{"id":18340,"date":"2013-02-22T08:32:53","date_gmt":"2013-02-22T16:32:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=18340"},"modified":"2013-02-22T09:48:32","modified_gmt":"2013-02-22T17:48:32","slug":"foreign-meddling-in-syria-prolongs-the-bloodletting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/22\/foreign-meddling-in-syria-prolongs-the-bloodletting\/","title":{"rendered":"Foreign Meddling in Syria Prolongs the Bloodletting"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As has been the case from the beginning, options for intervention in Syria go from bad to worse and the limited meddling by countries on either side is simply prolonging the conflict.<\/p>\n

Dr. Florence Gaub, a researcher at the NATO Defense College, writes<\/a> at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace that outside forces can’t end the Syrian civil war. Critically, a political settlement is implausible so long as either side believes they have the upper hand. And, thanks to foreign support, both sides are so emboldened.<\/p>\n

“A continuous supply of weapons to both sides\u2014whether from Russia, Iran or the Gulf States\u2014only maintains the parties\u2019 perception that fighting is a better option than negotiating,” Gaub writes. “This explains why, in terms of statistical probability, an external supply of weapons lengthens a civil war.”<\/p>\n

This has been known for some time. Hawks in Washington continue to advocate for direct arming of the Syrian rebels (despite ties to officially designated terrorist organizations<\/a> and documented war crimes<\/a>), clueless to the fact that the meddling already happening is precisely what has made the conflict so protracted and bloody to begin with.<\/p>\n

Kofi Annan, the former\u00a0UN and Arab League special envoy for Syria, said prior to quitting<\/a> the post\u00a0that while Russia had received a lot of criticism for continuing to back the violent President Bashar al-Assad\u2019s regime, \u201cvery few things are said about other countries that send arms and money and weigh on the situation on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSyria indeed has become an arena for outside meddling, but the meddling has been far more effective at sustaining the fighting than ending it,\u201d said a\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0last year from the International Crisis Group. \u201cBecause the mission\u2019s success was predicated on finding middle ground when most parties yearned for a knockout punch, few truly wished it well, even as no one wanted to be caught burying it.\u201d<\/p>\n

UN rights chief Navi Pillay has\u00a0condemned<\/a>\u00a0the continued flow of weapons from foreign powers to both sides in the Syrian conflict. \u201cThe ongoing provision of arms to the Syrian government and to its opponents feeds additional violence,\u201d she said in the text of remarks made to the Security Council. \u201cAny further militarization of the conflict must be avoided at all costs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beyond the proxy war that Syria has become, Gaub writes, direct military intervention “would simply make things worse,” and would not have legitimacy under international law.<\/p>\n

The White House has reportedly<\/a> rejected proposals to directly arm the rebels, a decision Obama is apparently reconsidering<\/a>. But the US and its European allies have been indirectly aiding the rebels, while their allies in the Arab Gulf states – along with the flow of Libyan arms – are providing weapons. The policies of Washington’s client states are to a large extent the responsibility of Washington, of course. Furthermore, Western support to the opposition has caused the Assad regime’s backers, cautious not to cede a geo-political win to the US, to dig in their heels.<\/p>\n

A resolution to the bloodletting is easily within reach, but for the insistence to meddle from the outside.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As has been the case from the beginning, options for intervention in Syria go from bad to worse and the limited meddling by countries on either side is simply prolonging the conflict. Dr. Florence Gaub, a researcher at the NATO Defense College, writes at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace that outside forces can’t end […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":86,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-18340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/86"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18340"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18340\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18344,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18340\/revisions\/18344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18340"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=18340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}