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In March 2011 tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in Syria. The protestors were demanding political reforms, dissatisfied with the cruel and authoritarian regime of Bashar al-Assad, who has been in power for more than ten years, succeeding his father after a 30-year rule. The government responded by opening fire. Within a few months, a peaceful uprising grew into a full-scale civil war, which has lasted for more than two years and is unlikely to end soon. This August, the death toll in Syria has reached 100,000. More than a quarter of the 22 million population has been displaced, hundreds of thousands of refugees have left the country.
The United States has been supporting the opposition, supplying it with food and medical aid, but refraining from military intervention and from providing the rebels with weapons. The Obama administration claimed that the US would not intervene unless it had strong evidence of chemical weapons used by the Assad regime. In June 2013, Washington concluded that chemical weapons, including nerve agent sarin, classified by The United Nations as a weapon of mass destruction, had been used. The White House announced for the first time in June that it was going to send weapons to the opposition. Congress vetoed this resolution.
There are many reasons why the US should refrain from providing the opposition with weapons. Over the two years of military confrontation, the situation on the ground has become increasingly chaotic. It is important to understand that there is no united opposition capable of overthrowing / toppling Assad’s regime. Instead, there are different military groups, using terrorist methods against the government forces, as well as against each other. The most prominent of them, the Free Syrian Army, is not strong enough to defeat Assad’s forces. Even if the US provides the FSA with light weapons, this opposition group is outnumbered by hundreds of thousands against Assad’s army. Even according to the most exaggerated estimates, the size of the FSA does not exceed 20,000 soldiers, while Assad’s army counts as many as 400,000, equipped with heavy and sophisticated weapons.
Due to the uprising, different extremist military groups have been able to cross the border and enter Syria. One of the leading armed groups, Al-Nusra Front, an affiliate of the world’s largest terrorist organizations Al-Qaeda, has been included by the US in the international terrorism blacklist. It is important to note that these rebels have many supply channels, making it impossible for the US to control which group will be receiving the weapons, creating the risk of the US arms being used by terrorists against America or its allies in the region.
Moreover, after two years of fighting against the regime, the opposition forces have started to turn guns on each other, fighting for power and territory. This significantly undermines their ability to form a united government, decreasing the probability of a strong alternative force. Providing military groups with weapons will only escalade the violence, lead to more massacre and destruction.
More importantly, even if the Assad’s regime is overthrown, the opposition is unlikely to succeed in forming a stable and functional democratic government. Admittedly, Bashar Assad has made immense mistakes since the beginning of the war. Human rights have been viciously violated, tens of thousands of people, including civilians, have been killed. But it appears that there is no better alternative at the moment than Assad remaining in power. Once the regime is overthrown, the power vacuum is inevitable. Removing Mr. Assad is just a tiny part of a long and troublesome process. If history is any guide, overthrowing a dictatorship is just the very first step. Ouster of Muammar Quaddafi in Libya was supposed to bring democracy and stability. Instead, the country is more destabilized than ever. Two years after the revolution, a significant part of Libya remains under the control of the militias, the armed groups who did not cease power even after the parliamentary elections and continue to use force against the government.
The situation is even worse in Iraq, where Al-Qaeda has been expanding its power again. The past four months have been among the bloodiest since 2008, with death toll reaching 3,000. The Al-Qaeda affiliate, The Islamic State of Iraq, started conducting terrorist attacks, not only against the government forces and Shia mosques, but also the civilians, further destabilizing the week government. The Islamic State of Iraq has become one of the most prominent military groups fighting in Syria. The terrorist groups are trying to destabilize and debase Syria, which would give them an opportunity to create there a platform to plan international terrorist attacks. If the opposition forces gain control of the country, this scenario is almost inevitable. Subsequently, the conflict in Syria is dramatically impacting its neighboring countries. More than a million of refugees from Syria have fled to Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Iraq.
Some critics, looking at the turmoil in Syria, Egypt, Lybia, claim that the warm Arab spring has turned into a cold winter. Tunisia, for example, the first of the Arab countries to overthrow their dictatorship, is on the edge of another civil war after two political assassinations. It might take years until the situation in Syria stabilizes, decades until the country turns into a genuine and a true democracy. If Americans are to learn from their mistakes in Iraq and Libya, military intervention is off the table. To stop Syria’s turmoil, the United States needs a new strategy aimed at pressuring both sides into negotiating. Syrian conflict cannot be resolved by military methods. The only way to end the war is through political dialogue. Providing the rebels with weapons would only aggravate the situation and lead to more deaths and casualties.