iraq, part of a regular "troop" rotation, and would be expected to fight until they in turn were either killed or replaced.

In return Abdullah's family would be paid $3,000 a month by the mosque--more than most American soldiers in Iraq and a fortune in Syria where average salaries are less than 10 pounds a week.

To enter Iraq from Syria there are three border crossings. Abdullah's convoy took the most northerly, through Rabia, a dusty collection of concrete houses straddling the border, and with pictures of the former Syrian president Hafez Assad festooning the checkpoint.

Al-Jabouri tribesmen man the border. Like the al-Dulaimy tribe that guards the southern entry points into Iraq, they are deeply hostile to the US presence and Abdullah's convoy was waved through without checks.

The men were driven to a mosque in Mosul where, according to Abdullah, dozens of their fellow countrymen were staying. He would not disclose the name of the mosque, but one such building in Mosul is the Mahmud mosque, infamous for supporting the insurgency.

This squat building on the west bank of the city has seen some of the heaviest fighting between insurgents and US and Iraqi forces recently.

Sheikh Latif al-Jabouri, who runs the mosque, claims the Syrians he shelters are businessmen who come to buy and sell cars and pray. Inside the mosque, Abdullah was greeted by a former Iraqi military officer. He was assigned to a 10-man unit of Iraqi guerrillas, and the other Syrians he traveled with were spread among other units.

For the next 80 days, Abdullah and his unit went almost every day to attack American bases with mortars, or to man mujahideen checkpoints.

He took part in ambushes on US convoys. As a mine hit a patrolling Humvee, Abdullah fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the second vehicle.

He was transferred to Fallujah for three months, conducting raids with his unit in the neighboring Sunni towns of Samara and Ramadi. . . .

US and Iraqi officials believe the Syrian government has turned a blind eye to those supporting terrorists in Iraq, seeing the insurgency as an outlet for religious extremists to let off steam. . . .

Iraqi exiles in Damascus say there may be as many as 80 "mujahideen mosques" either in name or spirit supporting the resistance.

Several prominent mosques in Damascus, including the large Bilal al-Hashemi mosque, have reputations as staging posts for Syrian fighters, suggesting a logistical and financial operation beyond the ability of any one tribal leader. The US military believes there may be as many as 2,000 foreign fighters in Iraq, mostly from Syria.

They do not operate in a vacuum. . . . At the other end of the city, thousands of members of Saddam's regime have settled in the wealthy Mezzeh district. . . . The refugees include the three sons of the former industry minister Mohammed al-Douri, on whose farm Saddam was captured in a bolthole.

It is likely that many recent arrivals have sufficient funds to finance Syrian mosques. As members of Saddam's regime some have been able to buy swaths of Damascene property which they rent out. Others live off their plundered Iraqi money. . . .

By Bush Doctrine standards, Syria is a hostile regime. It is permitting and encouraging activities that are killing not just our Iraqi friends but also, and quite directly, American troops. So we have a real Syria problem.

Of course we also have--the world also has--an Iran problem, and a Saudi problem, and lots of other problems. The Iran and Saudi problems may ultimately be more serious than the Syria problem. But the Syria problem is urgent: It is Bashar Assad's regime that seems to be doing more than any other, right now, to help Baathists and terrorists kill Americans in the central front of the war on terror.

The deputy prime minister of Iraq, Barham Saleh, wants to address the problem. He said last week, clearly referring to Syria as well as Iran, that "there is evidence indicating that some groups in some neighboring countries are playing a direct role in the killing of the Iraqi people, and such a thing is not acceptable to us."

U.S. military intelligence officials agree: They have recently concluded, according to the Washington Post, "that the Iraqi insurgency is being directed to a greater degree than previously recognized from Syria, where they said former Saddam Hussein loyalists have found sanctuary and are channeling money and other support to those fighting the established government."

What to do? We have tried sweet talk (on Secretary Powell's trip to Damascus in May 2003) and tough talk (on the visit three months ago by Assistant Secretary of Defense Peter Rodman and Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt). Talk has failed. Syria is a weak country with a weak regime. We now need to take action to punish and deter Assad's regime.

It would be good, of course, if Secretary Rumsfeld had increased the size and strength of our army so that we now had more options. He didn't, and we must use the assets we have. Still, real options exist. We could bomb Syrian military facilities; we could go across the border in force to stop infiltration; we could occupy the town of Abu Kamal in eastern Syria, a few miles from the border, which seems to be the planning and organizing center for Syrian activities in Iraq; we could covertly help or overtly support the Syrian opposition (pro-human rights demonstrators recently tried to take to the streets of Damascus to protest the regime's abuses). This hardly exhausts all the possible forms of pressure and coercion. But it's time to get serious about dealing with Syria as part of winning in Iraq, and in the broader Middle East.


TOPICS: Editorial; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: assad; axisofevil; axisofweasels; islamofascists; kristol; napalminthemorning; neoeunazis; religionofpeace; roguestates; syria; wot
This article speaks for itself.
1 posted on 12/11/2004 11:35:32 AM PST by mojito
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To: mojito
At least we are not cutting the CIA and such. We have alot of work to do , but at least they advertise . Shouldn't be hard to track that.
2 posted on 12/11/2004 11:42:23 AM PST by Deetes
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To: mojito

Nuke 'em.


3 posted on 12/11/2004 11:44:21 AM PST by oldleft
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To: mojito

"This article speaks for itself."

Pretty much.


4 posted on 12/11/2004 11:46:04 AM PST by myvoice
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To: mojito; NormsRevenge; Grampa Dave; blam; SunkenCiv; Dog; Dog Gone; TexKat; JasonC; John Jorsett; ...
We need to fix this problem!

If this is the straight scoop.....

But....we may need more troops...........

5 posted on 12/11/2004 11:56:34 AM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach (A Proud member of Free Republic ~~The New Face of the Fourth Estate since 1996.)
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To: mojito; Flyer; Eaker; humblegunner; thackney

Syria's been this way for longer than I care to remember...

It really wouldn't take much to spank these numbnuts into line...

They are about like Libya was back in the 80's...They'll shut up real quick after a few well placed 2000 pounders...

I wonder why if we have the blatant evidence to prove that countries involvement in the war in Iraq, with them sending their own countrymen and others across "their" border into Iraq, why, when we have the manpower and the ability to turn that border area into a no-mans-land etc etc...

What more excuse do we need???

Seems like it'd be easy to do...

But then again, the commanders on the ground there, if they felt like it was a problem, maybe we'd hear more about it...Or would we???


6 posted on 12/11/2004 11:57:09 AM PST by stevie_d_64 (Houston Area Texans)
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To: mojito
Hey, I could make a bombing target list and it should be done with no notice. Bashir Assad, his palaces, the military and intelligence facilities, the mosques implicated, the homes of the Iraqi Baathists. We've got to stop playing footsie with all these creeps worldwide.
7 posted on 12/11/2004 12:02:11 PM PST by Jabba the Nutt (Breaded and deep fried in peanut oil.)
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To: Deetes
The article switches from dollars to pounds in mid-sentence without saying what kind of pounds. The Syrian monetary unit is the pound but it's worth about two cents, so I would guess that the British pound is meant.

Why are the border tribes hostile to the U.S.? Were they favored by the Baathist regime, or just hostile to any "infidels"?

8 posted on 12/11/2004 12:13:05 PM PST by Verginius Rufus
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To: mojito

BTTT


9 posted on 12/11/2004 12:13:07 PM PST by Freebird Forever (HAPPY HANNUKAH!!!)
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To: mojito

Syria destroyed Lebanon, the only decent country in the entire Middle East outside of Israel.

Nothing surprising about this article, except that I hope Bill Kristol won't start attacking Bush if he DOES go after Syria. He's been pretty contrary these last few years.


10 posted on 12/11/2004 12:32:10 PM PST by Cicero (Nil illegitemus carborundum est)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach; ValerieUSA

"we may need more troops"

I don't think so. After the Iraqis and Afghans have sufficient force to handle further terrorist efforts (which will be easier after US forces slaughter another couple of thousand of the terrorist a-holes), Syria will be x'ed off the list. And more or less simultaneously, Iran will be overthrown by patriotic secular forces within the country.

If the US needs more troops, we can obtain them by drawing down US forces in Europe, beginning in the former Yugoslavia. The Germans and French can handle that problem, I'm certain of it. And we certainly don't need to spend a dime maintaining US forces in Germany -- they can be removed immediately.

Sudan was billed as a major campaign issue by those who regard Republicans as racists. Now? Bupkis. Because they really don't give a **** about the Christians and Animists being slaughtered by their Moslem allies. My view is that the gov't forces should be opposed by forces trained and armed (as inexpensively and covertly as possible) by the US and EU.

But it won't happen, not as long as the oil keeps flowing.

Rooting the Chinese out of Sudan would be a pleasure, particularly as the captive Chinese are paraded in front of the cameras.


11 posted on 12/11/2004 2:20:16 PM PST by SunkenCiv ("All I have seen teaches me trust the Creator for all I have not seen." -- Emerson)
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To: stevie_d_64
Seems like it'd be easy to do...

Each next move in a chess game is very critical. So will be our nations. Stepping beyond the principle of freeing Iraq, into the next phase of the war on terrorism, will not be 'easy'.

All the important and new stuff (WMD's) from Iraq went somewhere. Guess where? Wanna See?

12 posted on 12/11/2004 4:30:48 PM PST by UCANSEE2 (>)
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To: UCANSEE2

http://www.2la.org/syria/wmd.html


13 posted on 12/11/2004 4:42:06 PM PST by UCANSEE2 (>)
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To: UCANSEE2

I keep kicking myself wondering why I did not save the link to the article and story about the 3 ships leaving the Iraqi port (hull down and loaded) in December of 2002...Right before we got serious and started staging troops in Kuwait...

The pictures I remember were of a type of ship very well suited to load and off load chemicals and other dangerous liquid cargo...They were chemical "parcel" tankers...Meaning they could carry volumous amounts of the same or different substances in separate tanks within the ship...And in tank vessels above deck...

They made a big deal about spotting them, and it was a news item for about 24 hours...Then nothing...

I can imagine what happened...Either they are undocumented "hazards to navigation" now...Or they made it all the way around to Syria...Or other similar nation...

They weren't carrying baby formula this time...


14 posted on 12/12/2004 9:47:46 AM PST by stevie_d_64 (Houston Area Texans)
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