Assad's Fall and Russia's Stumble

Thursday, December 12, 2024 

I can only imagine how eerie it must have been for the residents of Damascus to wake up this past week and find themselves finally rid of the Assads. 

All smiles for now

But it must be terrifying as well, at least for those who don't savor the idea of living under the rule of fighters who, until quite recently, were affiliated with ISIS and other extremist Sunni Muslim militias. So, while I doubt that there are very many Syrians who will miss the tyranny of Assad's rule, there are some who will definitely be sorry to see the secularism of Baath party rule come to an end. 

Now that Assad has been overthrown, the jockeying for power begins.

There are also foreign policy implications for these events. The government in Israel, for one, is celebrating Assad's overthrow, playing up their own role in the event. To that I say: be careful what you wish for. There could be worse things than having a bungler like Bashar al-Assad for an enemy 

Syria and the Ukraine War

Of more importance, in my view, is what Assad's departure means for Moscow, which had made shoring up the Assad regime an important Middle East-related policy objective since 2015. 

The collapse of Russia's client in Damascus constitutes a good example of how Moscow's adventure in Ukraine is limiting Russia's ability to project its influence elsewhere. It's not just a question of Putin's supposed "humiliation" or a"blow to his prestige," but rather concrete issues that must be of concern to people in the Kremlin right now. Namely: what happens now to Russia's two military bases in Syria, one of which has been controlled by Moscow since 1971? These bases, which are each located in the former Assad family stronghold of Latakia, are crucial for Russia's continued involvement in Libya and Africa. 

It's worth repeating: for as long as Russia's army is bleeding out in eastern Ukraine, Moscow is going to have a much more difficult time exerting its power in places like Moldova, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and other parts of the former USSR. This isn't the first time since 2022 that we've seen this, either. Azerbaijan's breaking, in 2023, of the Moscow-imposed ceasefire in Nagorno Karabakh is another example of the extent to which Russia's Ukraine fiasco is limiting the Kremlin's ability to influence developments not just in relatively far-flung areas like the Middle East, but also in Moscow's own backyard. 

The US & Russia

It sure would be good for Russia, though, if the new administration in Washington were able to get Moscow off the hook by imposing a peace deal upon Kyiv.   

Don't get me wrong: war is bad and inherently destabilizing, and finding healthy and hopefully long-lasting ways of ending wars is a good thing. In the case of the Ukraine war, there's an easy way for Russia to put an end to the bleeding: by withdrawing. 

Short of doing that, however, I cannot understand why it would be in American interests to attempt to impose some kind of peace upon Ukraine for as long as Ukrainians are still willing to fight. For as long as they are, we'll continue to see a weakened Russia losing its ability to project its influence on to its neighbors and beyond. And that strikes me as a good thing, frankly. It is perhaps reassuring to think that Russia is just a regional power, rather than a global one, but it's hard to say what the endgame in Syria would have been had Assad's chief backer not become so distracted by events in Ukraine. 

Back to Syria

As for Syria itself, it's also important to bear in mind that there are still a number of regions of the country that are not under the control of the militias that took Damascus last week. 

The government of Turkey has endeavored for years to establish a buffer zone between itself and US-backed Kurdish forces that still control much of the northeast of Syria. What's going to happen there? 

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Not that it makes any difference with regard to anything I've written above, but I took a short trip through Syria once. It was in September of 1995, back when I was living in Turkey. In those days I'd typically travel for 6-8 weeks every summer. On this particular occasion I went overland from Istanbul to Tel Aviv. I was especially interested in Syria and Israel, traveling quickly to Antakya, and from there via shared taxi to Aleppo. I spent about ten days in Syria, traveling to Latakia, Hama, Damascus, and a few other places before heading onward to Jordan en route to Jerusalem. Good times, at least for me. I took a lot of photos during the trip. 

Showing off some skills I
learned in college while visiting Syria

None of this, of course, gives me any special insights into politics in Syria. But it's a reminder that stability is a luxury. And if you live under a violent, tyrannical regime, stability is difficult to carry over from one government to another. 

In a multi-ethnic and (especially) multi-religious country like Syria, the fall of a secular-nationalist-authoritarian figure like Bashar al-Assad can portend bad times for minorities. Not because it's inevitable that people of different ethnic and religious groups go to war against one another, but rather it's because conflicts like this have a way of politicizing ethnic and religious differences. Just ask people in Iraq what life was like in the years immediately following the US invasion and overthrow of Saddam Hussein. A tyrannical regime was replaced by a murderous civil war and, eventually, rule by a fundamentalist religious party. 

We'll see what happens going forward. 

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For more regarding Syria, go here. 

For more on the Russia-Ukraine war, go here.