US troops deployed to Syria, November 2020. Photo: U.S. Army by Spc. Jensen Guillory.
While I am certainly not one to begrudge those residents of Syria who are celebrating the end of Assad’s ultimately brutal regime, I am hesitant to accept the overthrow of that government as either a democratic uprising or even as a quantum step forward for the people of that region of the world. Indeed, the immediate aftermath of Assad’s defeat has been an increase in the bloody assault on the region by Tel Aviv and Washington. As any observer of war and politics in the region knows, when Washington and Tel Aviv step up their armed attacks, lots of people die.
While Assad’s regime was ridden with corruption and brutality, I am not convinced in the slightest that a regime led by the current rebel fighters and “covertly” funded by Israel, the US and probably Turkey and composed of a coalition of terror gangs, criminal gangs, and warlords from around the world is a better option. By its own documented admission, Washington has worked towards the destruction of a viable Syrian government and its replacement by a client regime since at least 2003. If Iraq is any indication, if such a government doesn’t result from Assad’s departure, Washington and Israel are more than happy to help chaos reign until one does.
Many in the western Left are cheering the overthrow of Assad and running on about Syrian freedom. Pictures of jubilant Syrians are splashed across the western media. Personally, I was reminded of similar scenes on television after US forces took Baghdad in 2003, right before George Dubya Bush walked across the deck of an aircraft carrier wearing a codpiece and claiming the “mission was accomplished.” The slogans from those on the Left celebrating the regime change sound good but one wonders what relation they have to facts on the ground. Likewise, one must understand that the US and Israel have little to no desire to see a genuinely progressive government anywhere in the region we call the middle east. Washington has long preferred and supported reactionary regimes, whether they call themselves republics or monarchies. If Washington can’t facilitate that, it will—like it did in Iraq and Syria—facilitate chaos.
You won’t hear about US and Israeli support. However, it’s a historical fact that their subterfuge and money created the situation from which HTS and the Syrian National Army arose. Also, Turkey is a NATO country. That in itself implies Washington’s involvement in some way. That being said, I remain hopeful the new government is better than Assad’s in terms of its treatment of the opposition and its acceptance of Syria’s cultural plurality. At the same time, I remain even more skeptical that this will be the case.
Israel occupies part of Syria and is bombing much of the rest of it. It will be interesting to see if or how the new Syrian government responds. Will it demand its territory back from Israel and the US (which occupies the oil fields) or will it acquiesce? The answer will probably be related to what the new government owes both powers. The US was deeply involved in creating this situation. The only thing it should be doing is telling its client regime in Tel Aviv to back off. Of course, that won’t happen until Washington’s goals there are met. (Don’t hold your breath.) The Israeli expansion of its occupation in Syria adds fuel to the call for an immediate and long term arms embargo on Israel. As I write, US forces are occupying more of Syria than they previously held. One assumes this to expand and tighten control of the oilfields they occupied several years ago; resources that were previously held by Kurdish fighters; fighters who were temporarily aligned with US forces who then threw them to the Turks, their mortal enemies.
Retired USAF General Wesley Clark revealed in his 2003 book The Clark Critique, that the United States designed a plan after the September 11, 2001 attacks to take out “seven countries in five years.” While this plan was modified and has yet to be fulfilled, two of the regimes Washington are now gone: Saddam Hussein’s in Iraq ans the Assad regime in Syria. Both of these governments were Baathist and both had spent decades involved in various schemes from Washington designed to keep revolutionary movements from taking off among various populations in the region. When these endeavors began, the revolutionary movements Washington wished to destroy were communist; these were later replaced by revolutionary Islamic campaigns. Both shared an intense opposition the US presence in the region. In other words, they were anti-imperialist. The Baathist regimes emphasized a secular and anti-communist nationalism. Both the Baathists and the subsequent Islamist revolutionaries supported the liberation of Palestine. A for the rest of those seven nations, only Iran remains intact. Four others—Sudan, Lebanon, Libya and Somalia are what the empire’s media likes to call “failed states.”
The current situation is an indirect and direct result of Washington’s support for reactionary elements that combine various strains of armed Islam, international gangsters and straight up mercenaries. Their training has been under the auspices of US, Israeli and Turkish intelligence agencies. Perhaps the largest of these operations was a CIA operation known as Operation Timber Sycamore, which the New York Times called “one of the costliest covert action programs in the history of the CIA.” In recent years, US-trained Ukrainian forces have lent their knowledge and skills to different Islamist militias. This in itself is an interesting sidenote that contradicts the US-promoted myth that the war in Ukraine is just a defensive operation and that the civil war in Syria is just a war for liberation from oppression. In fact, this little fact provides a basis for the argument that both conflicts are imperial wars designed to strengthen US hegemony. I would argue these wars are actually a much greater world war. Hence the headline of this piece.
In summation, while it is legitimate to cautiously celebrate the overthrow of the Assad regime, it is even more important to oppose Israeli and US military actions in Syria. Acknowledging the joy and relief of the Syrians who suffered under that government does not justify the ongoing occupation of Syrian territory by US, Israeli and Turkish forces. In fact, it is even more important to oppose the presence of those forces in Syria. Furthermore, the opposition to Washington and Israel’s ongoing genocide of Palestinians and bombing of Lebanon must expand and increase. Our understanding must begin with the understanding that from Gaza to the West Bank, Damascus to Beirut, Baghdad to Tehran—these are all conflicts resulting from the ever-aggressive nature and unending greed of US imperialism.