Part of the problem is to work out who is fighting for what.
Add to this who is supporting whom and also for what reason and the question really is impossible to answer.
There is a risk of much more widespread ethnic warfare, and this might even suit certain amongst the supporting non-protagonists.
Trying to imagine a democracy amongst all this is probably just a distant dream, possibly the best that can be hoped for is a non-partisan government that is able to provide stability and security without singling out any part of Syrian society for revenge treatment.
People think planes and tanks win wars and they don’t. It takes people to operate them and supplies to keep them going. When war is distilled down to this level it requires logistical support.
Public support is unnecessary for dictators. Force is what matters, and a lot of force can come from outside the country. The Assad regime has always been a Russian puppet.
Not to mention that the Alawite minority in Syria also has support from the Palestinians and Shiite Lebanese, many of whom are entering the country to fight for Assad.
That depends what you want Syria’s future to be like. If you want Syria to retain civilisation and development then you should want Assad to win. If you want Syria to end up like Libya, Iraq and Afghnaistan then you should support the cannibals. Assad runs a country based on the values of ex Egyptian president Nasser. While the death squads backed by NATO and the Gulf monarchies would like to set up a theocracy based on backward tribal hatreds. One of their mottos is “Christians to the sea, Shiites to the grave”.
If I say I want Labour to win the next UK general election, I don’t mean I hope they’ll seize power even if 75% of the country votes Conservative. I mean I hope people will see the same virtues I do in such a choice. Besides this, in the case of a war, popular support for one fighting side is not the same as democracy.
I recall Kissinger once saying about the then Iran Iraq war, both countries ruled by unsavoury regimes, that it was a pity that both sides didn’t lose.
Nobody voted the West, World Policeman, so we should stay out of it altogether.
This. No matter what we do somebody is going to shit all over us over it and maybe even retaliate. I don’t see a clear winner or friend in this endeavor regardless of the outcome. All we got out of Libya is the smug satisfaction of killing one person to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars and the deaths of US diplomats and soldiers guarding them which nobody in the US seems to give even the tiniest concern over.
Well, I do want Syria to end up like Libya – some things are bad there, but the country is not on a bad course at all, all things considered. But I ain’t that optimistic that Syria can end this war that way.
I don’t even think it matters. Europe responded to the Israeli-Arab conflict with arms embargoes and a fairly neutral policy, and were rewarded by widespread Palestinian terrorism. And I don’t know what the hell Argentina has to do with the Israeli-Arab conflict, but Hezbollah thought it would be cool to blow shit up there.
I mean, these guys actually went to the trouble of infiltrating a Hezbollah operative into Argentina of all places to blow up a van full of explosives at a Jewish community center. There’s still a plaque honoring him in Lebanon.
More in the nature of no news is good news. Haven’t heard about any pogroms. No ethnic cleansing since they did some taking-it-out on blacks right after the war. They’re still having trouble with the militias that haven’t disbanded, which occasionally clash with each other, but nobody expects them to try to overthrow new government, which is a government, and rather moderate. Only one party in the General National Congress, the Justice and Construction Party, is Islamist (MB affiliate), and it only holds 17 seats out of 200. There is some secessionism in Benghazi but it’s not heating up, there’s not even that much support for a federal system. No woman who didn’t wear a burqa before the revolution is being forced to now, that I’ve heard of. No strongman shows any sign of emerging as the new dictator.
All in all, not a bad track record, so far, for a people with absolutely no experience in democratic self-government in their history later than the ancient Greek colonies, and who were allowed to have absolutely no public political discussion outside official settings for 42 years.
But, as I’ve said, I have slender hopes things can turn out that well in Syria. Libya is ethnically and religiously homogeneous by comparison.
Anyone who is supported by Iran should not win. Iran is the ‘crazy guy,’ in the Middle East that most of the other countries see as unstable and problematic. Also, Assad was a vicious, evil dictator.
Yes after British Special forces gave them the freedom to do whatever they liked, they smashed up, vandalised, and spray painted anti British slogans, at a British Army war Cemetary from WW2.
Rune, I don’t get your reasoning there. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have their problems, but their governments are entirely rational. Iran, on the other hand, not only supports worldwide terrorism, but actively aids attacks on countries that have nothing to do with their disputes, just to get at Jews. Again, I bring up Argentina. Iran went through a lot of trouble to attack Argentina, and that’s really what it was: a military attack by Iran against Argentina.
Beyond that, if you think think the Iranians or the Iranian government hates Jews more than the Saudis or the Pakistanis, well then you really don’t know much about the Middle East.
Iran is certainly extremely anti-Semitic, but with the exception of Israel, it’s the only Middle Eastern country which still has a sizable Jewish population and the only country other than Israel that has Jews in it’s parliament(though obviously as tokens).
I won’t pretend to understand Pakistan enough to comment on it, but I have no problem saying that the Iranian government, for all it’s flaws, is less odious than the Saudi government, just as I would say I’d rather be punched in the face than kicked in the nuts.
Speaking for myself, while I consider Iran to be a greater threat to my country, currently, I have much more respect for the Iranians than I have for the Saudis and other Gulf nations.