The Middle East is on the cusp of a seismic shift. This change has been precipitated by the shocking events in Syria. Few would have anticipated the bewildering rapidity with which the Bashar al-Assad regime collapsed. Assad had successfully kept the state-sponsored and non-state rebels at bay since the start of the Syrian civil war following the 2011 ‘Arab Spring’.
The Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group, led by its enigmatic leader Abu Mohammed al-Julani who still carries a $10 bounty on his head, achieved within 11 days what 13 years of civil war could not. The group’s triumphant march from its northern Syrian stronghold of Idlib to Damascus was reminiscent of the Taliban’s spectacular capture of Afghanistan in 2021.
How did Damascus fall this fast? Perhaps three factors hold the explanation: Syrian state’s fragility, gradual fragmentation of Assad’s authority, and his near-total reliance on his foreign backers Iran and Russia.
From shock and awe to anarchy
The process of redefining the Middle East started more than two decades ago with the US-led military interventions in the oil-rich region plagued by governance failures, tribal and sectarian tensions, social discontent, and regional power struggle. From Iraq to Libya, Afghanistan, and now Syria, the US interventions were justified under the pretext of promoting democracy and fighting terror but the underlying objective was to humiliate the defiant strong men in the region who were considered a challenge to the American geopolitical objectives. These military interventions rid the region of “authoritarian rulers” but in the process reduced once-stable nations to failed states riven by chaos and anarchy, plunging the entire region into instability and uncertainty.
The American game plan for the region started unfolding with the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The US and its Western allies launched ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom’ in March 2003 in violation of the UN Charter to topple the Saddam Hussein regime that they accused to possessing weapons of mass destruction (which they never found). The objective of ousting Saddam was achieved within weeks in a “shock and awe” bombing campaign that in the words of Human Rights Watch caused “extensive civilian suffering.”
The subsequent occupation decimated Iraq’s infrastructure, wrecked its political framework, and laid bare sectarian and ethnic fault-lines, setting in motion a cycle of deadly conflicts among sectarian and tribal militias, and insurgents egged on by foreign powers jostling for influence in the post-Saddam Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of lives were lost and millions of people were displaced, creating a humanitarian crisis that persists to this day.
Eleven years later, the US and its NATO allies turned their attention to Libya, which sits atop Africa’s largest oil reserves. They supported rebels in a civil war against the decades-old rule of Muammar Gaddafi before launching a bombing campaign under a UN Security Council mandate to “protect civilians and civilian areas in Libya.” The 2011 military intervention, called “Operation Unified Protector”, culminated in the humiliating end of another defiant strong man of the region.
Gaddafi’s rule was by no means democratic, but he had maintained relative stability in a country sharply divided on tribal lines. Western attempts to cobble up a “democratic state” in post-Gaddafi Libya threw the North African nation into anarchy as a new phase of civil war between rival factions and militias threatened its very existence. The oil wealth of the once-stable nation became a source of conflict spawning a cascade of security crises and waves of migration to Europe, leading to a humanitarian crisis in the Mediterranean.
Before the Iraq and Libya interventions, the US and its NATO allies invaded Afghanistan to topple the hardline Taliban regime after it refused to hand over Osama bin Laden, who was accused of masterminding the 9/11terrorist attacks in the US. The military intervention called, “Operation Enduring Freedom”, began in October 2001 as part of the “Global War on Terror” and succeeded in ending the Taliban rule within weeks. However, the militia regrouped and launched a deadly insurgency, unleashing a war that became the longest, deadliest, and costliest in the history of American military interventions. The $2trillion war ended in 2021 in the chaotic exit of US troops from Afghanistan, leaving behind advanced weaponry and handing the country back to the same terrorists the Americans fought for over two decades. The US attempts to democratise a medieval tribal society fell apart as the Taliban re-established their hardline rule and turned their country back into a magnet for transnational terrorist groups, threatening neighbours and imperilling global peace.
Unfinished business in Syria
Like Libya, the conflict in Syria was spawned by “Arab Spring” – a movement many believe was engineered by the US as part of its plan to redefine the region. However, the Bashar Al Assad regime launched a brutal crackdown, resulting in a civil war as many protesters formed rebel groups to fight the regime forces. The US first imposed crippling sanctions on Assad’s Syria before jumping into the fray indirectly by arming the rebels. However, Assad, backed by Iran and Russia, managed to fight off the rebels who were now joined by an ultraorthodox terrorist group, Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). In 2014, the US directly intervened; launching “Operation Inherent Resolve” with the stated objective of defeating ISIS. Although the US scaled back its presence in 2019, but American troops never left Syria. The US and its regional allies became largely resigned to the Assad rule until the Gaza/Lebanon conflict sprang another opportunity to finish off the long overdue task.
As Russia got bogged down in Ukraine and Iran got embroiled in dangerous escalation with Israel, the Assad regime became vulnerable, providing a godsend to the Syrian rebels, led by Abu Mohammed al-Julani’s HTS, to unleash a decisive assault on Damascus. Assad and his family fled to Russia as the rebels triumphantly entered the Syrian capital without any resistance.
Greater Israel power play?
As if waiting for this opportunity, Israel quickly sent its troops into a demilitarised zone within Syrian territory along the Golan Heights, which Tel Aviv already illegally partially occupies. At the same time, Israeli warplanes carried out hundreds of air strikes in Syria, targeting purported positions of its arch-nemeses Hezbollah and Iran.
This set conspiracy-theory mill in motion with some speculating that the Oct 7 Hamas-led surprise attack on Israel was deliberately allowed to happen by Tel Aviv to use it as pretext for its US-backed greater plan to redraw the Middle East map. A statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave credence to these conspiracies. “The collapse of the Syrian regime is a direct result of the severe blows with which we have struck Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran,” he said after the fall of Damascus to HTS.
The ouster of Assad is the deathblow to Iran’s “Axis of Resistance” as Syria was the main logistical hub for Tehran to supply arms to its ally Hezbollah in Lebanon. However, given the situation in post-Saddam Iraq and post-Gaddafi Libya, fears are rampant that Syria might also descend into chaos post-Assad. The Syrian rebel groups who captured Damascus range from secular democrats to Islamists and ethno-nationalists, reflecting a volatile mix of ideologies and loyalties. As they jostle for bigger share in power and influence, Syria could become another casualty of the geopolitical gamble, sucking in regional nations pursuing conflicting agendas.
Coming back to the American power play, the US military interventions and its support for rebel groups across the Middle East has left a trail of devastated nations and fragmented societies. This erodes American credibility in the region and exposes the dangers of its short-term geopolitical calculus while offering a stark lesson to smaller nations: involvement in the global powers’ geopolitical games comes at an excruciating cost.