For there to be a regime change in Syria the United States and its allies (including Australia) will have to consider strafing (without initially firing on) on the military aircraft of the Baathist regime as an initial waring to Assad that his representatives must attend an international conference to put in place a new transitional government which can more effectively fight against ISIS.
Should there be an international conference on Syria the success or otherwise of such a gathering will depend upon a government being established similar to the high quality transitional regime under the brilliant and late Hector Garcia Godoy which was established in the Dominican Republic in 1965 following the United States led Organization of American States (OAS) invasion of that nation to prevent a Castro backed communist takeover.
Syria will similarly need an extraordinarily talented provisional government to grapple with the poisoned chalice of a post-Assad nation. Currently Bashar al-Assad* refuses to make way for such an international conference and resultant provisional government. However resort to allied planes flying over the Assad regime’s military positions as a warning that substantial military action could be undertaken should be enough to prod the regime to agree to an international conference to establish a new transitional/provisional government.
(*The Assad family should be given asylum in either Algeria or republican Iran with legal immunity being granted to them for having foregone power).
Such a transitional/provisional government would have to include representatives of the Shia, Christian and Alawite minority communities which have given their allegiance to the ruling Baath Party out of fear that the Sunni majority will take retribution against them. Accordingly, the Baath Party would have to have substantial representation in any new post-Assad provisional government. Such a government would therefore essentially be a coalition between the Baath Party, the supporters of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and the Kurds.
The Syrian civil war would still continue even if such a provisional government came into existence. However, with continued international military air support or even troops on the ground being composed of personnel from an Arab League force, concerted and successful military action could be taken against ISIS. For there to be successful military action against ISIS a key task of a future Syrian provisional government will be to merge the regular armed forces of the Assad regime, the FSA and the Kurds into an effective fighting force.
Should ISIS be militarily defeated in Syria due to that nation having a very effective provisional government and receiving Arab League military support then the military situation would markedly improve so that the Iraqi government of Haider al-Abadi would also be able to rout the Jihadists with continued international air support. The overall point which needs to be made is that political and military matters in the Middle East are so inter-connected that flow on effects from one nation to the next are often the norm. Consequently, positive military and political outcomes in Syria will flow through to Iraq and vice versa.
Lebanon is also a nation which would immensely benefit from positive political and military developments in Syria due to the close geographical and cultural proximity between those two nations. Indeed, Lebanon, despite ferocious military and political conflict between 1975 and 1990, has consistently being a democracy of sorts. The reality of Lebanese democracy however has been that the leaders of various communities have often (but not always as has occurred during periods of warfare) resorted to electoral processes to share power in accordance with a 1930s political covenant.
A Syrian democracy in the immediate future would probably resemble Lebanon with people voting along communal lines. Nevertheless, by having a future constitution stipulating a parliamentary system in which a government would have to gain a two-thirds majority would ensure that all communities are accommodated within a national unity government.
Before the 1963 Baathist military coup Syria essentially had three competing political parties; the National Party, the People’s Party and the Baath Party. The rivalry between the National Party and the People’s Party reflected an intense but non- lethal rivalry between Damascus (the base of the National Party) and Aleppo (the base of the People’s Party). This inter-city rivalry was paradoxically positive because both parties consequently garnered inter-communal support. Divisions between those two parties were also exacerbated by the National Party being inclined towards a union with Iraq while the People’s Party was orientated toward closer ties with Lebanon and Jordan.
The Baath Party, as the third party in pre-1963 Syria, was (and still is) an Arab intra-nationalist party which attracted support from the marginalized sectors of society such as the Alawites. This party’s advocacy of union with Nasser’s Egypt considerably expanded its bases of support but not enough to ever have won a majority in a free election. It was not to be by electoral means by which the Baathist Part took power in Syria but by military connections for Baathist officers seized power in a military coup in March 1963 overthrowing the democratic government of the People’s Party’s Nazim al-Kudsi.
Although Syria had a military backed single party government there was a limited degree of political pluralism due to intense factionalism within the Baath Party between March 1963 and November 1970 when General Hafez al-Assad seized power in a military coup. Due to the unpopularity of Hafez al- Assad’s subsequent tyranny he cultivated the support of his Alawite community as well as Christians and Shia Muslims against the Sunni majority. This inter-communal support amongst these minority communities will undoubtedly continue for the Baath Party in a democratic post-Assad state. As a result republican Iran and Russia will still be able to continue to exercise influence within a democratic Syria through an electorally viable Baath Party.
Russia and republican Iran should therefore assist the west in finding a Syrian equivalent of Hector Garcia Godoy to lead a provisional government. There is an abundance of brilliant Syrians who could fulfil a Hector Garcia Godoy leadership role so it is really a matter of international diplomats undertaking a successful search. Should Moscow and Tehran refuse to help join in this search or be disingenuous in participating in such an endeavour then the west should do so without their input. Ultimately it will be up to the west to place sufficient pressure on the Assad regime to participate in an international conference to establish a new provisional Syrian government.
A Moral Debt: The West’s Unfinished Business in Libya
The process of the west pressuring the Assad regime to cede power to a new provisional Syrian government will not be easy but it will be worthwhile because nearly anything can be achieved if brilliant people are involved. This was the case in 2011 when there was effective co-ordination and liaison between the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the savvy Libyan rebels when the latter were able to prevail against the Qaddafi regime due to crucial international air support.
The current mess in Libya is because the solution to Libya’s problems was not the removal of the Qaddafi regime but that outcome being only part of the solution. The west, and in particular the United States, must now commit to Libya by doing what was done previously during the 2011 anti-Gaddafi rebellion- supporting intelligent and decent people by providing them with *air support.
(*Egypt is currently providing limited air support to the al-Thani government in Libya. Egypt’s military backed government of government of General Abdul Fattah al-Sisi can avoid an Algerian scenario of having to resort to massive repression to crush Islamist dissent by refraining from forming a regime backed party, thereby allowing the secular liberal parties which supported the 2013 military coup to prevail in future Egyptian parliamentary elections).
Libya has a democratic parliamentary government based in Tobruk led by the monarchist inclined Abdullah al-Thani (a Libyan equivalent of Nazim al-Kudsi) which is confronted by a rival Islamist government in Tripoli, while the Libyan version of ISIS holds vast swathes of territory due to an anarchistic vacuum and a multitude of militia gangs wreaking havoc. American/NATO air support should be provided to the al-Thani government as well as military equipment sent to this Tobruk based government so that Libya can be re-united.
Another African nation which was once riven by apparently intractable tribal division and bewildering anarchy was the Congo. This former Belgium colony in the 1960s became a flashpoint in the Cold War but one which the United States backed the winning side by supporting the unscrupulous and corrupt General Joseph Desire’ who later took the name ‘Mobutu Sese Seko’ as part of a supposed African *‘authenticity’ campaign. While western interests may not have prevailed in the Congo had it not been for the diabolical mind of General Desire’ the price that Washington had to pay was to support a sultanistic regime which eventually fell in 1997 due to internal decay as much as external pressure from military rebels.
(*In keeping with this ‘authenticity’ campaign Congo was re-named ‘Zaire’ between 1971 and 1997).
The United States in the contemporary Libyan context does not have to rely on the wiles of a would-be despot to master a complex situation. There already is in place in Libya a democratic regime which is worthy of American/ NATO military air and logistical support. Whether such support will be promptly forthcoming from Washington is now dependent on the goodwill of President Obama.
President Obama is an inspirational person whom future presidential historians will later debate whether there was substance to his rhetoric. At this juncture it is too early to assess the American’s president’s effectiveness although it can be said that he does stick to established positions. It is probably an established position of President Obama’s that he will not send ground troops into the Middle East unless this absolutely necessary.
The American president may be similar to John Fitzgerald Kennedy (JFK) who had he lived he might not have committed ground troops to South Vietnam due to advice from the conservative retired five-star general whom this president deeply respected, Douglas Mc Arthur. That is not to say that an anti-communist such as JFK would not have done everything short of permanently stationing ground troops in South Vietnam to prevent a totalitarian takeover of that nation. An option that JFK might have considered was to have sent aircraft carriers off the coast of Indo-China to provide semi-permanent air support to the South Vietnamese army.
It seems that President Obama is now pursuing a military strategy in Iraq and Syria similar to what JFK might have implemented in Indo-China had he lived. However, more has to be done by the greatest nation in history to prevent the Middle East descending into chaos which could imperil world peace, the vital interests of the United States and ultimately tarnish President Obama’s historical reputation.
More could be done by the Obama administration adding politics to the mix of aircraft strikes in Syria by proactively undertaking initiatives which have already been discussed in this article to ease Bashar Assad from power in Damascus while providing air and logistical support to a deserving democratic government in Libya.