There is a lot of loose talk on intervention in
Syria. Various commentators, government
officials – former and current, and analysts
are calling for some sort of US military
involvement in the blooming civil war between
the Alawite Assad regime and the Free Syrian
Army (FSA). Recommendations range from arming
the opposition to providing special operations
and air support. Many of their arguments make a
compelling moral case for intervention. Some
even provide an operational framework for what
military support for the FSA might look like.
The trouble is, very few advocates of
intervention have taken the time to:
(a) Provide a strategic rationale for
intervention based on US interests,
(b) Identify what circumstances would merit a
commitment that would place American military
lives at risk,
(c) Explain the criteria for disengagement if
the conflict endures beyond our expectations,
(d) Explain how the likely alternatives to
Assad will be better for the United
States.
(e) Explain what success looks like and what
comes next .
Important questions like these were laid out in
1995 when Col. John Collins (ret.) penned a
useful tool for policymakers and military
planners for
Parameters called "
Military
Intervention: A Checklist of Key
Considerations." It proposes a list of key
considerations and questions for whether,
where, when, and how the US should or should
not intervene militarily. My proposition is it
would be irresponsible to commit American blood
and treasure without ticking every box on Col.
Collins’ checklist.
The gauntlet has been thrown.
There have been three prominent advocates of
military intervention: Anne Marie Slaughter,
former Director of Policy Planning for
President Obama's US State Department; Stephen
Hadley, President Bush's National Security
Advisor; and Max Boot, a well-regarded
commentator and military analyst.
Dr. Slaughter, the champion of the
Responsibility
to Protect (R2P) doctrine, focuses on the
"how" and not the "why." She
argues,
"Foreign military intervention in Syria offers
the best hope for curtailing a long, bloody and
destabilizing civil war." Due to Syria's
strategic significance due to its location, a
long civil war would be dangerous to American
interests. This is an important point and one
that Dr. Slaughter should have spent a few more
convincing sentences on. She goes on to
advocate arming the opposition, but notes that
doing this alone runs the risk of fueling "a
proxy war that would spill into Lebanon,
Turkey, Iraq and Jordan and fracture Syria
along sectarian lines." In order to avoid this,
she proposes the supplementary measures of
establishing "no-kill zones" with the FSA near
the Turkish, Lebanese, and Jordanian borders,
as well as sending in special forces from
Qatar, Turkey, and possibly Britain and France.
Collectively, these efforts will somehow keep
this war contained and force the Assad regime
into a truce.
Aside from the minefields involved in building
the coalition, implementing this campaign, and
creating the safe zones (
among
other things, how would we protect these
safe zones without soldiers on the ground?),
the biggest weakness of Dr. Slaughter's
argument is its
lack
of a defined end-state, or some criteria
that would merit either further U.S.
involvement or a withdrawal. This truce is
entirely aspirational. What if it does not
happen and the war drags on? It is also far
from clear how Dr. Slaughter's proposals would
forestall a larger sectarian war.
Mr. Hadley rests his
argument
firmly on moral grounds: The Syrian non-violent
protestors and armed rebels are displaying
remarkable courage in their quest for freedom.
The US must provide support, in the form of
arms, in order to create "a stable, democratic
Syria in which all sectarian communities feel
secure and strive together to build a common
future." America should take the lead in
rallying the international community to provide
political and support and a concrete plan for
the reconstruction of a post-Assad Syria. If
the US waits too long, al Qaeda will be more
likely to subvert the rebellion and thrive on
chaos and violence in Syria.
Of all people, a former US National Security
Advisor should be able to present a cogent case
for intervention based on strategy and American
interests. Instead, Mr. Hadley does not stray
far from a morality play and playing on
familiar themes that failed to translate into
an effective foreign policy during the Bush
Administration. When dreaming of a democratic
Syria with inter-sectarian harmony, he betrays
amnesia of the last nine years of conflict in
Iraq. During his most recent time in the White
House, Hadley and his colleagues expressed the
same dreams – dreams that evaporated in the
face of poor planning and sectarian death
squads. If Iraq and the Balkans have taught us
anything, it is that while dictatorships are
intolerably repressive, morally repugnant
systems, they tend to keep a lid on simmering
sectarian tensions. And when that lid is
lifted, the stability of the dictator doesn't
look quite so terrible by comparison.
Mr. Boot accuses President Obama of
making
a "strategic blunder" for refusing to order
air strikes in Syria and arm the FSA. He is
clearly an advocate of military operations, but
does not explain how this would serve American
interests, what the targeting criteria should
be for airstrikes, how and under what
circumstances the US should end military
operations if a brutal civil war continues
without a decisive end, etc. According to
recent intelligence assessments, the Syrian
regime
is
more resilient than many observers have
argued.
Boot does, however, provide one strategic
explanation: toppling the Assad regime would
cut off Iran's primary avenue for projecting
its malign influence into the Levant. Perhaps,
but Iran does not only give arms to Hizballah
through and over Syria. There are sea and air
routes that avoid Syria. Moreover, Hizballah
has a strong base of support in Southern
Lebanon and is already flush with arms. And is
it worth risking enduring civil war,
instability, or an unpredictable future
government to possibly weaken Hizballah? Would
removing Iran's only ally in the region
strengthen or weaken their resolve to get a
nuclear weapon?
For the sake of argument, let's say that all of
these advocates of military intervention are
right: we should take active military steps to
topple Assad and we should do it now. But what
happens if we succeed? The U.S. military
estimates
that it would take 75,000 troops
just to secure Syrian chemical weapons
facilities. How many would it take to
stabilize the country?
We need to think this through.
The people of Syria have my strongest
sympathies, but the United States remains
over-stretched and completely uncertain as to
how the "Arab Spring" is transforming the
Middle East and America’s place in it. When
examining
who
is likely to take control of Syria if Assad is
overthrown, I cannot help but worry that a
democratic and stable Syria is just a dream. A
nice one, but still a dream.
Until advocates of intervention are able to
provide cogent answers to Col. Collins'
questions, I remain unconvinced.
Recommended
link:http://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Syrias_Armed_Opposition.pdf
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