Daily Times

President Barack Obama’s policy statement on Syria was epoch-making as he announced that the US should take military action against the Assad regime, pending approval from Congress. While the world is fretting over the possible implications of the impending military strike, it is paramount to elucidate the Syrian conflict by demystifying the intrinsic political objectives of the regional and global actors.

Initially, the position of the US was relatively soft towards the Assad regime. However, as allegations were levelled against the Syrian government for using lethal chemical weapons against thousands of innocent citizens, the Obama administration stiffened its stance. Well cognizant of the concept of imperial overstretch as well as its perilous implications for national power and weary of repeating the Iraq or Afghanistan experience, the US is loath to have ‘boots on the ground’. But this does not insinuate that the world’s only superpower is not adamant to launch a military operation against Syria employing its most effective cruise missiles and airstrikes.

The US has two overarching objectives to achieve as a result of an assault on Syria. First, it wants to circumscribe the regional influence of defiant Iran by toppling the Assad regime. This would also consolidate the regional influence of Israel, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, the three close allies of the US in the Middle East. Second, the Obama regime wants the impending military strike against Syria to symbolise that despite the fact that the monopoly of five international states over the global order was institutionalised with the advent of the UN Security Council (UNSC), the US is still the most important and powerful international political actor that can act unilaterally without being under the auspices of any international framework or alliance. This would serve as a stern warning to all states that are either belligerent towards the US or are accused of harbouring anti-western ‘rogue’ elements.

President Obama is not eager to garner legitimacy to attack Syria, but he is not oblivious of the significance of developing consensus over the matter on the domestic and international fronts. This is why he accentuated that though it was his prerogative as the commander-in-chief of the US military to decide whether to strike Syria or not, he opted to “seek authorisation for the use of forces from the American people’s representatives in Congress.” Seeking a Congress vote on a Syria military strike will bring about a win-win game for President Obama. If Congress gives the go-ahead for a military strike on Syria, all policy makers of the superpower will share responsibility for the possible failure of the US in achieving its strategic and operational objectives. If Congress rejects intervening in the Syrian conflict and the civil war in Syria exacerbates, the onus will be on critics of the Obama administration to explain the failure of the US to act decisively. However, it must be mentioned here, a major political imbroglio will engulf the US at the domestic level if President Obama presses ahead with an attack on Syria even if Congress turns it down.

In a bid to mobilise global powers against Syria, the US ratcheted up efforts to seek the support of its allies on the matter. France, which vociferously opposes the Assad regime, has supported the US’s call for taking ‘punitive’ action against the Syrian government. It was the French Foreign minister Laurent Fabius who, following the alleged use of chemical weapons by Syrian forces, said that the situation would be handled “in other ways” than through the UNSC. France was the first European country to support the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, commonly known as the Syrian National Council, which maintains deep ties with the Free Syrian Army, the main opposition army group in Syria. Moreover, France, along with Britain, swayed the EU to lift its arms embargo, purportedly in order to furnish Syrian rebels with weapons.

Likewise, the British government has also been an ardent exponent of a robust military operation against Syria. But Prime Minister David Cameron is in a fix as his government failed in getting a motion passed that would have authorised military action against Syria by only 13 votes. Nonetheless, after President Obama’s announcement of taking punitive action against Syria, Prime Minister Cameron tweeted: “I understand and support Barack Obama’s position.” However, the inability of the British Prime Minister to wage war against Syria is a major setback for the US.

Britain is not the only factor currently unnerving President Obama. Germany has already ruled out its participation in any military intervention in Syria unless it is sanctioned by the UNSC. Similarly, Italy has asserted that it would not join any military operation against Damascus without authorisation from the UNSC. Italian politicians have gone to the extent of stating that the country’s military bases, which were used for international assaults on Libya and Kosovo, would be out of bounds to forces launching a military operation against Syria sans authorisation from the UNSC.

Although Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been providing financial patronage to Syrian rebel groups, other important regional actors in the Middle East, including Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and Egypt, have refrained from siding with the US over the issue. These states have called upon the world to seek a political/diplomatic solution to the Syrian predicament. Jordan hosts a US air base that could be utilised for carrying out strikes, but has emphasised that it will not be a ‘launch-pad’ for attacks on Syria.

Apart from the failure of the US to hammer out a large-scale international alliance against Syria, the belligerence of Russia and Iran is also playing a pivotal role in restraining the superpower in the region. Russia maintains longstanding ties with Syria that span an array of military, economic and cultural fields. In terms of Russia’s strategic interests in the region, Syria remains its key sphere of influence. Russia also has a naval station in northern Syria, which is its only military installation outside territories that once constituted the former Soviet Union. Russia, along with China, precluded the passage of a resolution against Syria in the UNSC. China, albeit not supporting the Assad regime, has accentuated political settlement as “the only way out for the Syrian issue”. The official news agency of China said that the matter was “reminiscent of the lead-up to the Iraq War, which the US staged with allegations about weapons of mass destruction that later turned out to be false.”

Iran’s stance is that the US’s efforts are geared towards targeting the ‘Resistance Axis’ of Syria, Iran and Hezbollah under the guise of cracking down on the purported oppressive regime of President Bashar al-Assad. It is pertinent to mention here that both Iran and Hezbollah are allegedly rendering support to the Assad regime.

Amidst the aforementioned realities, here is how the whole situation appears: despite Britain, Germany and Italy being out of the equation, the US will enjoy the active support of Israel, France and Saudi Arabia in the military operation against Syria. Meanwhile, Iran would go to any length to prop up the Assad regime. If Russia decides to provide unbridled backing to the Syrian government even if international pressure on it mounts, the crisis is likely to degenerate into an all-out proxy war between global and regional powers. The Assad regime would be an underdog in the conflict if Russia decides not to act in this manner. However, even if the US is able to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad, the next question would be about the various non-state actors involved in the conflict, including Islamist militants.

The writer is a freelance journalist