SYRIA…. A DIFFERENT KIND OF CONFRONTATION

SYRIA…. A DIFFERENT KIND OF CONFRONTATION

WRITTEN BY: Dr. SAMER ABD AL-HADI ALI

TRANSLATED BY: MAAMON GHADAB

Syrian Center for International Relations and Strategic Studies

Date: 14/ 6/ 2020

      Since Russia’s military intervention in Syria at the end of September 2015 until today, Syria has been the main playground for “Russian Tsar” Vladimir Putin; politically by holding the threads of the political decision of the Syrian regime, negotiating instead of it in various regional and international forums, and taking local and international decisions, and militarily, by leading the operations of the regime’s militia and its mercenaries in battles against the Syrian people and its revolutionary forces. Russia was also able to impose its political and military will to a large extent on the Syrian file despite its confrontation with a Turkish opposition that prevented Russia from reaching its goals by controlling the remaining parts of Hama and Idlib, and an American insistence on staying in eastern and northeastern Syria, where the main oil resources in the country, and the reservoir of strategic crops.

   “Russia’s Tsar” hadn’t left a forum without  showing his political and military  arrogance, and his superiority in Syria over the other players in this bloody arena. However, “historically stupid” Russia supporting tyrants and dictators did not learn from the lessons of the past, as all the tyrants who were supported by it resembled the Syrian regime, and lost years of support in its various forms, and gained nothing but political, military and economic losses, which ultimately led to the tremendous collapse of the former USSR  in 1990 .

Today … Russia in Syria has reached the same impasse which  previously ends up with. In other words, despite the unlimited support it provided to the Syrian regime to restore its military control over the country, and to renovate it politically at home and abroad,  Russia completely failed to do so; as it was unable to re-establish the regime’s control over the most important economic and strategic areas of Syria on one hand, and  unable to restore part of its political reputation at the international level,  remaining a regional and international Arab outcast.

     Russia believed that the Syrian regime would be more powerful and legitimate if it managed to re-control the country or large parts of it, this belief also failed after the areas under its control became the poorest and the most suffering, so that the situation would get worse with the accelerating collapse of the Syrian currency, accompanied by an unprecedented expensive price in living, what made the backers  live an unprecedented state of agitation as a result of the failure of the regime  government  to find satisfactory solutions that stop the deterioration taking place at all levels.

Despite all, what Russia and its “Tsar”  did not expect would be the cruel blow to his ambitions and expansion project in Syria through an American law i.e. Caesar Act that imposes unprecedented sanctions on the Syrian regime with its men, institutions and all its supporters “individuals, institutions and countries:  chiefly Russia and Iran.

 Caesar Act was worked on by a group of Syrians in the United States of America in cooperation with related American institutions after the Syrian “Caesar” delivered tens of thousands of pictures of detained Syrians who were killed by the regime in the most horrific ways and means that modern and contemporary history has never ever known.

    Regarding the Syrian file and the conflict with the regime and its supporters, this law is the most important political, legal and humanitarian move since 2011 until today. The law, whose effects began to appear quickly while approaching the date of the first sanctions package entering into force on June 17th, began to create a  conflict  within the narrow circle of the regime in order to win the largest possible amount of looted funds while sensing  the danger of Caesar on the one hand, and to satisfy their allies (Russia and Iran)  whose  target  was the same but the interests of each were different.

     The most important disagreement is what recently appeared to the public between the most powerful economic and financial figure in the regime, “Rami Makhlouf” and the head of the regime, “Bashar al-Assad and his wife.” This dispute was reproduced among the supporters themselves i.e. between  pro-Assad and  pro- Makhlouf, which did not happen during the nine years of the revolution.

     Yes ….. Today we are facing another kind of confrontation between the “Russian Tsar” who sensed the real danger and  the

“Syrian Caesar”, which represented an unexpected blow to Russia and the regime with all its supporters.  This confrontation, which Russia started with a new approach in dealing with the Syrian file,  seeks to avoid the incalculable fall of the regime i.e. the fall of all of Russia’s dreams, ambitions, and interests in Syria and abroad.

      Russia now faces two options: the first is the continuation of its useless support for the dilapidated Syrian regime, which means an inevitable loss especially after Caesar Act is in effect. The second is for Russia to lead,  within a form of regional understandings with Turkey, and  international ones with the United States of America, the process of ending the rule of the weak Assad, and leading a transitional stage in which a coalition government or civil-military council is assembled that ultimately stops the application of Caesar Act and its consequences on its interests in Syria, which is the closest possibility to reality. Therefore, the appointment of Russia’s ambassador, “Alexander Yevimov,” as the presidential representative of Putin in Syria on last May 25th, is the first Russian step in this path; which means that Syria, the regime parts, has become under the direct Russian mandate, and the main negotiator on the present and future of Syria.

     Thus, between the “Russian Tsar” and the “American Caesar”, Syria remains the state and the homeland and the Syrian people with all their sects remain the first and last losers in all previous confrontations, and this confrontation of today.

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