By Jared Ferris and Theodore Bell with Jennifer Cafarella
The armed forces of the Assad regime have established the use of chemical weapons (CWs) as a tactic to force localized disruptions of rebel operations. Regime forces have on a number of occasions used this tactic in order to setthe conditions for success for ground offensives against critical rebel holdout positions. Similar to the use of the Syrian Arab Air Force to project force into areas where the regime cannot deploy ground troops, the utilization of chemical weapons serves to offset the regime’s manpower shortage and enable offensive operations otherwise unlikely to achieve success. Their use is therefore often a crucial indicator of the weakness of regime forces in a given area, or alternatively a positive indicator of the ability of rebel groups to meaningfully challenge the regime in certain sectors. As such, recent allegations of CW use by the Assad regime shed important light on the status of the regime’s military campaign in Syria and highlight the continued importance of the regime’s use of unconventional tactics in achieving and holding terrain.
The Syrian regime agreed to surrender its stock of chemical weapons in order to forestall an international intervention in the aftermath of the August 2013 sarin gas attack on the rebel-held Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta. According to the terms of the agreement, the U.S. and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) embarked on a multilateral effort to destroy the regime’s CW stockpile. On August 19, 2014 the OPCW announced that all 600 tons of regime “Category 1” CWs, including 581 tons of sarin gas precursor and 19.8 tons of sulfur mustard gas, had been successfully destroyed, and on September 30, the OPCW-UN joint mission announced the completion of its mandate. However, subsequent allegations of the deployment of chlorine gas against rebel-held areas indicated that Assad had not relinquished the tactic itself. Assad was not required to declare his possession of chlorine given its ordinary use as an industrial agent, although the weaponization of chlorine is nonetheless a violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention, which entered into force in Syria in October of 2013.
A fact-finding mission announced by the OPCW in April 2014 to investigate alleged regime use of chlorine gas voiced concern that the Syrian regime may not have handed over all CWs. In May, Human Rights Watch released a report on an alleged chlorine gas attack on three towns in Hama Province, concluding that there was “strong evidence” the chemical agent had been used by regime forces. The deployment of chlorine gas as a CW appears to have been conducted through the use of barrel bombs embedded with cylinders of the gas. Responding to continuing allegations, on September 10 the OPCW reported it had found “compelling confirmation” that the regime deployed chlorine gas “systematically and repeatedly” in northern Syria in early 2014. Since the OPCW declared the complete neutralization of the regime’s surrendered CW stockpile on August 19, 2014, local sources have alleged a minimum of 16 chlorine gas attacks conducted by the regime, largely against rebels entrenched in the Damascus suburbs. In the Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta, where rebel forces are largely commanded by the Jaysh al-Islam-led Islamic Front, local sources report that the regime has recently deployed chlorine gas prior to successful ground assaults on Adra, Dukhanniya, Jobar, and Irbeen. This tactic has permitted the regime to regain control over territory from the Islamic Front in Eastern Ghouta, most recently over parts of Adra on September 27 and over Dukhaniyya on September 28. In addition, the regime has allegedly deployed chlorine gas against a number of other rebel positions in Dera’a, Hama, and Deir ez-Zour provinces, areas in which regime offensives had been achieving little success.
In most cases, alleged CW strikes in Syria throughout 2014 have occurred in locations inaccessible to OPCW or Human Rights Watch investigators. Therefore, it is impossible to verify the accuracy of the allegations according to the standards utilized by these organizations. However, in the cases detailed here, evidence provided by local activist reporting regarding the occurrence of a strike is assessed with high confidence. In all cases, reports are drawn from sources on the ground assessed to have a high level of fidelity in their reporting, and are further crosschecked across sources. In addition, video evidence serves as a primary method through which to verify the symptomatic indicators of a likely CW strike, often involving the testimony of local physicians.
Where possible, alleged regime CW attacks are also evaluated against previous OPCW findings. Reported CW attacks near Hama, for example, follow a geographical pattern previously established by the OPCW. Reported regime CW usage between August and October furthermore follows a behavior pattern characterized by systematic and repeated CW usage. Given the dovetailing of local reporting with OPCW findings, we can therefore assess CW attacks reported between August and October with reasonable confidence.
Following the UN resolution mandating the destruction of the regime’s CWs, continued use of chlorine gas as a weaponized agent is a serious breach of international law and a violation of international attempts to prevent their use. If the reports listed here are confirmed, then use of CWs by the Assad regime appears to comprise a nearly routine element of regime military tactics to clear entrenched rebel positions. Combined with the utilization of siege-and-starvetactics in order to force the submission of rebel holdouts, the utilization of CWs is further evidence of the extent to which the regime is willing to utilize any means necessary in order to maintain control when faced with a meaningful challenge by rebel forces.
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