Why Assad is scaling down military readiness across Syria

 

 'The Syrian régime's decision to reduce the readiness of its army and armed forces has raised a panoply of questions related to the motivation and timing behind the decision on the military and economic conditions in Syria and raised the question as to whether the régime is seeking to convey specific messages to parties influencing Syrian affairs.

 On Jan. 10, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad issued a circular ordering a rollback of army mobilization to regular level, meaning the level maintained nine years ago before the start of the conflict.

 According to the Enab Baladi opposition website, the decision stipulated “scaling down the combat readiness of the Syrian military departments by the order of 66% to 33% for administrative departments, 80% to 50% for military units affiliated thereto and 100% to 80% for ground forces and the navy. In hospitals, however, readiness was maintained at 80%.”

 Mohammed Adeeb, a political science researcher who lives in the countryside of Aleppo, said, “To maintain the same level of combat readiness, the régime requires a continued flow of support and funding. The régime has been garnering support from Iran ever since it joined its ally, the Assad régime, in the war against the Syrian revolution. However, it seems that Iranian funding for the régime’s army has stopped due to the economic conditions and international sanctions imposed on the Iranian régime.”

 Adeeb said the régime, through its decision to reduce the combat readiness of its forces, "is seeking to calm the anger of its Syrian supporters who started to long for their sons recruited in the army. The decision has been seemingly taken to allow soldiers and officers to visit their families.”



 Ahmad Hasan Abdel Qader, a political activist based in the countryside of Aleppo, said, “The decision to reduce the readiness of the régime army was [seemingly] based on a Russian order, as Russia wants to convey a message to the influential countries in Syrian affairs that the war has ended. Also, the régime is preparing itself for the upcoming phase, and the decision comes in the framework of Russian efforts to entrench Assad's rule and preserve his régime.”

 Hisham Eskif, deputy head of the political bureau of the opposition Al-Salam Brigade, said, “The direct reason behind the Syrian régime’s decision to scale down the readiness of its forces is its inability to bear the high costs that the permanent state of alert requires due to the deteriorating economic situation in Syria. Consequently, we might witness a rollback in the financial allocations to the army, meaning a reduction in food, fuel and other daily expenses.”

 The brigade is affiliated with the Free Syrian Army (FSA). Eskif said, “The decision will not have a noticeable effect on the Idlib fronts in northwestern Syria, for example, because it does not apply to the militias supported by Russia nor the militias supported by Iran, and we have thus far not monitored any significant changes in the military situation of the régime forces in Idlib and its surroundings.”

 Abdulslam Abdulrzak, a researcher in military affairs living in Idlib, said, “The decision to scale down the readiness of the régime’s army is a pro-forma decision that will remain ineffective. It is merely intended to convey messages to the allied forces, primarily Iran, in order for them to resume their financial and military support for the régime’s army in the fight against the Islamic State [IS] in the Syrian desert, which is a vital land route for the Iranian forces and their affiliated militias to reach their areas of influence. The timing of the decision was not coincidental but coincided with the battles taking place in the desert. It is as if Assad wants to tell the Iranians, ‘If you want us to seriously participate in fighting IS in the desert, then you should continue to support us.’”

 Abdulrzak said, “The readiness of the régime’s army will not be affected by the de-escalation, as it can mobilize its forces in record time in case there is a need to involve the forces in a battle against the FSA or the Syrian Democratic Forces [SDF].”

 Younes al-Karim, an economic researcher and analyst who lives in France, said, “The decision that Assad made to scale down the readiness of his army seems to be inevitable in light of the large deficit in the army’s budget, as Assad’s soldiers do not have enough food in their military barracks, and the state of resentment in the ranks of the army is increasing by day. The Assad régime is trying, through this decision, to absorb the anger of its soldiers.”

 Karim said, “The decision conveys several messages to many parties. It conveys a message to Turkey whereby the régime will not launch a battle against the FSA — Turkey’s ally in Idlib. It also conveys a message to the United States where it [Syria] will not launch a battle against the SDF in northeast Syria and a message to Israel whereby the Assad régime is not disturbed by the airstrikes directed at the Iranian forces in Syria.”

 Karim added, “Through its messages to the three influential countries in Syrian affairs, the régime is trying to get them to sympathize with it to mitigate the effects of the Caesar Act, and is preparing itself for the presidential elections scheduled for mid-2021.'

Syria: Which way forward under Biden?

 Frederic C. Hof

 'March 2021 will mark the tenth anniversary of Bashar al-Assad’s decision to wage war on peaceful protestors. Assad’s decision would produce refugee flows that would ultimately change the politics of Europe in ways that delighted the Kremlin. It would also lead to the destruction of the Syrian state. And it would produce American policy responses that would only deepen the crisis while compromising the credibility of the United States, both inside Syria and far beyond. Now a new administration must grapple with this problem from hell. What is to be done?

 The default position of President Joe Biden and his team will likely be along the lines of trying to manage the mess. In fairness, however, its Syria inheritance from the Donald Trump administration is not as toxic as what the Barack Obama administration bequeathed to its successor.

 Eager to do a nuclear deal with Assad’s regional champion, Iran, President Obama adamantly refused to lift a finger to oppose or punish the mass civilian homicide survival strategy of the Syrian regime, even as Obama deployed troops to fight the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) in northeastern Syria and Iraq. Indeed, The Wall Street Journal reported on a letter from Obama to Iran’s Supreme Leader, assuring him that US military operations in Syria would not target his client. Already encouraged by the 2013 “red line” collapse, Assad made maximum sanguinary use of a renewed and gratuitous blank check.

 The Trump administration twice responded militarily to regime chemical attacks on civilians, disproving the Obama thesis that punishing and deterring Assad’s Syria would only lead to invasion and occupation. The slippery slope to escalation argument of a supine Obama administration was further undermined when a Russian attack across the Euphrates River was routed. The Trump administration accelerated the battle against ISIS in the northeast, leading to the erasure of the physical “caliphate.” But even this victory was spoiled by bad policy. The thoughtlessly casual Obama administration decision to partner against ISIS with the Syrian chapter of the terrorist PKK both alienated Turkey and prolonged the battle against ISIS, employing as it did a militia instead of professionals against armed extremists. And then President Trump, after speaking to Turkey’s president, casually betrayed the Kurds while administration officials proclaimed that the post-combat stabilization of areas liberated from ISIS was just too hard for Americans to organize.



 Parties interested in promoting the political fortunes of Assad—starting with the dictator himself—are trying hard to take advantage of the new administration’s preoccupations. The Syrian regime has argued consistently that US economic sanctions—not its own corruption, incompetence, and brutality—are predominantly responsible for the Syrian economy’s failure. This line is supported by the Carter Center, which is doubling down on President Jimmy Carter’s 2018 New York Times op-ed in which he identified the lifting of sanctions as the key to Syria’s economic recovery and called for gradual diplomatic reengagement with Assad—the twenty-first century’s greatest war criminal to date.

 Undoubtedly, the Biden administration should review sanctions placed on regime kingpins and institutions to try to ensure that nothing the US does to hold them accountable adds even marginally to the suffering Syrians endure due to their misrule. Sanctions can often be blunt instruments producing unintended effects. But there is no need for the new administration to take instruction from those seeking to solidify the rule of Syria’s principal destroyer.

 Unless challenged again militarily by the Russians or other regime enablers, the Biden administration will try in the near-term to keep Syria on the back burner or off the policy stove altogether, continuing to provide humanitarian assistance to refugees and to Syrians living in areas not controlled by the regime. Indeed, every effort should be made—partners included—to provide emergency aid to all needy Syrians regardless of where they live. Yet doing so in regime-controlled areas is, as the United Nations has discovered, difficult, as members of the regime’s entourage have successfully garnered self-enriching aid contracts.

 What to do operationally in areas of northeastern Syria where American forces and local partners seek to prevent the resurgence of ISIS should be a matter of urgent internal review. A prominent American former diplomat has suggested that the anti-ISIS mission be handed to Russia and the regime, along with the areas liberated from ISIS in northeastern Syria. The Islamist extremists trying desperately to mount an insurgency comeback will pray that the advice be accepted. They know all too well that the caliphate never would have existed absent the misrule of Assad in Syria and Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in Iraq.



 In terms of an overall objective for Syria, political transition producing legitimate governance remains the goal. It will not happen in the next twenty minutes, figuratively speaking. But Syria under Assad and his entourage will never be anything short of a serious threat to the peace. It will be a menace to its neighbors, a promoter of Islamist extremism and terrorism, and a platform for Iranian regional hegemony. Under Assad, Syria will always threaten to empty itself, even if—or perhaps especially—reconstruction funding is lavished on an insatiable regime.

 There are no near-term fixes for Syria. The most damaging option in terms of American interests and the future of Syria would be to assume that Assad has won and crawl into his oily embrace. It will be important to continue supporting the UN Special Envoy and to uphold the international community’s political transition decisions as embodied in the 2012 Final Communique of the Action Group on Syria and Security Council Resolution 2254. Efforts to build a full record supporting the eventual legal accountability of Assad and his associates should be redoubled and, as recommended in 2019 by the Syria Support Group, an investigation into Russian war crimes in Syria should be undertaken.

 The new administration must commit itself to punishing militarily any renewed campaign of mass killings of civilians and state terror undertaken by the Assad regime. Regime stalwarts were heading for the exits in the summer of 2013 when President Obama erased his own chemical weapons red line. Senior Biden administration officials have publicly acknowledged regret for the Syria policies of the Obama administration. The sincerity of those regrets and their operational significance will be tested if the Assad regime resumes mass slaughter, whether by chemical weapons, barrel bombs, or any other instruments of state terror in its inventory.

 American action and inaction in Syria instructed adversaries of the US how hard and how far they could push in Ukraine and elsewhere. Syria has never been a candidate for self-containment. It is possible that ten years of bad American policy has rendered thoughtfulness and discipline in defining objectives and devising a strategy useless. Assad and his regime are not about to empty their prisons, welcome home refugees, or share power with anyone. They await, patiently, the Western surrender their enablers assure them is sure to come.'