Page 2 of
2 SPEAKING
FREELY The
real Syrian problem By Richard
Javad Heydarian
Of course, the defection of
Prime Minister Riad Hijab is the latest blow to
the regime, signifying growing ossification and
vulnerability within the highest echelons. During
his first press conference, which took place in
the Jordan's capital, Amman, the regime's highest
profile defector emphatically stated, "The regime
is on the verge of collapse morally and
economically," and called upon, "the army to
follow the example of Egypt's and Tunisia's armies
[and] take the side of people," while adding,
"Syria is full of honorable officials and military
leaders who are waiting for the chance to join the
revolution."
By some estimates, around 60%
of country's economy has ground to halt,
especially with Aleppo - the commercial center of
Syria - in the midst of a civil war, plus the
regime's inability to sell
crude oil, responsible
for much of the country's exports, to traditional
trading partners in the West.
The
million-dollar question is: for how much longer
can Assad hold on?
The fight rages
on The fight is perhaps far from over. The
regime still wields considerable firepower to
hang-on for sometime and continue its deadly
confrontation with the armed opposition forces: it
still commands the support of hundreds of
thousands of army, navy, and airforce soldiers.
Despite the high-profile defections (gaining
momentum in recent months), the upper echelon
(especially the praetorian guard and
security-intelligence sectors) of the regime is
still relatively intact. This explains the
regime's ability to push back the FSA forces from
parts of Aleppo, most especially in the highly
strategic Salaheddin district.
Of course,
the Kurds have kept out of the conflict, while
Alewite and Christian minorities - wary of the
intentions of the Sunni-dominated armed-opposition
- are holding on to the regime.
Owing to
its complete aerial advantage, and the
opposition's lack of effective anti-aircraft guns,
the regime has been able to bombard opposition
strongholds with impunity (despite some
questionable accounts of some FSA units recently
gunning down a Syrian aircraft). The FSA has also
been struggling to gain much-needed support by a
significant proportion of Aleppo's citizenry, who
have harbored their own reservations against
former's intentions, capacity, and principles -
especially in light of growing reports of summary
executions, forced recruitment, tortures, and
massacres by the armed opposition.
The
regime also holds the ultimate card: weapons of
mass destruction (WMDs). Developed as a
counter-measure to Israel's military superiority,
the Syrians - who are not signatory to the
international convention on chemical weapons - are
believed to possess five manufacturing plants and
20 storage sites, containing significant
stockpiles of mustard gas, VX and Sarin gas - plus
the artillery and missile systems to deliver it.
According to a recent report, neighbors
and Western powers are taking pre-cautionary
measures: they are talks of assembling a
60-thousand-strong ground force to secure the
WMDs, while US special forces and reconnaissance
teams have been deployed around and within Syria.
There are special treatment medical
facilities for chemical weapons injury in Jordan
and Turkey. Meanwhile, in Israel, "IDF Home Front
Command units embarked on a series of chemical
attack drills in the towns of the northern
district down to Afula, which is 52 kilometers
east of Haifa and 110 kilometers north of Tel
Aviv. ... The soldiers taking part those drills
wore new anti-contamination suits. ... In Tel
Aviv, city hall announced underground parking
spaces would be available in an emergency as bomb
shelters for up to 850,000 people," according to
the report.
Will the Syrian government use
its WMD against the opposition? Or against Western
forces as a form of deterrence? Or against Israel
- mo matter how suicidal the move - to shift the
frontiers of the war and unify the country amidst
a nationalist struggle to retake the Golan
Heights? Or hand it to allies such as Hezbollah?
Well, the Assad regime's primary fear is not
losing power as much as facing the prospect of
large-scale massacre and revenge attacks by the
armed opposition, especially extremist Sunni
groups, which have lamented the dominance of the
minority-led Alewite-Baathist regime for almost
six decades. This means that the regime - with or
without Assad - will do anything to defend itself,
unless the international community crafts an
effective platform for "managed political
transition".
For some observers, somehow
given the regime's depleting control over the
country, it might begin to act like
'just-another-militia-group' embroiled in a civil
war - portending a dangerous phase of lawless war.
Avoiding the nightmare
scenario US Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton's latest visit to Turkey - amidst
intensified military clashes between opposing
forces in Aleppo, Syria's commercial center - has
purportedly touched on the possibility of a
'limited intervention' in the form of: (1)
establishing humanitarian "safe zones" along
Turkish-Syrian borders; (2) imposition of a
"no-fly zone" to neutralize the regime's usage of
helicopter gunships and fighter jets to bombard
opposition strongholds; and (3) increased
logistical, military and financial assistance to
FSA.
With Iran and Russia (and to a
certain degree China) heavily criticizing any form
of military intervention (direct or indirect) in
Syria, on one hand, and fears of NATO hardware
falling into wrong hands, on the other, it seems
that, at least in the meantime, option 3 is the
most appealing - or least risky - course of action
for NATO and its Arab allies, mainly Saudi Arabia
and Qatar. Thus, Syria is locked into a state of a
precarious "internal arms race".
With an
international community splintered along
conflictual geopolitical interests, and the West's
insistence that Iran - the foreign actor with
greatest leverage over Assad - should be excluded
from any multilateral solution, the Syrian crisis
could most likely lead to two possible scenarios:
(a) either the regime itself will sacrifice Assad
to save its own skin (akin to how the Egyptian
Army dispensed with Mubarak to retain its own
power), or (b) the armed opposition will continue
to benefit from the inflow of increasingly
advanced armaments and defections within the
regime's ranks to eventually override the regime.
However, in an event of the disintegration
of the regime, after a protracted and tremendously
violent conflict, the extremist elements could
gain the upper-hand by not only by taking credit
for the regime's fall, but also transforming a
failed Syrian state into a new training ground,
which could be used as a launching pad for
terrorist attacks across the region and beyond
(especially proximate European landmass).
Worse, they could gain control over the
regime's considerable stockpile of advanced
armaments and WMDs, which they could, in turn, use
against minority groups that have stood by the
regime, as well as against enemy states, most
especially Israel. Under such scenario, Syria will
be host to continuous perpetration of mass
atrocities, against a backdrop of intervention by
regional powers, from Israel to Iran, who have a
direct political and existential stake in Syria.
Richard Javad Heydarian is a
Philippines-based foreign affairs analyst
specializing on Iran and international
security
(Copyright 2012 Richard Javad
Heydarian.)
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