What Then?

I have this picture in my head of the likely scene that marks the end of the Syrian civil war.  By the way, why do we call it a civil war when any such war is the most uncivil of all types of conflict?  Anyhow, back to my scene. In it I see Bashar Al-Assad standing on a huge pile of rubble with a few of his supporters standing around him looking triumphant.  But in the background, the ground is littered with a million dead bodies.  A dark and forbidding picture to be sure, but as this war struggles on, the scene seems to get closer and closer. 

Now don’t get me wrong, I am certainly no supporter of Bashar Al-Assad.  He should have stepped aside five years ago if he had any regard for the people he rules.  Then it could have been accomplished through negotiations and in a fairly orderly fashion.   But it is far too late for such an orderly turn-over now.  There is too much history, misery and too many players in the game for such a thing to happen today.  The opposition has grown from a group of Syrian rebels to a crowd of challengers that includes not only home grown resistance fighters but Turkey, Kurdish peshmerga, ISIS, Iranian proxies and now the powers of America and Russia.  Each now want their piece of the pie that will remain of Syria after this miserable conflict is over.  

Several countries, including Canada, are now saying that Al-Assad must go.  But in my opinion, it is too late for that simple an answer.  If history, particularly recent history, has taught us anything (and I always wonder if anyone pays attention) it is that the removal of a strong one-man ruler is one of the hardest things to accomplish.  It inevitably causes a power vacuum and resulting instability.  Consider the case of Iraq and the removal of Sadam Hussein.  This resulted in a protracted war involving the United States acting as a virtual army of occupation and the resulting rise of ISIS.  But in the case of Syria, you have Russia as a solid backer of the current regime.  Syria is much closer to Russia, politically and geographically, than Iraq was, so Russia feels that they have a vested interest in calling the shots there.  Since Russia has been much more involved in the actual fighting, particularly against Syrian dissident groups, it would be much more reluctant to see “its” man go.  What then?

How does the world get out of the mess that is the Syrian civil war since it has now become simultaneously a civil war, a war against terrorists, a proxy war between different countries and a possible spark to war between two superpowers?  Certainly the United Nations cannot do much because of the threat of vetoes in the Security Council.  I don’t think NATO has any stomach to get involved as an organization.  Negotiations for even temporary cease fires have proven quite fruitless, so the prospects of a negotiated settlement, particularly one imposed from outside, look pretty hopeless.  So unless the western powers led by the US want to get caught up in another quagmire, the solution must be left up to the Syrian people.  Maybe the only solution is for the Syrian, indigenous opposition groups to sit down with Al-Assad and more or less surrender to the idea that he will remain in power, and that their joint effort will now be on defeating the terrorists groups like ISIS and stabilizing the country.  This would be a very hard decision for the Syrian people to make.  No one really wins in this war.  Even Al-Assad will be left with a weakened country faced with dissent and the prospect of terrorist war.  

If I could see any other solution to this mess, I would certainly propose and support it, but I cannot.  The Syrian people will go on suffering whosever side they are on.  But unfortunately, with all of the factions with a hand in this thing, the ordinary Syrian people are the last people that anyone is thinking about right now.  So look kindly on those Syrian refugees that have made it out of the war zone and make them feel welcome.  If this war ends, many of them will undoubtedly go back to their homes.  But if we treat them right, many will stay and those that return will have nothing but kind thoughts for the western people who gave them asylum.  In the end, it has to be ordinary people that are the most important.