James F. Jeffrey
AWashington Post piece by Ishaan Tharoor on June 30, “The Battle In Syria That Looms Behind Wagner’s Rebellion,” on the Wagner Group’s role as an armed tool of Kremlin foreign policy in Syria and its 2018 attack on American forces, raises attention to the new “great game” being played in Syria.
This involves five outside military forces — the U.S., Russia, Israel, Turkey and Iran — and campaigns within campaigns. Those include the still simmering civil war between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and much of his population; the conflict between most everyone and Islamic State (IS) remnants; Turkey’s struggle against the PKK terrorist organization’s Syrian Kurdish offshoot, the YPG (renamed the “Syrian Democratic Forces” or SDF to downplay PKK ties); and Israel’s air campaign against Iran’s Syrian missile deployments. The SDF is also America’s partner against the IS.
But the most strategic conflict is between the U.S. and Russia, a conflict that is heating up. Central Command's (CENTCOM) commander, Gen. Michael Kurilla, recently told Congress that Russian President Vladimir Putin “views [Syria] as a base from which to project power and influence throughout the region and into Europe and Africa.” And the U.S. has just announced deployment of F-22 stealth fighters to combat Russia’s aggressive behavior, described by Kurilla as a spike in “unprofessional Russian behavior in Syria,” including flights by armed Russian aircraft over U.S. bases there.
Russia has had a decades-long military alliance with Syria, and from the onset of the Syrian internal conflict in 2011, has supported the Assad regime against much of the Syrian citizenry backed by the U.S., Turkey and many Arab states. Russia’s goals were initially defensive, preserving a security relationship and basing rights, and its assistance to Assad was indirect, mainly weapons transfers, diplomatic backing in the United Nations Security Council, and a deal with Washington supposedly to eliminate Syrian government chemical weapons and forestall U.S. air strikes in 2013. But in 2015, Russian air units, military advisers and some ground troops, as well as Wagner, joined Iran in intervening directly in the fighting, reversing the opposition’s battlefield gains and securing Assad’s control over a rump Syrian state.
The U.S. role in Syria has been more complex and confused over the past three administrations. As noted, the U.S. initially provided arms and other support to the Syrian opposition, but that effort was not well-coordinated with other outside supporters, and President Obama’s enthusiasm for Assad’s potential overthrow was modest at best. Later, the Obama administration focused on the humanitarian crisis that has seen half of Syria’s 24 million population flee either as refugees (over 5 million) or internally displaced persons (almost 7 million more), combating the IS as an al Qaeda offshoot controlling, by late 2014, much of Syria and western Iraq, dealing with Assad’s chemical weapons use, and seeking with Russia a comprehensive, compromise political solution to all Syria’s woes.
To that end, then-Secretary of State John Kerry in 2015 pushed through, with Russian support, U.N. Resolution 2254. But neither Moscow nor Damascus subsequently adhered to the resolution, perpetuating the underlying conflict, which fuels the many sub-conflicts described above.
The Trump administration initially devoted little attention to Syria, which President Trump once described as “blood-stained sand,” beyond pursuing military operations against IS with the goal, once it was largely defeated, of withdrawing U.S. troops. Circumstances changed, however, in 2018. The Wagner attack on U.S. forces, Assad’s continued use of chemical weapons despite the U.S.-Russia agreement, Turkey’s military incursions into northwest Syria to secure its border against various hostile forces, and Israeli air escalation against growing Iranian missile deliveries, all brought Syria to a boil. The U.S. defeated the Wagner attack, launched airstrikes to halt Assad’s chemical weapons attacks, supported Israel’s and Turkey’s military activities, and reinforced a U.S.-held enclave along the Syrian-Jordanian border — Tanf — blocking transit from Tehran to Damascus.
This resulted, by late 2018, in a halt of major ground actions, a de facto ceasefire that has held with several minor violations until now. And that ceasefire enabled the Trump administration to advance Syria talks with Russia, begun by Kerry. But, despite a meeting between then-Secretary Mike Pompeo and Putin in 2019, Russia was unwilling to accept a compromise solution that Moscow felt might undercut both Assad and Russia’s ally in Syria, Iran.
The Biden administration initially downplayed Syria, breaking off those high-level talks with the Russians and prioritizing, as had the Obama administration, the fight against IS remnants and humanitarian relief. The reality of Syria and the Ukraine war, however, have produced a slow shift in Washington toward a more serious Syria policy, now focused more on great-power competition, as seen by the recent F-22 deployments and Kurilla’s statement. Washington thus has repeatedly, privately and publicly, said that it will keep its troops in Syria, and has pushed back against Arab states’ recent rapprochement with the Assad regime.
While this new awareness of the Syria stakes has at least stemmed Russian, Iranian and Assad’s advances, it does not amount to an integrated, high-level policy approach that would coordinate better with Israel, Turkey, those armed Syrian elements opposing Assad, and the broader international community. All have various stakes in Syria but remain leaderless. What is needed is understanding — not just by CENTCOM but also by the White House — that strategic competition with Russia is broader than Ukraine and includes Syria.
Syria is where Moscow for the first time intervened militarily and deployed conventional and Wagner forces for strategic gain beyond pro-Russian territories in northeast Georgia and Eastern Ukraine. Until Russia’s larger ambitions there are checked, the risk of Moscow advancing further in the region remains high.
Amb. James F. Jeffrey joined the Wilson Center in December 2020 as chair of the Middle East Program. He served as the Secretary’s Special Representative for Syria Engagement and the Special Envoy to the Global Coalition To Defeat ISIS until Nov. 8, 2020.
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