What, if Anything, is the US Strategy in Syria? Is There One?

This report notes the US is moving ahead with the idea of creating a new Syrian resistance movement from the ground up to fight ISIS. This has been discussed for couple of weeks now, and the decision seems to have been to address the problem of a fragmented, factionalized opposition by creating yet another faction. We're being warned it will take 18 months or more.

Meanwhile, in case no one noticed, just as we were stepping up air strikes in Syria, so was the Asad regime, reportedly striking 210 targets in just 36 hours, suggesting a sortie rate many would have thought the Syrian Air Force incapable of achieving. That probably includes barrel-bombs dropped from helicopters. But of course, many of the targets are Free Syrian Army targets, not ISIS, and it may be that while the world is preoccupied with ISIS, the Asad regime is doing its best to crush the rest of its opponents before the US can arm and train them (though we seem intent on creating a new force).

And the regime continues to portray itself as a de facto ally against ISIS: after those recent reports that ISIS had three operable combat aircraft, and the US said it was unaware of them, the regime announced that it had destroyed two of the ISIS aircraft in a raid. As I had noted last month, the Syrian regime has already been claiming that it is on the side of the anti-ISIS coalition and hinting at coordination.

I don't think the US is cooperating with Asad, though I know serious analysts like Graham Fuller have urged it to do so; I tend to agree with other analysts such as Ambassador Robert Ford and Michael Young, that anything that strengthens Asad will backfire.

The problem is, I'm unclear what exactly the overall strategy is. It's not unusual to see US Middle Eastern strategy driven by myths, misconceptions, and a blindness to historical experience of the countries involved. See Vietnam, Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq again (and now again). Despite Colin Powell's famous "Pottery Barn Rule": 'If you break it, you've bought it' (which Poetry Barn denied is its policy), we have a large responsibility for breaking Iraq. It was always a fragile construct, but from 1919 or so until now, a period a little short of a century, it somehow held together as a country. No more. Mideast policies have tended to be reactive, knee-jerk responses to unforeseen (though often foreseeable crises. In Syria we are fighting ISIS and claim to be opposed to Asad, but instead of strengthening the FSA we are talking about creating a new faction of our own, which prompted the estimable Rami Khouri to characterize it as "New hare-brained American ideas in the Mideast." 

Forgive one of my rare uses of NSFW language in suggesting that the patch at right may prove to be an appropriate characterization of too much recent and current policy in the region. Once again.

Syria: Trapped in the Web of Geopolitics

The Russian and Chinese vetoes of the Security Council Resolution on Syria and the closing of the US Embassy in Damascus are further reminders that, more than any other "Arab Spring" case, Syria's agony is caught up in the complex geopolitics of the region. Like the Lebanese civil war a generation ago, the Syrian conflict is exacerbated, and perhaps fueled and funded on both sides, by regional players. With growing signs that the new Egypt will be estranged from, if it does not entirely abandon, its traditional strategic alignment with the US (and less overtly, Israel), some no doubt see Syria as a way to rectify the balance; lose one from "our" camp, win one from "theirs." That's bipolar, Cold War kind of thinking, but it's true that Syria's role as Iran's one Arab ally, and as the bridge through which Iran supplies Hizbullah in Lebanon, means the outcome of the struggle has implications far beyond the boundaries of Syria. As was the case in Lebanon during the war years, that is not good news for the ordinary people on either side of the struggle, since it tends to prolong the conflict. Unlike Libya, where Qadhafi had few friend left near the end (well, okay, Burkina Faso, but they're no match for NATO), Iran and arguably Russia have an investment to protect in Syria, while the West sees a chance to alter the balance.

I am not an advocate of Western intervention in Syria, not from any lack of horror at the humanitarian toll if the conflict continues, but due to the lack of practicality as well as the danger of escalation. In Libya, where most of the population and economic resources were on the Mediterranean, with NATO airbases in Sicily, southern Italy and Cyprus and French and Italian aircraft carriers in the Med, the logistics were easy. In Syria,where the major cities are inland, one would have to operate from eastern Turkey or enter from the sea via the Latakia corridor, or else overfly Lebanese airspace.  Logistically it would be a problem, and while Turkey is actively working against the Asad regime, use of Turkish bases would further complicate the geopolitical tangle.

For all the Western outrage about the vetoes, Russia and China are no doubt acting in what they perceive  to be their own interests, or those of their client. (Bear in mind that the overwhelming majority of US vetoes in the Security Council have been on resolutions involving Israel.)

The Syrian tragedy will go on, UN resolution or no, until something changes either the balance on the ground (where there are signs of gradual strengthening of the rebels) or a transformation of the geopolitical mosaic. An Israeli attack on Iran could make the Syrian civil war (or whatever you choose to call it) part of a much larger regional struggle, in which anything could happen.

Holiday Weekend

I find I haven't quite got my thoughts together on the National Security Strategy, so for now I'll leave you with the think tanks and bloggers on the subject I linked to yesterday.

In the US it's the three-day Labor Memorial Day weekend, the traditional start to summer, and I probably won't be blogging unless something major occurs. (Oops: I almost closed out the summer before it started.)

The New National Security Strategy

The new version of The National Security Strategy of the United States 2010 (link is to the PDF on the White House website) was previewed at the Brookings Institution today and has been written up in the press; (NYT here) (WaPo here). I plan to post my own comments, probably tomorrow, after a more careful read. Meanwhile, here are some early takes:

Secetary of State Hillary Clinton's presentation of the document at Brookings.

Brookings responses: Bruce Jones, Michael O'Hanlon, and Bruce Riedel offer their responses.

Around the other think tanks and blogs: Marc Lynch on Al-Qa‘ida in the NSS; Andrew Exum's comments here; plus this release containing comments from the whole range of experts at CNAS.

More from me later or tomorrow.