In Syria, regime change by other
means By Ehsan Ahrari
The United States has not abandoned the
option of regime change. This time, the objective
is to oust the Bashar Assad regime of Syria, but
by using "other" means.
This use of other
means includes a combination of old tactics used
to topple Saddam Hussein, and also uses a number
of new tactics aimed at ensuring that the European
Union - or its major members, the ones that were
derided in the past by Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld as part of "old Europe" - does not oppose
it, and that even the United Nations Security
Council goes along with it. At least in principle,
that is a deft approach.
Why has Syria
become the target of America's fury? There are at
least two reasons. First, as an immediate neighbor
of Iraq, Syria has been increasingly accused by
the US of aiding and abetting the Iraqi
insurgents. This is not a new reason. However, as
the security situation worsens in Iraq, the Bush
administration intensifies its rhetoric of the
condemnation of Syria.
US ambassador to
Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad said in Washington this
week that "patience is
running out with Syria" and that "all options are
on the table". The stepped-up warnings came as
US-backed Iraqi forces continued efforts to take
control of the border town of Tal Afar. US and
Iraqi commanders say the town is a staging post
for foreign fighters infiltrating from Syria.
Speaking in New York, Khalilzad added:
"Our patience is running out, the patience of
Iraqis is running out. The time for decision ...
has arrived for Damascus." He said that Syria
"should not allow youngsters misguided by
al-Qaeda, from Saudi Arabia, from Yemen, from
North Africa, to fly into Damascus international
airport". (The Syrian ambassador to Washington,
Imad Mustapha, called Khalilzad's allegations
"100% rubbish".)
The second reason Syria has
become a US target is Syria's role as a former
occupying power in Lebanon still remains a source
of
contention between Washington and Damascus.
Syria was an occupying state of Lebanon when one
of its major politicians and a former prime
minister, Rafik Hariri, was assassinated. There
was a widespread suspicion that Syria was behind
it. One story that has been circulating in Lebanon
and other Arab states is that Assad himself
threatened Hariri with physical harm, if he were
to oppose the extension of the term of office of
the pro-Syrian president of Lebanon, Emile Lahoud.
Not much later after that meeting, Hariri was
assassinated.
Assad gave Der Spiegel, a
German magazine, an entirely different account of
that meeting. He said: "I said to him [Hariri], we
want to exert no pressure on you. Go back to
Lebanon and inform us then of your decision."
Now the UN inquiry of that event has the
backing of the US and France, two countries that
strongly disagreed over the entire episode of the
American invasion of Iraq. A German prosecutor,
Detlev Mehlis, heads that inquiry.
Now,
the US appears to be following a well-thought-out
campaign of ousting Assad. The first phase of that
campaign successfully ended when the UN became
involved in the inquiry of the assassination of
Hariri. The second phase had also been
successfully carried out immediately before the
beginning of the UN summit in New York this week.
Assad was planning to make his appearance
at the summit as a representative of the new
generation of Arab leaders who would transform the
region as a promising place of stability and
economic progress. He was also to make some
promises of initiating Syria's march toward
democracy during his speech in New York. That
visit was also to mark the end of a long period of
isolation of his country.
The Bush
administration, on the other hand, wanted to do
everything to deny Assad any recognition or
accolades from the West. Syria was told that Assad
would have no chance of meeting President George W
Bush. In addition, Washington systematically
persuaded the EU heads to shun Assad. The Syrian
president got the message and abandoned his plan
to attend the summit.
The third phase of
the US regime-change plan involves putting
pressure on Mehlis to be proactive in seeking to
"interview" a number of Syrian officials,
including Assad. Naturally, Syria would not agree
to have its president interviewed by a UN
prosecutor, a process that even Saddam did not
encounter when he was in power.
From the
perspectives of psychological warfare, that is
also an adroit move. The purpose is to constantly
place Assad on the defensive, forcing him between
accepting the humiliating option of being himself
interviewed by a UN prosecutor, or providing
important enough Syrian officials for Mehlis'
interviews so that he would not insist on
interviewing him. If that measure does not satisfy
Mehlis, Assad might meet with him, but only if the
meeting were to be labeled as a "courtesy call".
The fourth phase of the impending
regime-change plan is to find an alternative ruler
for Syria, an "Ahmad Chalabi version", but with a
cleaner reputation than the Iraqi exile courted by
the US before the fall of Saddam. On this point,
the Bush administration is not having much
success. One option is to meet with the late Hafez
Assad's brother, Riffat, who does not reside in
Syria, and extract some sort of commitment from
him to democratize Syria if, or when, regime
change does take place.
The general
thinking in Washington is that the US will not
repeat the mistake of heavily relying on Syrian
expatriates, who, like their Iraqi counterparts,
may have the number one objective of
self-promotion and telling the US government what
it wants to hear. The top US national security
officials remember only too well the fairy tales
of rose water and sweets that the American troops
were to be offered once they walked into Iraq.
However, there is no guarantee that a number of
fallacious actions immediately prior to and in the
immediate aftermath of the US invasion of Iraq
will not be repeated.
In this high-stakes
politics, Syria is not without options. It has
calculated that it will do nothing to make the US
occupation of Iraq a smooth operation, and Assad
would have to be persuaded to cooperate - and he
has things he wants. First and foremost, he wants
the US to pressure Israel in negotiating a
withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Second, he
wants his regime to be removed from the US list of
"bad actors", and be rewarded with economic and
other assistance. Syria always feels that the Bush
administration has been too harsh toward it and
has never manifested a preference for
rapprochement. Third, the US toppling of Saddam
has created a deep feeling of suspicion in
Damascus that its number will be up sooner or
later.
After unsuccessfully attempting to
arrive at a rapprochement with the US, Assad
adopted a policy of benign neglect toward the
Iraqi insurgents' use of its territory. He
maintained a semblance of being vigilant about
their movement, but never really used his
well-known brutal power to crush them. As tensions
between Syria and the US mounted, those insurgents
were envisioned very much like the Hezbollah
guerrillas in relation to Israel when Syria was an
occupation force of Lebanon. They could be used as
a bargaining chip.
No one can say that
Syria's options are enviable. A weak power
compared to the lone superpower is bound to appear
desperate in a situation that Syria is currently
encountering. It is good at playing the
Machiavellian version of high-stakes politics. But
the Bush administration does not want to play. It
knows that it is holding a better hand right now.
It is building some sort of consensus to tighten
the diplomatic screws on Assad, and hoping that it
will succeed in persuading the international
community for a regime change.
The only
unknown part of the Bush administration's
regime-change plan is whether any use of military
force will take place. If that is the case,
another unknown is whether it will seek UN
sanctions prior to such an action. Considering
that US forces are currently in Iraq, the
logistics of conducting a military campaign would
be simpler compared to the ones it encountered
prior to invading Iraq.
Still, there is no
certainty that regime change in Syria will take
place. Can Assad still save his regime? The answer
is yes, but he has to decide how far he will go in
terms of satisfying the Bush administration to
save his rule. Democratizing his country would be
one precondition. The most immediate measure he
must take is to crush the insurgents that are
pushing Iraq closer to a miserably failed state.
The possibility of Iraq becoming a failed state is
as much a grave option for Bush as the loss of
power is for Assad. Thus, to save his regime, he
must ensure that the Iraqi insurgents get no
respite or help from his side of the border.
Ehsan Ahrari is an independent
strategic analyst based in Alexandria, VA, US. His
columns appear regularly in Asia Times Online. He
is also a regular contributor to the Global Beat
Syndicate. His website: www.ehsanahrari.com.
(Copyright 2005 Asia Times Online Ltd. All
rights reserved. Please contact us for information
on sales, syndication and republishing
.)
contention between Washington and Damascus.
Syria was an occupying state of Lebanon when one
of its major politicians and a former prime
minister, Rafik Hariri, was assassinated. There
was a widespread suspicion that Syria was behind
it. One story that has been circulating in Lebanon
and other Arab states is that Assad himself
threatened Hariri with physical harm, if he were
to oppose the extension of the term of office of
the pro-Syrian president of Lebanon, Emile Lahoud.
Not much later after that meeting, Hariri was
assassinated. 
