Syria

[Marmora Man]

Should we be optimistic that Kofi Annan's sponsored cease fire has taken a fragile hold today or take a more cynical view that President Assad will use the pause to refresh and repair his dictatorship?

I fear that there will no clear cut end to the Syrian crisis until Assad is ousted and that, even tben, the diverse and incoherent opposition is unlikely to form a stable post Assad administration and that we will see that amazing country become another "failed state" replicating the horrors of Lebanon in the 80's & 90's.

UN armed intervention is highly improbable and any other less internationally sanctioned intervention would only inflame the political / religious / terrorist divide in an unstable part of the world. It is a problem that does not lend itself to simple solutions but is, to my mind, a truly pressing and urgent issue for world leaders to address.

I have no solutions to offer beyond a hope that UN staff can enter to the country to administer and monitor the ceasefire while world leaders negotiate / impose a stand down of the Assad regime and sponsor some form of stability from which a relatively balanced, honest and stable government can emerge.

[New Nexus]

Would be helpful if Saudi?s and Israel stopped pumping weaponry to the rebels in Syria for months.

Would be helpful if the U.S. stopped training Syrian rebels in Turkey, then sending them back to Syria to put into practice what they just learnt.

Would be helpful if the U.S. closed the logistic base in Jordan that they have been running for months to aid and abet Syrian rebels.

Would be helpful if ?al-Qaeda? operative?s had not been spirited into Syria to carry out target practice.

The UN is not the answer, it is part of the same problem.

[El Pibe]

I hate to sound like aboring drone, but your proof for all these allegations?

The US has made no secret about it's demands that Assad should step down but, from what I've been reading in Washington strategists circles such as CNAS, that arming the rebels isn't a favoured approach and policy makers seem to be stuck for any solution bar ramping up the diplomatic pressure.

Israel is much happier with the Syrian devil they know, arming the rebels is that last thing they'd do.

ALl the evidence is that the rebels are largely locally organised, weapons are bought from syrian civilian donations and are getting there by and large through smuggling operations via lebanon (doubtless with the tacit approval of those not so sympathetic to hezbollah) and Turkey, possibly with the tacit approval of the Turkish gov't.

As for your sources within Al Qaeda, I'm impressed, have you considered a job in the security services?

To address MM's points, I'm pretty sure everyone is with you that this can be a stepping stone to meaningful political reform. If this fails full scale civil war seems to be the only path ahead.

Will it end up a failed state?

It's difficult to tell, but the Libyan experience certainly suggest that it is likely in the short term, and there are certainly parallels to be drawn with the organic and disparate nature of the rebellion in Syria.

And with the civil war and coup in Mali as part of the fall-out there, wider destabilisation in an already unstable area would also seem likely.

Fingers crossed that talks can produce change, or next best case scenario, that some middle ranking officer in a position to do so locks Bashar and his cronies up.

[El Pibe]

"The UN is not the answer, it is part of the same problem"

Are you suggesting the UN is conspiring to arm and train the rebels? Presumably using its fleet of black helicopters.

[El Pibe]

That said,it wouldn't surprise me if you were right about the Saudis pouring in funds/weapons as the rebellion is largely sunni and it serves their specifically sunni pan arab strategy, and will also undermine hezbollah of whom they are no fan.

Although there are reports that the US are leaning on them to hold off whilst diplomatic efforts remain (however vaguley) hopeful, and that the Saudis have been receptive tot he pressure.

What do you think Israel has to gain exactly? The Arab spring is a propoganda disaster for their claim to be the middle east's only democracy, if anything (and I don't think ther're doing this) they'd have more to gain from shoring up repressive regimes!

[New Nexus]

?The Arab spring? = CIA, NSA, Mossad and others !!! play-day event, AKA Zbigniew Brzezinski Eurasia plan.

[El Pibe]

I give up.

[Loz]

New Nexus - proudly creating unlikely conspiracy theories from any and every world event.

It's a talent. Not a terribly useful talent, but a talent nevertheless.

[El Pibe]

You know we haven't seen much of the Duke of Edinburgh lately, I reckon he's out there fomenting revolution as we speak.

There's no proof that he isn't so it's entirely plausible.

[New Nexus]

Glad to see the B. F. Skinner training has worked so well on you. Keep up the good work.

?conspiracy theories? Really, you have used that phrase so many times now, it sound like your catch phrase.

Just for fun.

[El Pibe]

Ok, taking you at face value

"?The Arab spring? = CIA, NSA, Mossad and others"

Why, on what basis, other than that's the general world view to which you attribute everything?

Don't you think that's massively insulting to the millions of brave, ordinary arabs who risked imprisonment, torture, truncheons, rubber bullets, snipers and shells to demand their right to be heard?

Do you honestly think they weren't asking for representative government and a freer society, they were just being manuipulated by a bunch of spies?

Also can you enlighten us how they achieved this? Were the spies posing as police when they beat Bouazizi? Did they then brainwash him into setting fire to himself? Were then hundreds of thousands of spies on twitter organising protests?

Or did these people actually do this because they saw that Arabs could have a voice and they wanted the same?

Back to Occam's razor, which on the balance of possiibilities is the more likely?

[El Pibe]

Plus I read your "Zbigniew Brzezinski Eurasia plan".

It's not exaclty geopolitical rocket science is it.

It boils down to "Lets be pals with the Europeans, lets try to be friendly with the Ruskies and hopefully everything else will fall into place"

It's incorrect in its assumption that the US has no global challengers within a generation and it's focus on Europe is outdated, it needs to focus on the pacific rim and south asia.

US policy is indeed pacificizing and Europe will have to pay for it's own defence in future.

Seems to me you're setting rather too much store by this, not especially nefarious, plan.

[New Nexus]

http://aliveandbitchin.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/sas-arrested-in-basra-false-flag.jpg

If you know the picture you know the story, just one of thousands played out in the ?Arab spring?

Sorry, do your own homework.

[El Pibe]

Ooh, is that a picture of some bruised squaddies. My god, that's irrefutable evidence that the arab spring is in no way a casused by demographics and mans yearning for freedom of expression that actuall;y caught everyone on the hop, but actually a long planned and nefarious plot by unprecendented cooperation between the security services of a number of unspecified countries.

I hate to get personal, but I think you might be an idiot.

[New Nexus]

Clearly you have not read Brzezinski, your depiction or synopsis of his works is way off target.

The premise of his work was and is, if we cannot have it we will make sure no one else can have it.

The U.S. has no intension of sharing power, it has taken them to long to bankrupt the world to now share the plunder.

[New Nexus]

El Pibe Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Ooh, is that a picture of some bruised squaddies.

> My god, that's irrefutable evidence that the arab

> spring is in no way a casused by demographics and

> mans yearning for freedom of expression that

> actuall;y caught everyone on the hop, but actually

> a long planned and nefarious plot by

> unprecendented cooperation between the security

> services of a number of unspecified countries.

>

> I hate to get personal, but I think you might be

> an idiot.

And there it is, your naivety.

The picture is of UK SAS, Iraq 2005. There?s your starter for 10

[El Pibe]

I'm guessing you think a deal was done with the Mehdi Army to secure their release.

That deal involved spreading democracy across the Arab world.

You are Dirk Gently and I claim my five pounds.

**eta

1. 2005 was a 6 years before the arab spring, I've no idea why you are connecting the two

2. I see from another idiot that apparently this is evidence that the Iraqi civil war was actually the end in itself and created by the sas and others planting bombs and shooting civilians.

This is so ludicrous on so many levels I actually have lost the will to ask you why, but just out of curiosity i want

a) evidence, not another link to a website with yet more speculation or tendencious opinion dressed as fact and cirular references to other loons on the internet

b) A motive. Why are the CIA, Mossad the SAS and others (FSB? Peruvain internal security?) fomenting civil war in Iraq when it seems to have achieved nothing and runs counter to the policies of their civilian governements?

Whilst you're at it do you believe in any or all the below?

The US government conspired to let 9/11 happen

THe US government conspired to do 9/11.

The US government is powerless, the real world secret goveernment did it.

The protocols of the elders of Zion.

The UN as secret world government.

The priory of Sion as secret government.

The Templars as secret world government.

The Rosicrucians are the real power behind our puppet civilian governments.

Roswell and Area 51.

[El Pibe]

I guess I was as cynical about the ceasefire as most of us, but fingers crossed that there are very fragile signs that there may be reasons for optimism.

The regime must surely realise now that all the violence has served is to entrench and widen opposition to it given the fresh wave of protest.

Given that it understands that brutal suppression has failed it must surely conclude that there are two options open.

1)Entrench with far more brutality and crush opposition once and for all

2)Move towards democracy, a path that will likely eventually result in a trip to a court of some description unless a clean slate and or immunity deal is done as seen in other conflict zones (N Ireland, Guatemala, even Spain post Franco)

Sadly 1 could be the more likely option and will surely result in full scale civil war.

The reason I'm optimistic is that a largely conscript Sunni army has been kept in barracks away from the murder of civilians for rather obvious reasons, and from what I've read there are only a couple of loyal divisions that can be depended upon, and these have been stretched to their limits already, meaning a wider more brutal suppression is actually beyond the regime's ability, and hopefully they know this.

If (and that's all a very big speculative if) this is a given, then negotiation is surely the only realistic option available, and with a bit of luck the Assad's are buttering up what few allies they still have for a nice retirement dacha on the Black Sea somewhere!

[New Nexus]

Russian commando?s deployed to Syria March and April.

Russia Is Massing troops On Iran?s northern border.

That should slow things down for a nanosecond.

Watch out Georgia.

[El Pibe]

I don't get it, you wont buy the reports and accounts of journalists who actually travel to the area and research by talking to people on the ground, but you're willing to swallow crap like this wholesale from some embittered loon sitting on and talking out of his his arse in Boston.

http://israelmatzav.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/russia-massing-troops-on-irans-northern.html

As for ludicrously poorly reasoned and speculative toss like this http://www.williambowles.info/ini/ini-0365.html, seriously?!?!

[El Pibe]

Two interesting articles from Foreign Policy Magazine, one about how how facebook is being used, the other worrying about how internationalising the conflict is taking the initiative away from the Syrians seeking reform.

Both suggest very cautiously that the soul of the revolution may yet be one of peaceful resistance.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/04/18/any_given_friday?page=full

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/04/17/who_broke_syria?page=full

[El Pibe]

Execellent analysis of the situation in Bahrain suggest that regime intransigence is radicalising the opposition, spiralling violence looks inevitable if there is no political settlement.

[Huguenot]

Yup yup, absolutely right.

As a Brit I sometimes live in an ivory tower when doing business, but it was pretty difficult to ignore the obvious divisions twixt the people in the room and the guys outside.

However, these are not bright and generous communities. The replacement of Sunni leadership with Shia 'democracy' is a fake ideal.

I don't want to characterise furryners as unenlightened, but there is no realistic chance of democracy when most decisions are likely to be made by an uneducated, tribal, and intellectually stunted gerontocracy, and their decisions are likely to be enforced by young male teenagers for whom spelling tests are so embarrassing to make them want to kill teacher.

[El Pibe]

You sound like a victorian gerontocrat justifying why universal suffrage shouldnt be introduced ;)

I think the point of the article is that the desire for democracy is neither islamist nor sectarian.

ALl the naysayers and poopooers have been dissappointed by the lack of hand-chopping and burqas in TUnisia for instance. Indeed Libya may have deep problems to overcome, but thus far an islamist year one fundamentalist rule aint one of them.

But in Bahrain, and indeed Syria, the attempts to sectarianise the struggle as a means to divide and conquer may well be shoring up their minority power bases (sunni and alawite respectively) but is backfiring by causing the opposition to sectarianise and become more hardline, and likely less forgiving come the revolution.

here was a nice background piece on it Syria.

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/137407/leon-goldsmith/alawites-for-assad?cid=rss-rss_xml-alawites_for_assad-000000

[Huguenot]

Sure sure, I geddit.

I'm just observing that as with Birmingham postal voting, the outcome of 'democracy' is unlikely to be everybody's vote counting, it's likely to be the fierce enforcement of the prejudices of angry old men projecting their daft allegiances through the ballot box.

You'll need three generations to see liberal suffrage, and even then it's not a guarantee.

As you will no doubt remind me, that's no excuse for not embarking on that particular ship ;-)