Posted on 09/11/2015 6:57:18 AM PDT by Trumpinator
DYER: Russia to Assad’s rescue in Syria?
Nobody, including the Russians, likes Assad’s regime, but it is the least bad remaining option
Hamilton Spectator 9 hours ago
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has just phoned Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warning him not to "escalate the conflict" by increasing Moscow's military support for the beleaguered Syrian regime. He stamped his foot quite hard, telling Lavrov that his government's actions could "lead to greater loss of innocent life, increase refugee flows and risk confrontation with the anti-ISIL coalition operating in Syria."
What the Russians have actually done, so far, is to send an advance military team to Damascus of the sort that is normally deployed to prepare for the arrival of a much larger military force. They have also sent an air traffic control centre and housing units for its personnel to a Syrian airbase.
It suggests that Moscow is getting ready to go in to save President Bashar al-Assad's regime. It has given Assad diplomatic support, financial aid and some weapons over the course of the four-year-old Syrian civil war, but it will take more than that to save him now. That would include at least an airlift of heavy weapons, but maybe also direct Russian air support for Assad's exhausted troops.
They need it. Since the fanatical fighters of "Islamic State" (or ISIL, as the U.S. State Department calls it) captured Palmyra in central Syria in May, they have advanced steadily westward from their new base.
One month ago they captured the mostly Christian town of al-Qaratayn, north-east of Damascus. (The inhabitants fled, of course). And now IS forces are within 30 kilometres of the M5, the key highway that links Damascus with the other parts of Syria that remain under government control.
The jihadis captured Palmyra, by the way, because the "anti-ISIL coalition" — the U.S. air force, in practice — did not drop a single bomb in its defence. It made at least a thousand airstrikes to save Kobani, the Kurdish city on the border with Turkey that was besieged by IS fighters, because the Kurds were U.S. allies. Whereas Palmyra was defended by Assad's soldiers, so the U.S. let Islamic State have it.
One can imagine Kerry's (and President Barack Obama's) horror at the idea that by defending Palmyra they would be seen as protecting Assad's brutal regime, but if Islamic State troops manage to cut the M5 it will be seen as a sign of the regime's impending defeat. At that point, up to half the people who still live in government-controlled areas — around 17 million — may panic and start trying to get out of Syria.
They would obviously include the religious minorities (Christians, Alawites, Druze), some five million people who have good reason to fear slavery, rape and murder at the hands of Islamic State. The millions of Sunni Muslims who have served the Syrian government and its army would also be at risk. So let's say four or five million more refugees pouring out across Syria's borders, to join the four million who have already fled.
What they left behind would be a Syria entirely controlled by the extremists. The only remaining question would be whether the jihadis roll on through behind the refugees, overrunning Lebanon and Jordan as well, or whether they fall to fighting among themselves.
All three major Islamist groups — Islamic State (which Turkey and Saudi Arabia no longer support), and the al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham (which they still do) — are virtually identical in their ideology and their ultimate goals. However, they have some tactical differences, and Islamic State and al-Nusra fought a quite serious turf war last year, so maybe they will get distracted again. But even if they do, Syria will be gone.
This is what the Russians see coming, and they may be willing to try to stop it. When asked on Friday if Moscow intended to get involved directly in the Syrian fighting, Russian President Vladimir Putin would only say that the question was "premature." Nobody, including the Russians, likes Assad's regime, but it is the least bad remaining option.
Indeed, it is the only alternative left to a jihadi victory. Most of the "moderate" antiregime rebels went home or fled abroad years ago, unable to match the jihadis in firepower, in money or in frightfulness. The notion that the U.S. can now create a moderate "third force" able to defeat both the jihadis and the Assad regime is a shameful face-saving fantasy.
Moscow used diplomacy to save the Obama administration from itself two years ago, when Washington was getting ready to bomb Assad's forces in response to a (possibly spurious) allegation that they had used poison gas on civilians. The only way Russia can avert disaster this time, however, is to put its own air force into the fight — and maybe its own ground troops too.
If it does, the key question will then be whether the United States lets Russia do the job that it is too fastidious to do itself, or whether it gives in to the clamour of its Turkish and Saudi allies — and they would be clamouring — to "stand up" to the Russian intervention.
Since the United States doesn't actually have a coherent strategy of its own, it's impossible to predict how it will respond. For all Kerry's bluster, they don't know yet in Washington either.
Gwynne Dyer is an independent journalist, syndicated columnist & military historian published in 45 countries. He joined the Royal Canadian Naval Reserve aged 16, and served in the Canadian, American, and British naval reserves before pursuing a career in journalism.
I apologize for the bold (just wanted to do the title). My html skills are poor to lacking.
It would be odd....if Putin and the Russians came on like gang-busters and put down ISIS in a matter of a couple of weeks. If you just put 20,000 Russians into the middle of Syria and just said to wipe out ISIS thugs...they’d do the job. Course, as ISIS was in some escape mood....where exactly would they go? Anyone want to take a guess?
Good article, I’ve never read that about Palmyra before, and why we were happy to see it fall. Also a very good point how the differences between ISIS and the other two rebel groups are very esoteric.
How would Russia stopping the ISIS killing machine lead to escalating the conflict? Heck, with all of those fighting-age men walking to Europe, hopefully they can make it safe for women and children to live in the Mideast.
That’s my take.
I am a firm believer that Russia is merely servicing a customer by continuing to supply weapons and some training in their use. The selling of weapons to Syria is a jobs program.
as long as Syria has money to pay, russia will sell. Weapons is all they have to sell that really creates jobs
Then Jihadist blowback would be re-focused on Russia and not us. They’d pull something in Moscow and Putin would nuke Mecca in retaliation.
Works for me.
It will be fun to watch Putin humiliate Obama and Kerry, as Putin kills ISIS and protects Christians.
I know they are a NATO country, but I wouldn’t mind seeing Russia take Turkey and re-establish Constantinople.
Perhaps the Current Regime in the territory once known as “the United States of America” should change sides and desert their allies, including ISIS, in the war to unseat Bashar al-Assad, and join the Russians and Iranians. It would make the most economic and political sense to keep Assad in power.
Wiping out ISIS would take a great deal of pressure off the surge of refugees now fleeing to Europe.
But, but, I thought Putin was a Muslim...he’s not? Who knew?
the American allies in the affair are Arab and they have been deserted.
that desertion in I think november of ‘13 led to the Syrian debacle
Syria has no money ( Hafez al Assad survived for years on selling oil the Iranians gave him)
What Syria has is real estate
A nice coastline on the Mediterranean with ports for ships
Airfields within easy flying distance to the underbelly of Europe and the Balkans
Nice heights overlooking Israel ( currently held by Israel)
Good question!
My guess is they would melt back into Iraq and Turkey Libya or emigrate to Europe , the new front for jihad
And this explains the spread of ISIS
US and UK unwilling to engage them because it helped Assad
Willing to look the other way on all the depraved brutality ....
That’s the other aspect...if Putin really intends to re-establish a sphere of influence, he has to prove his value as an ally.
If America had a real president, we would help Assad too, and that would be wonderful. I despise Assad, who is a brutal dictator, but the options are far worse, and any decent commander-in-chief would instantly recognize that fact.
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