What About Syria?

Recent interactions between the US and Iran have driven Syria from the primary news cycles.  Such absence from our thinking will come back to bite all of us.  Syria is the center of most of the issues and problems in the Middle East and those problems have connections globally.

Owen Wilson famously tells Billy Bob Thornton in the movie Armageddon, “okay, so the scariest environment imaginable. Thanks. That’s all you have to say, the scariest environment imaginable,” in response to Thornton’s explanation of what it will be like on the asteroid to which they are being sent.  In thinking about Syria, one can start with a similar line: the most complex environment imaginable.


The Assad regime is seriously weakened.  It no longer governs the country in anything approaching its entirety.  The country is now the center of global great power competition with the participation of Russia, China, Turkey, Iran, and the United States along with other European countries in a lesser role.  A large percentage of the population is displaced either internally or externally.  It is also the nexus of regional sectarian and ethnic competitions and complexities.

What is going to happen in Syria?  The simple answer is I don’t know.  I will try to provide some thoughts regarding this complexity.

• Fighting in Syria is an existential struggle for so many of those involved.  It is existential for the Allawite community in Syria.  If the opposition parties win, who are currently dominated by ideological extremists, then it is perceived as likely that the Allawites will be destroyed as a people.  It is perceived as existential for many other groups and organizations in this fight.  This existential nature of the war makes it particularly brutal and long-lasting.
• Iran needs Syria to exist as a friendly country.  Iran’s deep investment in Syria is essential for the flow of material into Lebanon.  It is also essential as Syria is the only state ally that Iran has in the region.  Iran will not leave Syria so long as the Assad regime is in control.  It is highly doubtful that it would leave even if Assad lost power as those who see the conflict as existential will regularly turn to Iran for support.
• Turkey is crucial to the regional dynamics and particularly inside Syria.  I think that Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is seeking to create a neo-Ottoman relationship with the Middle East and the Islamic world.  He is also inclined to expand Turkish control of northern Syria in line with the National Pact of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk that calls for a return to the lines of the Mudros Pact.  Turkey is not going to give up its positions and influence in Syria and I expect that it will attempt to expand that influence with opposition forces to include governance of cities along the border.
• The Kurds are a serious question mark in this entire equation.  There is nothing like Kurdish unity, but the Kurds in Syria have demonstrated a greater level of unity than the various groups in Iraq.  They have governed territory.  They are also pragmatic.  As with the Allawites and Iran and maybe even Turkey, this is existential.  They will and are cutting deals with whatever group they need to work with in order to survive.

Russia and China are also deeply involved for separate and complicated reasons.  Russia is seeking a warm water port, expanded influence outside its borders, combat experience, and a way to weaken and complicate the NATO relationships.  China is likewise interested in expanding its influence and developing an understanding of the 21st century combat environment.


One theory of the future might be the following.  At some point Syria will gain sufficient control of its internal dynamics such that it can get the Kurds to agree to some form of semi-autonomy.  The Kurds will do so to avoid domination of their territory by Turkey.  Syria will owe its continued existence to Iran.  As such, it will have to follow Iran’s guidance.  Syria will continue to be a conduit for arms to Hezbollah.  It will also become more and more co-dependent on Hezbollah as Syria could not have survived without Hezbollah’s military support.  This will place Hezbollah in a near-peer bargaining position with the government of Syria.  Once Syria has control of its internal dynamics it will be inclined to reestablish a stronger regional position and exert influence over Lebanon and intimidate Israel.  The Syria-Lebanon struggle will be interesting as Syria will have lost most of its dominance.  I am unsure that it can regain the prior position absent some significant change in the Allawite-Kurdish relationship within Syria.  Syria needs to return to a combative relationship with Israel as that will be the only way, in their perspective, to regain regional posture.  This may take years, unless Syria directs some of its many proxies against Israel or Syria becomes Lebanonized by Iran such that some of the Syrian militias become within Syria as Hezbollah is within Lebanon.