After waging 13 years of brutal war, the Syrian Arab Republic is no more. Bashar al-Assad fled to Moscow with his tale between his legs. A rebel coalition led by a former al-Qaeda affiliate seized Damascus on December 8th, and the last remnants of the Ba’athist government are already pledging to work out the government transition as one of the most horrific prisons on earth is cracked open. The Syrian Civil War can’t be described as over. The Assad regime has disintegrated as the Syrian Salvation Government of Abu Mohammad Al-Jolani seizes control; meanwhile, the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are striking at Islamic State targets around Syrian Kurdistan and the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army is trying to expand its territory and consolidate gains. Israel has occupied a wider section of the Israel-Syria border that was once controlled by Assadist forces.
To some, the collapse of the Assad regime and the expected predominance of Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), led by al-Jolani, is the nightmare scenario. Staying out of the war was the better option, some argued; others suggested limiting U.S. intervention to attacks on al Qaeda and ISIS cells. Arch-realist John Mearsheimer long viewed the Assadist state as a bulwark of stability. It was anything but.
The great fear about Syria’s Islamist rebel groups, especially when HTS represented al-Qaeda as the al-Nusra Front, was the risk of a Taliban-like state replacing Assad. Anarchy following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the 2011 Libyan Revolution, and the zenith of the Islamic State in 2014 have made some strategists, especially self-described realists, far too comfortable with secular authoritarians as a rampart against jihadism. The fundamental flaw with this perspective is how brutal dictators like Assad themselves generate support for extremist regimes while simultaneously being extremely brittle themselves. The forces of the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) barely put up a fight. Assad made bold claims about his desire to fight it out to the end from his safe house in Moscow. Russia and Iran were too weakened to support the regime, with the former tied down in Ukraine, and the latter weakened by Israel.
The speed with which the Ba’athist state crumpled and the celebrations in Syria should surprise no one, and it should be a lesson against relying on murderous tyrants as a bulwark against murderous terrorists. The long-standing minority rule was always questionable; the Assad family and its backing in Alawite communities represented a tiny minority of Syria, which is dominated by Sunni Arabs. More than complex tribe confederation politics, Bashar al-Assad held onto power first with his own horrendous cruelty, including mass torture and the use of chemical weapons, and then by relying on Russian and Iranian forces to multiply the devastation he could inflict on his own people.
The victory of HTS and its coalition is a lesson in dealing with the currents of war and the fragility of dictatorships. The West failed to back moderate rebels, and President Obama’s “redline” on chemical weapon debacle in 2013 opened space for Russia and Iran to intervene more forcefully while crushing U.S. credibility with rebel leadership. Later, when Assad again used chemical weapons in 2017, Trump restored some of that credibility by firing 59 Tomahawk missiles at the Syrian Air Force’s Shayrat Airbase.
Far too many strategists and analysts saw the war as settled around the time that the Assad coalition seized Aleppo from rebel hands in December 2016. By then, the United States and our European partners were far more focused on combating the Islamic State as it seized territory in Iraq and Syria. By 2023 and 2024, the Arab Gulf monarchies had given up hope of a new regime as well, returning recognition to Assad, with the exception of only Qatar. Turkey and Qatar remained strategically committed to the destruction or dissection of Syria, and it paid off. Perhaps planners in Istanbul and Doha best understood the evergreen judgment of tyrannies: they appear strong yet can snap at a moment’s notice; they are unshakeable until they collapse.
Now, the United States and allies must deal with HTS and brace for a Sunni extremist government in Damascus. That likely requires greater military and intelligence commitments in the Levant as well as greater coordination and even some concessions to Turkey and Qatar. Israel is wasting no time, already occupying further buffer zones around the Golan Heights and striking strategic targets in Syria.
There could have been a better outcome had Washington made a serious plan to support Syria’s opposition. The rebel forces were always going to have a strong Sunni population base and thus there was always the threat of Salafist agents of influence. Instead, Washington frittered away its credibility and fighters flocked to the well-armed Gulf and Turkish backed Islamist militias. Tacitly, the United States seemed to accept that Assad had brutalized his way to a new equilibrium.
Damascus fell with a whimper because neither Assad nor his foreign patrons could muster the strength for another round of massacres. With Damascus in the hands of HTS, the greater part of Syria might be ruled by Salafist terrorists, but this amounts to only an ideological chance and not a material one. Since Hafez Assad seized total control in 1971, Syria has been ruled by terrorists. They have called themselves Ba’athists and Arab Socialists. They received support over the decades from the Soviets, Khameneist Iran, and then Russia under Putin. The constant over 50 years is that Syria has set itself up as an enemy of the United States and a threat to global freedom. Assad’s regime should have always been seen as such – not as a bulwark against something worse.
The post Supporting Brutal Dictators is Not a “Realist” Position first appeared on Providence.