Ian Welsh

The horizon is not so far as we can see, but as far as we can imagine

Category: Middle East Page 13 of 20

Some Interesting Things About the Russian Coalition’s Syrian Campaign

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On October 16, 2015

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Notice that one of their major initial objectives is to seal the border with Turkey.

This is because Turkey is the major supply route for the various factions in Syria (and Iraq). And that is Turkish policy.

Note, also, just how effective Russian air support, backed by coalition ground forces, has been. Air power without decent boots is great for destruction and not much else, but it really is a force multiplier if you have the troops to exploit it. This is Russia giving its ally an air force, in the same way the US has so often done.

Finally, note that Russia has just given itself a major presence in the Middle East by becoming a strong ally of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and (downstream) Hezbollah. Don’t think they’ll forget who bailed them out on this.

I’ll have a longer guest post up on Russian strategy in historical context posted soon, I hope.

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The Human Crop of War

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On September 14, 2015

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There is little question that absent the Iraq war there would be no Syrian refugee crisis.  The line draws direct between the two.

Germany, today, is closing its borders to refugees after earning the world’s praise (for a change) for its compassionate acceptance of those who needed its shelter, and those whom it certainly can afford to shelter. As the richest European state, Germany can take more refugees, feed and house them and even find work for them.

Ethically, the countries who should be taking most of the Syrian refugees are those responsible for Iraq and who have directly fueled the flames of the Syrian conflict: Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, America, Britain and so on.

There is a deadly price for posturing that leads to war: be clear, Assad, however bad he was was not as bad as the Syrian civil war.  To be sure, there is often a case for ending the reign of tyrants, but one does need to check the price tag.

And, along with checking the price, one might want to to check the motivation. Wrong ends generally feed back to into wrong means: it is not credible, given their own records on human rights, that most of those who are trying to overthrow Assad actually are acting out of good motives.

This is power politics, not humanitarian action.

There is little more to say about this.  We could take care of the refugees if we wanted to, we have the resources, this is not in question.  In question is if we want to.  In a western world whose baseline policy is austerity—who do not even want to care for their own citizens, the answer tends to be no.

Jeremy Corbyn, who suggests (to mainstream laughter) that the solution to the Syrian crisis is not to bomb Syria more, is the beginning of the repudiation of the nonsense that doing more of what didn’t work in the past is the solution.  Let us hope he is Britain’s next Prime Minister, and the beginning of a wave of repudiation of the austerity and war.

Until then the weak will suffer what they must, and powerful will do as they will.  And then whine about the results of their actions.

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Is Russia About to Send a Thousand Troops to Syria?

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On September 5, 2015

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Perhaps:

Russia is building a military base in Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s heartland, according to American intelligence officials, in the clearest indication yet of deepening Russian support for the embattled regime of Bashar al-Assad.

The anonymous officials say Russia has set up an air traffic control tower and transported prefabricated housing units for up to 1,000 personnel to an airfield serving the Syrian port city of Latakia.

Why would they do that?

Syria is already home to Russia’s only base outside the former Soviet Union – a naval station in Tartus.

The humorous part is that Russia is claiming that they want to expand their role to “fight terrorism” and “ISIL.” Everyone claims whatever they’re doing in Syria is to fight ISIL and terrorism, of course, including the Turks, who are bombing the Kurdish forces who are the only people to consistently win against ISIL.

Of course what Russia is really doing is supporting its interests, which don’t include allowing a loyal client state to be overthrown by Islamic forces which are hostile to Russia and supported by Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

Or to lose a warm water port it cannot easily replace.

Or to be shown to let down a loyal ally.

Everyone else seems to think they have the right to bomb Syria in the guise of “bombing ISIL,” why not the Russians?

As for the morality of it, well, I see no “good” actors in Syria. However, it is a simple fact that Syria was a better place to live before the civil war and those who have encouraged that civil war either: a) shouldn’t have, or; b) should have applied the necessary force to end it quickly. (At which point, Syria would have probably become a failed state, like Libya.)

As anyone was unwilling to do either, and then rebuild properly (which, again, no one is willing to do), perhaps Assad, as nasty as he is, should have been left alone?

Just a thought.

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The Iranian Nuclear Deal

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On July 18, 2015

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This is a Good Thing™.

I suspect, however, that one of the main reasons for it is to bring Iranian oil back online fully, thus pushing down the price of oil further, which will damage many countries the US wants damaged and will help the US economy (no, the US is not yet an oilarchy itself, low oil prices are still better).

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Hizbollah’s Leader Says They Are Battling All Across Syria

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On May 26, 2015

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Nasrallah:

The leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah has said his fighters would expand their presence in Syria, saying the group was engaged in an existential battle against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

Hassan Nasrallah acknowledged for the first time that his Shia group was fighting across all of Syria in support of President Bashar al-Assad’s government.

Picture of Hassan Nasrallah

Picture of Hassan Nasrallah

Years ago, I noted that Hizbollah needed to keep supply lines open to Iran, and thus had reason to support the Syrian government. That was a near-existential reason in itself.

And he called specifically on his fiercest critics in Lebanon to back his intervention across the border, warning that their support for Assad’s opponents would not save them from ISIL.

I think this is accurate. There is a weird idea that if ISIL conquers Syria it won’t move into Lebanon. Of course it will. ISIS is the Caliphate. As a matter of belief and ideology, their legitimacy is tied to expansion, and Lebanon is definitely part of the lands they consider as rightfully belonging to the Caliphate.

To not fight them will not save Lebanon if ISIL wins, and Lebanon is a heck of a lot easier of a target than Iran or Turkey. Thus, former prime minister, and leader of Lebanon’s anti-Hezbolla bloc, Saad Hariri’s criticism of Nasrallah’s speech and his movement’s intervention in Syria is nonsense:

“We in the Future Movement declare publicly that the Lebanese state and its institutions are legitimate and our choice and guarantee,” Hariri said in a statement. “Defending the land and the sovereignty and dignity (of Lebanon) is not Hezbollah’s responsibility.”

Well, I suppose the last part might be true. But it is laughable to suppose that the Lebanese army can guarantee Lebanon’s safety from an ISIL invasion. Lebanese who are old enough will remember how well the Lebanese army performed against the Israeli invasion. I am unaware of any particular reason to suppose they would do better enough this time to matter. (It is also true that Hezbollah is currently mostly fighting the Nusra front.)

These wars are also sharpening fighters throughout the Muslim world. They are becoming tougher and smarter. Hezbollah has already defeated the Israeli army twice, ISIL is fighting very well, and the same can be said of many other forces in the Muslim world. I will be frank: I believe that Western force’s edge now comes down mostly to military equipment, which means air power–open-field battle systems (i.e., shoot them before they are even in range of you) and surveillance systems.

I believe the Israeli military, especially, given its corruption due to being an occupying force whose primary job is to beat up, torture, and kill the effectively defenseless, is not even close to as good as quite a number of Muslim (non-state and ISIL) forces.

One really shouldn’t create the perfect Darwinian learning system for those one considers one’s enemies.

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As Palmyra Falls to ISIS, What Are the Syrian Government’s Prospects?

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On May 21, 2015

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Palmyran AmphitheatreSo, yet another city falls, and the city has some very nice ancient architecture, which we will no doubt soon see sledgehammered.  Some Palmyrans apparently thought the international “community” might protect them since they’re a great cultural site. I’d laugh if it wasn’t so sad.

ISIS has fought well and fought smart, and came into a regional war which had been going on for years.  (One can argue, in Iraq, since the first Gulf War.) They have a huge ideological advantage in claiming to be the Caliphate reborn, and they have made ground. I keep hearing speculation that Syria’s government is on its last legs, but I have no feel for whether this is true or not. In large part, they appear to have been giving back gains.

One advantage the Syrians have is that they have to fight in their core areas; if they lose, there will be no mercy from ISIL. Everyone knows what they do to prisoners. A second advantage is that Hezbollah can’t afford for Assad to fall. If he does, their supply routes to Iran are cut off.

Back in 2008, I was in Las Vegas, and I sat at a table with a wealthy Syrian merchant and his beautiful wife. We talked about what we did, and he thanked me for what I did at the time, because he understood that I got paid shit in order to work against events like the Iraq war. I thought that was awfully gracious, given how little success those of us who oppose such stupidity as Iraq or arming the dissidents in Syria have had.

It’s not that I have any mandate for Assad; he’s a truly horrible man who appears to personally delight in torture. But war and anarchy have huge costs, and the early opposition were always very dubious people–perhaps not quite as bad as ISIL, but certainly no great improvement over Assad and without the saving grace of competence, meaning that they couldn’t necessarily expect to win the war quickly.

And Assad proved to be a lot more determined than most observers expected, the Syrian army, under Iranian and Hezbollah tutelage improved, and so on.

I’m not against all war, or against all violence. Sometimes they are the least worst option. But Syria never passed that test.

I wonder what happened to the gracious Syrian merchant I met. Are he and his wife and children alive? Being wealthy, did he get out? It’s not that he was more deserving of life than any other Syrian just because he happened to play blackjack with me.

But he was kind and gracious, and I remember him. And I wonder how many kind and gracious Syrians and Iraqis have died, men and women I would have liked, in the Middle East.

With no Iraq invasion, there is no ISIS. Saddam was a bastard, but again, the status quo was better than what the invasion caused.

The barrier for “just war” is high, and it is both pre- and post-facto: Fuck it up, and it doesn’t matter how wonderful your intentions were. Idiots used to go on about the Pottery Barn rule: “If you break, it you own it.” They didn’t mean “You then have to fix it.” Japan and Germany were rebuilt, but the preparations for Iraq made it clear that such rebuilding would never happen there, and the aftermath of Libya has been a clusterfuck.

Perhaps George Washington, whom I believe (with those who lived at the time) was the greatest of America’s Founders, was right. Not just for America, but for all nations, when he advised avoiding all foreign entanglements, and to be a friend to all nations.

Perhaps not always right, but perhaps you really do need to pass the “Nazi” test, and Saddam, Assad, and Qaddafi were never Hitlers, despite the rhetoric used to justify each war or intervention or “aid.”

Leave people alone. If they want to overthrow their rulers, great, but that’s their business and not yours. Short of actual genocide (which we never intervene against anyway–see Rwanda or Cambodia), war is almost always worse than the status quo, and outside intervention rarely seems to make the situation better. (See the Ukraine for this also–and yes, Maidan was an intervention by outside forces.)

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Egypt’s Freely Elected President, Morsi, Sentenced to Death

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On May 16, 2015

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Really?  Really?

An Egyptian court has pronounced death sentences on ousted president Mohammed Morsi and more than 100 other people over a mass prison break in 2011.

And people wonder why Islamic groups become more and more radical over time. There is one set of rules for non-Islamic groups and another for Islamic groups. If they win fairly and within the rules (as when Hamas won the Palestinian elections), they are denied the fruits of their gains. If you claim that fair elections and democracy constitute legitimacy, then overthrow those who win when you don’t like them, no one can take your criteria for legitimacy seriously.

Peaceful means have now failed, legitimate means have now failed; expect those who support Islamic government to become more radical and violent. Yes, the Muslim Brotherhood was defeated militarily before, but this is not then: Islamic groups are on the rise, and often on the offensive, all through the region.

If you won’t let the reasonable people in the opposition take power, you will soon meet the unreasonable people.

Note also that Sisi has set a precedent with his executions. When the next Islamic group takes power in Egypt, they will follow suit. They will almost certainly purge the deep state in a bloodbath.

In this respect, Sisi has provided the perfect Machiavellian lesson to the opposition: You cannot leave men with guns in their positions when they oppose you. You must eliminate them.

Legitimate ways of transferring power are supposed to eliminate the need for Machiavellian practicalities. The men with guns, the deep state bureaucracy–even if they don’t like the new government–bow before them, precisely so that each new regime doesn’t feel it has to destroy the previous regime. This is so that society is not wracked by purges.

Al-Sisi and those who back them will reap as they have sowed. I feel very little sympathy for them, but I do feel great sympathy for Egyptians as a group. They tried.

At the time the Egyptians rose, I was castigated for my “cynicism.” It turns out to have been realism. Those who ignore where the real power lies in society in favor of mealy-mouthed niceties about “people power” are, too often, leading their flocks into a slaughter.

Allah bless Egyptians. They are going to need it.

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The Rise of the Islamic State

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On April 27, 2015

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Islamic State Flag

Islamic State Flag

Der Spiegel had an excellent article on how ISIS rose to power, based on files recovered from the ex-Baathist spy master who planned most of its structure and early strategy.

It boils down to two main themes. First, ISIS set up charity offices in the territory it would later try to seize. The men assigned to those offices were tasked with finding out who the most important people in the area were and marrying into the most important families, if possible.

When ISIS went active, they had complete files on the power structures of every area. They knew who had power, who was likely to oppose them, and, to put it crudely, where they lived. Their enemies knew next to nothing about them, but they they were able to bribe, blackmail or kill anyone who was in a position to be useful or pose a threat.

Second, and especially interesting, the initial ISIS force was comprised almost entirely of people not native to Syria. On the face, this seems like a bad idea, but lack of local ties, combined with ferocious operational security, meant that ISIS could move its troops from place to place and the locals couldn’t easily track those movements.

ISIS soldiers who were local would have talked, their movements would have been easy to track. Foreigners with few to no local ties, not so much.

As a result, ISIS was able to make a small army effectively much larger than it seemed. They would march almost all their troops to the next theater, and because their enemies didn’t know it, they couldn’t take advantage.

The result of this was that ISIS’s local enemies, the local elites, were often unable to effectively oppose them (since they got dead or blackmailed if they did). Additionally, ISIS possessed operational flexibility their armed opposition didn’t have.

The entire article is worth reading if you’re interested in how ISIS rose and worth thinking on how it could be applied elsewhere, or stopped. It’s also an excellent reminder that the best of the forces rising in the Islamic world are staffed and run by people who are brilliant and not to be underestimated. (They ought to be the best; a very harsh Darwinian selection has been run on them.  Slip up, wind up dead.)

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