By Jesse McLaren
As the Assad regime turns to increasingly brutal methods in a desperate attempt to stay in power, the West is threatening to undermine the revolution with “no-fly zones”–while ignoring Israel’s threats to bomb Iran.
The revolution against Assad continues to spread, involving battles for control over every major city. Assad is losing control, with defections from high-ranking officials (the Prime Minister fled to Jordan) and troops refusing to fight and defecting. With his regime crumbling, Assad is resorting to increasingly brutal methods to stay in power—including sending fighter jets to bomb cities. Already 20,000 have been killed, 200,000 are refugees and Assad has threatened to use chemical weapons.
The West is arming sections of the Free Syrian Army through Saudi Arabia, and backing the right-wing leadership of the Syrian National Council—in order to try to hijack the revolution. The West has long wanted to remove Assad and impose a more compliant regime as a stepping-stone to confronting Iran.
As with Libya there is inter-imperial rivalry over Syria: France (under its new “socialist” government) is joining the US in pushing for “no-fly zones”, while Russia and China continue to support Assad. “No-fly zones” in Libya allowed NATO powers to bomb and hijack the leadership of the revolution, but the lack of forces on the ground limits their control.
The West’s hypocrisy over “no-fly zones” is revealed by the silent endorsement of Israel’s threats to bomb Iran. The US overthrew Iran’s democratic government in 1953 and installed the brutal shah, and when the Iranian revolution overthrew him the US armed Saddam Hussein to fight Iran. The 2003 Iraq War was supposed to pave the way for invading Iran, but resistance across the region has so far prevented it. So the US unleashed Israel to attack Lebanon in 2006 (during which there were no calls for “no-fly zones”) and threatens to support and Israeli attack on Iran before the US elections.
The best way to support people in the region is by stopping Western military intervention—whether it be “no-fly zones” in Syria, arming Saudi Arabia, or support for Israel.
I agree with the conclusions and much of the analysis here but I think it is not true that “the West is arming sections of the Free Syrian Army through Saudi Arabia.” This assertion plays into the idea that the war in Syria has become little more than an inter-imperialist proxy war and is thus out of the hands of ordinary Syrians. Although Canada and the US have certainly delivered large amounts of arms to the Saudi monarchy, and are going to continue to do so, the reasons for this do not necessarily have anything to do with arming sections of the FSA. They have more to do with strengthening the Saudi royal family to directly intervene in repressing the Arab Spring in their own and surrounding countries such as Bahrain and Yemen. Of course we should oppose arms sent for this purpose. However, the US and Britain have in fact made it quite clear that they are NOT in favor of arming the opposition for the reason that you cite in this article: “the lack of forces on the ground limits their control.” In addition the FSA itself is not a force that they currently trust to bring in a regime that will be friendly to US interests. Simply put there are just too many anti-western and pro-democratic elements within it, including the many brigade commanders that have signed onto the Local Coordinating Committee’s Code of Conduct for the FSA. http://www.mfs-theothernews.com/2012/08/syria-local-coordination-committees.html?spref=fb It is this that makes it legitimate to respect the repeated calls by the FSA for more arms to help them topple the Assad regime so that the fighting can end and the real work of the revolution can begin. While I certainly agree that we should oppose attempts by the US and other foreign powers to hijack the revolution I don’t agree that this equates to opposing arms shipments to the FSA from outside powers. It is possible to call for the arming of the FSA while still opposing attempts to hijack the revolution. In Libya it was the use of direct air-strikes, not arming of the militias that led to the TNC being dominated by former cronies of the Qaddafi regime. The Saudi royal family have their own interests that do not necessarily accord with those of western powers and are based on competition with other regional powers including US allies such as Turkey. The elements in Syria that the Saudis would like to arm are Islamists that are often hostile to western imperialist powers. This would not be likely to produce a new government composed of former Assad cronies. It seems unlikely that the Saudis would want Alawites to have any role in a post Assad government.
Most evidence on the ground suggests that despite the claims from Saudi Arabia, the flow of arms from outside powers continues to be greatly inadequate, even to the point that many of the FSA’s most spectacular assaults have been carried out with improvised bombs made in local workshops. They continue to fight at a terrible disadvantage with light arms mostly captured from the Syrian army (often brought by defectors) or purchased from the black market. They have on numerous occasions been forced to abandon offensives because of a shortage of even basic ammunition. Fuel and food is in very short supply. They have received very little even in the way of anti-aircraft or anti-tank weapons which they sorely need. All of this suggests that rather than encouraging the arming of the FSA the US and other western powers are in fact trying to restrict and discourage the flow of arms. It also makes little sense that the US would resort to arming the FSA indirectly when they are openly denouncing Assad’s regime on a daily basis and the majority of westerners agree with them. In fact it seems they have been quite willing to highlight what little assistance they are providing. This is not to say that there are no attempts to hijack the revolution but so far they seem to have been very limited and largely unsuccessful. To overstate western influence is to underestimate the blow that the Arab Spring has dealt to western imperialism. It appears to be based mainly on the provision of non-lethal support, especially in the form of communications equipment and some training. They are attempting to use this to engineer the emergence of a centralized command within the FSA that will ally itself with the SNC but this has so far been unsuccessful although it certainly appears to have helped to improve the coordination of the FSA and its effectiveness as a fighting force. The democratic roots of the Syrian revolution continue to exert their influence and broad sections of the opposition continue to oppose western intervention. We should stand in solidarity with them, oppose DIRECT western intervention (no fly zones, airstrikes etc) and not refuse them badly needed arms, regardless of the source. The US may not trust them with those weapons but we should.
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