No help coming for Syrian rebels

The United Nations' insistence on a diplomatic solution to Syria’s escalating civil war is as absurd as the return on investments promised by Bernie Maddoff’s ponzi scheme.

Madoff’s investors have a better chance of getting their money back than UN press releases and US State Department rhetoric reigning in Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.

Having observed the fate of Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi and Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, Assad has no choice but to put down the insurgency in Syria with all the military power available to him.

The probability of military intervention in Syria’s civil war hinges on two major factors: the United Nations Security Council and the United States’ willingness to unilaterally intervene.

A UN Security Council Chapter 7 resolution authorising the use of force to intervene in Syria will be vetoed by Russia and China.

In the face of unprecedented protests against Vladamir Putin’s regime and growing dissent in China, both countries will want to reinforce the principle that nation-states have the right to suppress internal revolts without external interference.

A unilateral intervention by the United States is inconceivable for political and practical military reasons.

Months away from an election, President Obama is unlikely to commit the US military to war, especially in the absence of compelling national security interests.

While the US military juggernaut is certainly capable of destroying Assad’s armed forces in battle, the decade long wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has sapped the Pentagon’s ability to sustain the long-term troop deployments necessary for the post-war nation building phase.

There is no “military lite” option for an intervention along the lines of the NATO mission in Libya.

Syria’s military capabilities, its air defence systems in particular are significantly more potent more than Libya’s.

An attack on Damascus will require a significant number of US Marine Corp “boots on the ground”, and those boots are likely to still be in Syria years later, like a dinosaur stuck in a tar-pit.

Toppling Assad’s regime could result in a post-war Iraq scenario of chaos and sectarian violence worse than the current situation.

Syria is run by the Alawite community which makes up only small percentage of its population, much in the same way Saddam’s minority Sunni Ba'ath party ruled over its Shi'ite and Kurdish population.

Removing Saddam’s Sunni elite created a power vacuum which left the country in chaos. A similar situation is likely to occur by decapitating Assad’s Alawite regime.

On the surface, the divide between the United States and Russia bears the hallmark of a Cold War era battle via proxies, with Russia lending tacit support to Assad and opposing the United States’ calls for Assad to step down.

While this may resemble a Cold War proxy battle from last century, there is little chance of the divide between Russia and the US on Syria escalating towards the bitter ideological animosity of the past.

The real danger to regional and global security comes from Shi’ite Iran and Hezbollah’s support of Assad against its primarily Sunni Syrian opposition spiralling into a greater ethnic conflict between Shi'ite and Sunni Muslims in the Middle East.

Syria’s relationship with Iran adds an extra layer of complexity in assessing options for dealing with the civil war.

Toppling the Syrian regime would certainly remove one of Iran’s key allies and weaken its influence.

It could also however have the opposite effect of encouraging Iran to accelerate its nuclear weapons programme, which is already viewed by Israel with great trepidation.

An accelerated Iranian nuclear weapons programme could well force Israel’s hand in launching a pre-emptive strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities, which would be the first salvo of a bloody protracted regional war that will inevitably draw the United States into the conflict.

The ultimate arbiter of the Syrian civil war will be the Syrians themselves, either by acquiescing to Assad’s regime, or a military coup in conjunction with the rebels.

Washington clearly doesn’t have the appetite for another war in the Middle East, especially with upcoming elections. Neither does Europe as it struggles with the future of the Eurozone.

Unless atrocities on the scale of Srebrenica or Dachau occur, compelling the Western world to intervene, the Syrian rebels are on their own.

Aaron Lim completed his Master’s thesis on military strategy at Otago University. He has worked as an analyst for the New Zealand Army, stock-market operator NZX and New Zealand Trade & Enterprise.

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