ungifted said:
John it's really a kind of monologue I think.
You are casting a western point of view, I can voice "the opinion of Russia".
Welcome... my POV is western by definition and practice.
First question is Syria a sovereign state?
Yes, while Assad's government has been challenged from the inside by a civil war that up until fairly recently he was losing. Russia and Iran stepped in when it looked like the Assad government would fall (for different self interest reasons). .
Are rebels homogeneous mass, or scattered groups with their own interests?
These days they are looking more diffuse and scattered as Assad forces are retaking territory with Russian support. Humanitarian support has only recently started reaching the region and still not in Aleppo where hospital was bombed after the cease fire announcement (AFAIK).
As I mentioned before as these anti-Assad opposition forces lose more territory and resources, they will likely turn to asymmetrical warfare which will be indistinguishable from terrorism, and further erode any western support.
Do they have a leader who can replace Assad?
Kind of academic at this point. BTW Assad was blamed for being behind the car bombing of a popular moderate politician in Lebanon several years ago. Unlikely he would be any less viscous with internal Syrian politics.
So who are terrorists and who are rebels in Syria? We support good "rebels" and hate "bad" Assad and his troops, or ...?
Yup one the several difficulties in Syria. Assad has been out of favor with the west so a number of countries have been supporting his opposition, hoping for a western friendly regime change. Kind of wishful thinking now especially in light of recent events. The difference between rebels and terrorists often depends on which side you are rooting for.
Here (in Russia) we see news showing the successes of the army of Syria (BTW the legitimate army of people who gave oath of office) and rebels groups who come to regular troops side and fight against ISIL, and Turkey striking at the territory of a neighboring sovereign state. Assad troops will be at the border with Turkey soon and will close one of ISIL support source.
Do you have access to any external news sources (BBC, Deutsch Welle, etc?) Russian media is tightly controlled by Putin.
As I mentioned Turkey seems more concerned about Kurds gaining territory than ISIL and Turkey has some history with Russia. Russia seems more concerned about propping up Assad. While they all dislike ISIL too, at the moment ISIL provides a convenient excuse for lots of ballistic military activity in the region.
Why speculate opinions about what Russia is bombing civilian targets? BTW we've seen movies showing US soldiers shooting civilians in Afghanistan. It's war, where people fear and kill because of fear.
Afghanistan is a weak state, that will require support for the indefinite future. Afghanistan would be even worse off now if Obama continued the rapid troop draw down as fast as he first announced. Apparently the west didn't learn anything from Russia's experience in Afghanistan or we would have never tried the surge-lite. Maybe Obama learned something from his too rapid withdrawal from Iraq that allowed ISIL to gain power from the not yet strong enough Iraqi government .
? I don't think it's a secret that Russia supports Assad. Back in June there were rumors that Assad regime airstrikes in Aleppo were done to support ISIL taking over the city from rebels. More recently Syrian army coordinated with Russians are pushing out ISIL (killed 70 of them in last week or so).
Curiously the Russian defense minister said that US aircraft (A10s) bombed the Aleppo hospitals...
Turkey shelled a Kurdish held air strip in northern Syria.
And refugees. Now I see, refugees in Europe are because the russians are bombing in Syria, right? What was the coalition forces doing all this time I cannot understand. Fought with Assad, the legitimate head of Syria?
The refugees leaving Syria are fearing for their personal safety, while now old news Assad used poison gas on his own citizens. The regime attacks against the Syrian opposition are not very discriminate so many innocent citizens get hurt.
PS: As I've said it's a kind of "russian opinion" we can see in mass media. Obvious, It looks like everyone is pursuing their own different agendas. But there are questions...
Yup, more questions than answers. It is reality that everybody operates in their own self interest.
Turkey doesn't want a strong Kurdish region on their border. They have internal problems with Turkish kurds.
Russia wants Assad to remain in power so the Russian navy will keep access to the naval port in Syria. Russia doesn't want an Isil caliphate to succeed as that could incite muslim citizens at home.
Iran likes Assad because he was a useful puppet to help carry out their mischief in the region.
It is hard to tell what the west actually wants... The west wants ISIL defeated but wants other people to do the heavy lifting.
Assad was a bad actor in the region, but unclear that his successor would be an obvious improvement. Assad is probably less bad than letting ISIL take over Syria. Any replacement for Assad would not be Assad. Look at Libya after a couple years without a real coalition government. If anything preventing ISIL from gaining territory in Libya may unify them together against that common enemy.
The middle east is a mess... The US is more consumed by election year politics and people running for office offer hyperbolic over the top "too easy" sound bites when asked about the ME . I won't hold my breath for thoughtful discussion or a coherent plan from the US any time soon. US candidates are too busy slinging mud at each other when not arguing with the pope.
JR
PS: of course maybe I'm wrong...