Journal courier
Russia’s leader, Vladimir Putin, displayed anguish over the breakup of the Soviet Union. Now he hopes he can get back under his government’s control as many of the countries of the Middle East.
Several member states of the European Union are relying on gas from Russia and are therefore anxious to appease Russia.
It is not yet clear which course U.S. President Donald Trump will take. He tapped Rex Tillerson as Russia’s secretary of state, whose attitude with regard to Syria is not clear. From Putin’s perspective, it is not clear if he may prop up Syrian President Bashar al Assad and why Russia’s president is no longer calling for the dictator in Damascus to go.
Assad’s armed forces are comparatively weak, his soldiers are tired and are staring in the face of defeat. Experts predicted that Assad’s days in power are numbered. His opponents were holding almost all of the cards to forge a political settlement. Russia capitalized on a vacuum created by President Barack Obama’s lack of commitment to bring in the big guns, thus altering the situation in Assad’s favor.
Today, Russia’s bombs and heavily armed ground forces, including Hezbollah fighters, Iranian revolutionary guards and as many as 64 Shiite militias, control all major Syrian cities as well as most of the areas along the coast. Syrian propaganda outlets are circulating videos showing the residents of Aleppo out in force holding up posters of Bashar al Assad and — somewhat incongruously — Hezbollah flags.
When hundreds of bodies remain lying in the streets of eastern Aleppo where the fighters fell, untold numbers remain under the debris of their homes while refugees are dying from the cold weather, celebrations akin to dancing on graves. As the United States ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, rightly said, “Humanity is in the process of a complete meltdown.”
While she may be right, her own country, the United States, cannot absolved of responsibility, either.
The “meltdown” began with the invasion of Iraq on false pretenses, the destruction of Libya and Obama’s lackadaisical response to the slaughter of Syrian civilians that have severely undermined the United States’ credibility as a positive force. If Trump truly wanted to make the United States of America “great again,” he should have found a way to reconstitute the United States’ traditional pre-George W. Bush global caretaker role instead of it being usurped by Russia.
This argument is not advocating a military confrontation between the West and Russia, which could, in the worst case scenario, lead to nuclear war. There are, however, other methods to deter Putin from continuing his belligerent policies and his suspect alliances with rogue states and terrorist entities. Russia may have weathered United States and European Union sanctions to some extent, but its economy remains fragile — still fighting its way out of recession — although Trump’s embrace of Russia will ultimately be imperiled when its coffers will be swelled so that it can further strengthen Russia’s military intervention in Syria and elsewhere.
There are predictions that Trump’s and Putin’s mega-egos are likely to clash sooner or later. Countries that count themselves members of the civilized world can no longer tolerate Russia and its partners engaged in Syrian massacres, jointly with Iran, Hezbollah, Iraqi Shiites and others, while enjoying immunity due to being shielded by Russia’s veto power in the United Nations.
Given these circumstances, all diplomatic, economic and trade ties with Russia and its allies in Syria should be cut. Gulf Cooperation Council member states are in danger of Syria’s falling into Iran’s sphere of influence, as Iraq and Lebanon have, and are threatened by Shiite militias schooled in asymmetrical warfare close to their borders.
Lastly, the United States needs to be unstinting with its support of the Free Syrian Army and other moderate opposition fighting groups that have vowed never to give up until their country is finally free.