Syria Superthread [merged]

[tamouh]

I'm in full agreement with most of what you've said. However, I'm not seeing a war as the eventual solution. I do believe that it will take generations of Middle Eastern youth to re-shape the ME into a stable zone. If 3 wars with Israel, 15 yrs civil war in lebanon, 3 wars in Iraq (forgot the Iran-Iraq war) and numerous other revolutions from North Africa to South India did not make a dent to the way people deal with each other, then I doubt any future wars will make a change.

 

[a_majoor]

I'm in full agreement with most of what you've said. However, I'm not seeing a war as the eventual solution. I do believe that it will take generations of Middle Eastern youth to re-shape the ME into a stable zone. If 3 wars with Israel, 15 yrs civil war in lebanon, 2 wars in Iraq did not make a dent then no future wars will make a change.

Robert A Heinlein summed this attitude up well in the book "Starship Troopers"

(Paraphrase)

Student: My parents say that war and violence don't solve anything.
Teacher: Tell that to the people of Carthage

It takes really apocalyptic wars to make major changes; the World Wars of the last century, the 30 year's war and the Peloponesian wars come to mind as events that shifted the landscape and created entirely new orders in the political landscape. Maybe if the current crop of regional wars start to run together we will destabilize enough "pieces" to get the shifts needed for an Islamic "Reformation".

 

[Sythen]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/08/syria-crisis-jihad-idUSL6E8K80WG20120908

Jihadists join Aleppo fight, eye Islamic state, surgeon says


* French surgeon returns after 2 weeks in Aleppo hospital

* Says French fighters inspired by Toulouse gunman Merah

* Says Turkey flooding parts of border to stop refugees

By John Irish

PARIS, Sept 8 (Reuters) - Foreign Islamists intent on turning Syria into an autocratic theocracy have swollen the ranks of rebels fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad and think they are waging a "holy war", a French surgeon who treated fighters in Aleppo has said.

Jacques Beres, co-founder of medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres, returned from Syria on Friday evening after spending two weeks working clandestinely in a hospital in the besieged northern Syrian city.

In an interview with Reuters in his central Paris apartment on Saturday, the 71-year-old said that contrary to his previous visits to Homs and Idlib earlier this year about 60 percent of those he had treated this time had been rebel fighters and that at least half of them had been non-Syrian.

"It's really something strange to see. They are directly saying that they aren't interested in Bashar al-Assad's fall, but are thinking about how to take power afterwards and set up an Islamic state with sharia law to become part of the world Emirate," the doctor said.

More on link. I wonder how long it will be before another caliphate is set up in the middle east? And I wonder what the war between the Sunnis and Shias will look like when they end up fighting for control of it. War by proxy is working and effective for both sides in the short to medium term, but there will come a day when their 'cold war' will go hot.

 

[Edward Campbell]

We need to remember that Turkey is a regional power with strong historical claims to being the natural leader of the Arabic, Persian and West Asian Muslims and the military wherewithal to press that claim.

 

[a_majoor]

One result of the disintigration of "old" regimes is that many of the pressing issues of the Great War may finally come to a resolution. The Kurds already have a de facto state in northern Iraq, now a new Kurdish enclave has been created in Syria. The Turks are not too pleased by this, and I imagine this will also become a large and growing thorn in the side of the Iranians as well. This isn't to say that there is a prospect for a united Kurdistan any time soon; Kurds don't seem to work very well together either:

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2012/09/24/get-ready-for-syrian-kurdistan-3/

Get Ready for Syrian Kurdistan

Kurdish areas of the Middle East (in red).

Syria’s Kurds once waged a fruitless struggle with Damascus against discrimination and for basic rights like citizenship and official recognition of a distinct Kurdish language and culture. Now, however, the equation has changed, and large chunks of northeastern Syria are now under the sole control of the Kurds.

Back in July, Butcher Assad ceded the responsibility of governing and maintaining law and order in northeastern Syria to Kurdish leaders. In return they would keep out of the uprising. Syrian Kurdish leaders have taken this responsibility and run with it. In a recent interview, well-known Kurdish leader and PKK advisor Muhammad Amin Penjweni described the situation in northeastern Syria:

The Democratic Union Party (PYD) is a very active party in Syrian Kurdistan. Since the start of the uprising, the PYD’s cadres have gone back into the general population and started organizing them. They have formed councils in all areas, and the councils have formed a bigger council called the People’s Council. Now the People’s Council has formed another council with the Kurdistan National Council (KNC), each with five members. . . .
This is the reality in Syrian Kurdistan, whether Turkey wants it or not. The freedom achieved there — whether by bravery, or the Syrian regime giving the areas up — is a development for the Kurdish question.

Meanwhile, Assad also eased restrictions on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. The PKK is mostly based in Turkey, and its insurgency there has grown more intense in tandem with the Syrian civil war; observers suspect Assad is using the PKK to distract and annoy Turkey. The PKK, according to reports, now occupies towns along much of Syria’s border with Turkey. The past few months have seen an intensifying battle between the Turkish state and the PKK. Ankara claims to have killed hundreds of insurgents, and the PKK has been blamed for a spate of recent attacks on policemen and army checkpoints. A recent article in Turkey’s Zaman newspaper likened the PKK to the Taliban and described widespread drug cultivation in areas of Turkey controlled by the PKK, with enormous profits from the drug trade filling the coffers of Kurdish groups.

All this suggests a renewed struggle in the Middle East between the Kurds and their host countries (see map above). We’re likely to see Syrian Kurds start to push harder and more successfully for the same kind of regional autonomy as in Iraqi Kurdistan. Depending on inter-Kurdish politics, we might see the PKK establish a safe haven and base of operations in northeastern Syria from which to launch attacks in Turkey. This could in turn lead to Turkish incursions into Syria. Another variable is the Syrian civil war: So far the leaders of the uprising against Assad have offered no hint that they are on especially friendly terms with Syria’s Kurds, and should Assad fall, the future of Syria’s Kurdish communities (just like other non-Sunni non-combatant communities) becomes an ominous question.

All in all, a messy and complicated state of affairs.

 

[aesop081]

I do believe that it will take generations of Middle Eastern youth to re-shape the ME into a stable zone.

They will follow in the footsteps of the youth currently making a**es of themselves "protesting" over a Youtube video.

 

[Edward Campbell]

As Turkey shells Syria, today, this article which is reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from Foreign Affairs is timely:

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/138104/halil-karaveli/turkey-is-no-partner-for-peace?page=show

Turkey Is No Partner for Peace
How Ankara’s Sectarianism Hobbles U.S. Syria Policy

Halil Karaveli

September 11, 2012

At first glance, it appears that the United States and Turkey are working hand in hand to end the Syrian civil war. On August 11, after meeting with Turkish officials, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released a statement that the two countries’ foreign ministries were coordinating to support the Syrian opposition and bring about a democratic transition. In Ankara on August 23, U.S. and Turkish officials turned those words into action, holding their first operational planning meeting aimed at hastening the downfall of the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Beneath their common desire to oust Assad, however, Washington and Ankara have two distinctly different visions of a post-revolutionary Syria. The United States insists that any solution to the Syrian crisis should guarantee religious and ethnic pluralism. But Turkey, which is ruled by a Sunni government, has come to see the conflict in sectarian terms, building close ties with Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood–dominated Sunni opposition, seeking to suppress the rights of Syrian Kurds, and castigating the minority Alawites -- Assad’s sect -- as enemies. That should be unsettling for the Obama administration, since it means that Turkey will not be of help in promoting a multi-ethnic, democratic government in Damascus. In fact, Turkish attitudes have already contributed to Syria’s worsening sectarian divisions.

Washington is pushing for pluralism. In Istanbul last month, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Philip Gordon emphasized that “the Syrian opposition needs to be inclusive, needs to give a voice to all of the groups in Syria . . . and that includes Kurds.” Clinton, after meeting with her Turkish counterpart, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, stressed that a new Syrian government “will need to protect the rights of all Syrians regardless of religion, gender, or ethnicity.” 

It is unclear, however, whether Ankara is on board. As it lends critical support to the Sunni rebellion, Turkey has not made an attempt to reach out to the other ethnic and sectarian communities in the country. Instead, Turkey has framed the Syrian conflict in alienating religious terms. The governing Justice and Development Party (AKP), a Sunni conservative bloc, singles out Syria’s Alawites as villains, regularly denouncing their “minority regime.” Hüseyin Çelik, an AKP spokesperson, claimed at a press conference on September 8, 2011, that “the Baath regime relies on a mass of 15 percent” -- the percentage of Alawites in the country. Such a narrative overlooks the fact that the Baath regime has long owed its survival to the support of a significant portion of the majority Sunnis.

The AKP has antagonized not only Syria’s Alawites but also its Kurds. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has insisted that his country would resist any Kurdish push for autonomy in parts of northeastern Syria, going so far as to threaten military intervention. The Turkish government’s unreserved support for the Sunni opposition is due not only to an ideological affinity with it but also to the fact that the Sunni rebels oppose the aspirations of the Syrian Kurds.

Meanwhile, the AKP has sought to sell its anti-Assad policy to the Turkish public by fanning the flames of sectarianism at home. The AKP has directed increasingly aggressive rhetoric toward Turkey’s largest religious minority, the Alevis, and accused them of supporting the Alawites out of religious solidarity. The Alevis, a Turkish- and Kurdish-speaking heterodox Muslim minority that comprises approximately one-fifth of Turkey’s population, constitute a separate group from the Arab Alawites. But both creeds share the fate of being treated as heretics by the Sunnis.

At the September 2011 press conference, Çelik insinuated that Kemal Kiliçdaroğlu, an Alevi Kurd who leads Turkey’s social democratic Republican People’s Party (CHP), based his opposition to Turkey’s entanglement in the Syrian civil war on sectarian motives. “Why are you defending the Baath regime?” he inquired. “Bad things come to my mind. Is it perhaps because of sectarian solidarity?” In a similar vein, Erdogan claimed in March that Kiliçdaroğlu’s motives for supposedly befriending the Syrian president were religious, stating, “Don’t forget that a person’s religion is the religion of his friend.”

On the face of it, the Obama administration’s positions on Syria are consistent with those of Turkey. In their meetings in Turkey, Clinton reiterated that Washington “share(s) Turkey’s determination that Syria must not become a haven for [Kurdish] terrorists,” and Gordon underlined that the United States has “been clear both with the Kurds of Syria and our counterparts in Turkey that we don’t support any movement towards autonomy or separatism which we think would be a slippery slope.” Such statements may comfort the Turkish government, but the preferred U.S. outcome of a Syria where all ethnic and religious communities enjoy equal rights would nonetheless require accommodating the aspirations of the Kurds to be recognized as a distinct group. And that is precisely what Turkey deems unacceptable. Consider the fact that Turkey has persecuted its own Kurdish movement for raising the same demand; in the last three years, Ankara has arrested 8,000 Kurdish politicians and activists to keep the nationalist movement in check.

None of this is to suggest that the United States should not work with Turkey, especially since Saudi Arabia, the other main participant in the effort to bring down Assad, has even less of an interest in promoting democracy. But to have a reliable partner in the Syria crisis, Washington will have to pressure Ankara to rise above its ethnic and sectarian considerations.

The United States should therefore confront these differences in approach head-on and encourage Turkey to see the benefits of pursuing a more pluralistic policy. Despite its fear of Kurdish agitation at home, Turkey would stand to gain from establishing a mutually beneficial relationship with the Kurds in Syria, like the one that it has come to enjoy with the Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq. Indeed, representatives of the leading Syrian Kurdish party, the Democratic Union Party (PYD), have urged Ankara to forge a similar partnership. In an interview with the International Middle East Peace Research Center, Salih Muhammad Muslim, the leader of the PYD, said that Turkey should get over its “Kurdish phobia.” Erdogan’s government seems reluctant to do so, fearing that by reaching out to Syria’s Kurds and other minorities, and accepting the idea of a pluralistic Syria, Turkey would encourage its own ethnic and religious minorities to seek constitutional reform and equality. But if Turkey allows ethnic and sectarian divisions in Syria to further spiral out of control, those divisions may spill over its own borders.

By now, it should have dawned on Ankara that shouldering the Sunni cause to project power in its neighborhood courts all kinds of dangers. Framing Turkey’s involvement in Syria in religious terms leads Sunni Turks to imagine that they are waging a battle for the emancipation of faithful Muslims from the oppression of supposed heretics. This fanning of sectarian prejudice against Syria’s Alawites naturally engenders hostility toward religious minority groups in Turkey, leading the country’s already fragile social fabric to fray.

There is a bigger risk here, too. The AKP’s pro-Sunni agenda in Syria threatens to embroil Turkey in the wider Sunni-Shiite conflict across the Middle East. By taking on Iran’s ally, Turkey has exposed itself to aggression from the Islamic Republic. In a statement last month, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s chief of staff, General Hasan Firouzabadi, warned that Turkey, along with the other countries combating Assad, can expect internal turmoil as a result of their interference. The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the Kurdish rebel group considered a terrorist organization by Turkey and the United States, stepped up its attacks over the summer, notably staging a major offensive in Turkey’s Hakkari Province, which borders Iran and Iraq. Iran denies any responsibility for the PKK attacks, but Turkish officials assume that Tehran is involved and that PKK militants cross into Turkey from Iran.

Until now, the Sunni bent of Turkish foreign policy has suited the geopolitical aims of the United States, as it has meant that Turkey, abandoning its previous ambition to have “zero problems” with its neighbors, has joined the camp against Iran. That advantage quelled whatever misgivings U.S. officials may have harbored about Turkey’s sectarian drift. But if the United States achieves, with Turkish help, its strategic objective of ousting Assad, it will need a different kind of Turkey as its partner for what comes after.

I believe, based on scant evidence I admit, that Turkey is eschewing its 20th century European ambitions and is, now, looking South and East - to the Middle East, West Asia and North Africa - for opportunities to play a leadership role: frustrating the ambitions of Iran and Egypt and displacing the USA.

 

[tamouh]

I believe, based on scant evidence I admit, that Turkey is eschewing its 20th century European ambitions and is, now, looking South and East - to the Middle East, West Asia and North Africa - for opportunities to play a leadership role: frustrating the ambitions of Iran and Egypt and displacing the USA.

I disagree. If Turkey was seeking to become a regional power, they would have intervened in Syria long time ago. They would have provided better support to the FSA as an example.  I believe Turkey does not want to intervene in Syria and really has little interest in it except for the Kurds and commercial truck traffic.

Syria since its independence in late 1940s and until the Hafez Al-Assad coup in 1969 have had 4 successfull military coups and 2 "corrective" revolutions. Between 1961-1969, Syria have had numerous failed military coups that are too many to even count.

Thus, any country looking to intervene in Syria knows very well that the road to stability is very long and treturous one. This is my reasoning why nobody had stepped up to "own" the Syrian problem.

Further, Saudi Arabia is the main financier of the Armed Syrian opposition (through military councils, religious figures and others). Saudi in itself may have little interest in Syria except for countering the Iranian Shiaa expansion. Turkey is basically the gateway for Saudi Arabia to mingle in Syria. If any country in the ME is seeking a leadership role, it is probably Saudi.

As a side note, one of Saudi Arabia's King Abduallah wives is the sister of Rifaat Al-Assad (Bashar Al-Assad uncle) whom is currently living in Paris, France after he had been forced out of power by Bashar Al-Assad late Father, Hafez Al-Assad. Rifaat Al-Assad is most enfamous for his Hama massacre in which most of the city was leveled to the ground. He had also attempted a coup against his brother Hafez Al-Assad, but failed. He used to command the elite army unit known today as the 4th Battalion.

 

[a_majoor]

Various old and new "power groupings" exist in the Middle East, it would take an archeological expedition to find the roots of all of  these.

The Turks are a distinctive Ethnic group, and have historical aspirations based on ruling the Middle East in the recent past as the Ottoman Empire (note, in this part of the world, recent seems to be the Crusades. 1918 is practically yesterday)

The Persians are also a distinct Ethnic and religious grouping, who also have historical claims to regional hegemony

While the Saudis are "new kids" relatively speaking, they have a malevolent interpretation of Islam and lots of money to push it. Wahhabi madrasas are springing up everywhere, a rather novel approach to projecting power.

Egypt is a very old civilization, and Egyptians still see themselves as being very important in the grand scheme of things. They are currently a secular power, but with the Arab Spring being hijacked by the Muslim Brotherhoods, will probably evolve into another sectarian faction with lots of military and economic muscle.

The Ba'athist party is/was a Fascist wannabe secular movement. While it is no longer a power in Iraq, it is still the guiding force behind the Assad regime in Syria, and has adherents throughout the Middle East seeking a secular alternative to sectarian rule.

Throw in the Jews, the Kurds and dozens of smaller ethnic and religious factions and you have another fine mess. Syria is currently allied to Iran but historically belongs in the Turkish orbit, and the ultimate fate may well be a series of mini "states" and areas absorbed by other nations (Kurdish Syria may well blend into Iraqi Kurdistan, for example, and various minority groups in Syria may try to create enclaves as safe havens as the Civil War reaches its climax). The greater regional powers fighting over the remains may well be the trigger of the Regional War that threatens to engulf the entire Middle East.

 

[Bigmac]

Turkey returns fire after Syrian bomb crosses border

Shelling marks fourth day of Turkish retaliation as cross-border attacks threaten to escalate into war

Turkey has returned fire after a mortar bomb shot from Syria landed in a field in southern Turkey.

The exchange came the day after Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, warned Damascus that his country would not shy away from war if provoked.

It was the fourth day of Turkish strikes in retaliation for mortar bombs and shelling by Syrian forces that killed five Turkish civilians further east on Wednesday.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/06/turkey-returns-fire-syria


It looks like the Kurds in Syria may provoke Turkey to cross the border. The Middle East is turning into quite the powder keg!

 

[tomahawk6]

The big winner would be the Free Syrian Army.

 

[Old Sweat]

There are a couple of ways of looking what might happen. Neither is all that appealing.

First - Turkey goes to war, maybe with limited objectives, taking the heat of the west to intervene. Hopefully this will not prompt Russia, iran or China to aid Syria and it will not rally the Free Syria movement to join the Assad regime in defending the homeland. In any case the region is destabilized even more and fractures begin to develop along ethnic fault lines. When the dust clears and the bodies are buried, we all have to relearn our geography.

Second - this turns into a replay of the events of the spring and summer of 1914.

And the wild card is what if somebody decides to blame it all on the Joos and launches a strike on Isreal?

Hopefully my new tin foil hat is working and these scenarios are just the product of an overactive imagination.

 

[The Bread Guy]

More grist for the mill....

2 Aug 12 (via Pentagon Info-machine):

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta today pledged to explore ways to continue U.S. help in providing humanitarian aid to those affected by violence in Syria.

A meeting between Panetta and King Abdullah in Amman, Jordan, focused on regional security challenges, most notably Syria and recent refugee flows into Jordan, Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said.

“They talked not only about how to deal with the current crisis that is being fueled by the intolerable acts of the Assad regime,” Little said in a written statement, “but also the prospects for political transition in a post-Assad Syria.”

Panetta and King Abdullah agreed that strong international pressure must be sustained to make it clear that Syrian leader Bashar Assad must go, and that the Syrian people deserve to determine their own future, the press secretary said.

Panetta also reiterated the U.S. commitment to its strategic relationship with Jordan and to the strong defense relationship between the two countries, Little added ....

9 Oct 12 (via NY Times):

The United States military has secretly sent a task force of more than 150 planners and other specialists to Jordan to help the armed forces there handle a flood of Syrian refugees, prepare for the possibility that Syria will lose control of its chemical weapons and be positioned should the turmoil in Syria expand into a wider conflict.

The task force, which has been led by a senior American officer, is based at a Jordanian military training center built into an old rock quarry north of Amman. It is now largely focused on helping Jordanians handle the estimated 180,000 Syrian refugees who have crossed the border and are severely straining the country’s resources.

American officials familiar with the operation said the mission also includes drawing up plans to try to insulate Jordan, an important American ally in the region, from the upheaval in Syria and to avoid the kind of clashes now occurring along the border of Syria and Turkey.

The officials said the idea of establishing a buffer zone between Syria and Jordan — which would be enforced by Jordanian forces on the Syrian side of the border and supported politically and perhaps logistically by the United States — had been discussed. But at this point the buffer is only a contingency ....

 

[Colin Parkinson]

I could see Turkey moving into parts of Syria to protect it's population from shelling and to pursue the PPK, the move would be announced as a tempoary measure to prevent attacks on it's soil and to provide humanitarian aid to displaced people. The FSA will welcome it and use the area as a refugee gathering area and safe haven. Assad and gang might try to provke the Kurds in attacking the turks or at least PPK and allies. I suspect(hope) that most Kurds see little advantage in such attacks, but the turk's heavy hand might force them to fight back. Syria might decide to fight the intrustion in the politcal arena such as the UN, with Russian and Iranian support, but avoid confrontation directly with the Turkish army. If assad puts down the rebellion, he will then be in a postion to move his army to face the Turks. At this point all bets are off, what is the turkish public mood, what sort of protections will be put in place for the displaced people, will the UN agree to put observers in?

 

[Bigmac]

Turkish PM says intercepted Syrian plane carrying ammunition

Canada's foreign affairs minister commends halting of arms shipment

The Associated Press

Posted: Oct 11, 2012 5:02 AM ET

Last Updated: Oct 11, 2012 7:09 PM ET


Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird commended Turkey on Thursday for stopping a possible shipment of weapons reportedly on its way to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

Escalating tensions with Russia, Turkey defended its forced landing of a Syrian passenger jet en route from Moscow to Damascus, saying Thursday it was carrying Russian ammunition and military equipment destined for the Syrian Defence Ministry.

Syria branded the incident piracy and Russia called the search illegal, saying it endangered the lives of Russian citizens aboard the plane.

The accusation by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan contradicted denials by both Russia and Syria that anything illegal had been aboard the Airbus A320 that was intercepted over Turkish airspace late Wednesday.

"Equipment and ammunitions that were being sent from a Russian agency ... to the Syrian Defence Ministry," were confiscated from the jetliner, Erdogan told reporters in Ankara. "Their examination is continuing and the necessary (action) will follow."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/10/11/turkey-syria-plane.html


Russia involved in arms dealing with another nation? 
Says the Russian "civilian" passenger: " Nyet, that rocket launcher is not mine, I was holding it for a friend! "  :

 

[tamouh]

Syrian regime is using cluster bombs in Homs/Aleppo:

Source: http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2012-10-14/syria-gunmen-kill-4-on-factory-bus-in-homs

By AP News

The Syrian regime was accused Sunday of dropping cluster bombs — indiscriminate scattershot munitions banned by most nations — in a new sign of desperation and disregard for its own people..........

 

[aesop081]

Syrian regime is using cluster bombs in Homs/Aleppo:

Tiamo,

If you have not noticed yet, no one cares what goes on in Syria. Cluster bombs won't change that, they are just another weapon.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Let me add a bit of anecdotal evidence regarding this from my own time in Syria. The hatred felt by FSA and other Syrian insurgent fighters toward Hezbollah is very intense. It of course also has a sectarian element. I have seen Hezbollah flags burned at opposition demonstrations in Idlib Province. In Aleppo last month, I interviewed a Tawhid Brigade fighter who referred constantly to the party as ‘Hizb a Shaytan’ (party of Satan.) It created a weird dynamic in our conversation because I would keep asking about ‘Hezbollah’ (party of God) and he would keep replying by referring to ‘Hizb a Shaytan’ until in the end I started feeling like I was acting as some kind of apologist for Hezbollah. Which I’m not. As you know.


read the rest at  http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blogs/michael-j-totten
The Israeli Who Sneaked into Syria

 

[a_majoor]

More cracks are opening in the region. It seems Turkey was much more hevily involved even from the beginning, and we might see one aspect of the Syrian conflict as a proxy battle between Iran (which supports the regime) and Turkey. Of course several other struggles are also going on at the same time. All the more reason to be very careful in how we approach the conflict, and avoid being drawn in if at all possible:

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/10/16/sleepwalking-into-disaster-over-syria/

Sleepwalking into disaster over Syria

Araminta Wordsworth | Oct 16, 2012 8:51 AM ET | Last Updated: Oct 16, 2012 9:37 AM ET
More from Araminta Wordsworth

AP Photo / SANA 'They make a desert and call it peace': Downtown Aleppo

Full Comment’s Araminta Wordsworth brings you a daily round-up of quality punditry from across the globe.  Today: The escalation of hostilities between Ankara and Damascus should be alarming the rest of the world.

Instead, international powers seem to be sleepwalking into a major war as Turkey and Syria exchange fire and impose tit-for-tat bans on using each other’s airspace.

Maybe it’s because they — and we — have become numbed by the grinding horrors of the last 18 months: the deaths of thousands of civilians caught in the crossfire or tortured to death by the Assad regime, and the rebels, albeit on a lesser scale; the hundreds of thousands more displaced; the cities turned into heaps of rubble.

Some in the U.S. are even jingoistically sabre-rattling. They have obviously learned nothing from the waste of blood and money in previous American adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan. All-out war between Syria and Turkey could also drag in regional powers, such as Iran and Saudi Arabia, maybe even Russia, Bashar al-Assad’s continuing best friend.

As the London newspaper The Independent points out in an editorial,

    With violence raging in parts of Syria, cross-border clashes – either by mistake … or deliberately, in pursuit of rebel fighters sheltering in Turkey – become ever harder to prevent. The UN has so far been unable or unwilling to halt Syria’s descent into civil war. But the real risk now is that the conflict will spread, escalating into regional conflagration. Better late than never, this is the point at which Russia and China must make common cause with the other Big Five powers – or be culpable in what happens next.

From neighbouring Lebanon, which knows better than most the horrors of civil war, editorial writers at the Daily Star are sounding the alarm.

    [L]ast week’s events on the border with Turkey represent a potentially catastrophic turning point which could turn the civil war into a regional one … as the history of wars often reveals, many of the worst conflicts have started due to a seemingly small miscalculation, miscommunication or stray bullet.
    With the region as much of a powder keg as it has ever been, this escalation of activities on the borders promotes nothing but chaos and further bloodshed. Common sense and clear thinking is desperately needed before the border clashes draw in regional, or international partners, and all the while the Syrian people who are really suffering will continue to be ignored.

Another editorial, this one in the Jerusalem Post helps explain why the international response has been muted: self-interest.

    t is difficult to know who to root for. While it would be morally reprehensible to back Assad’s ruthless regime, the alternative – the rise of a Syrian version of the Muslim Brotherhood, followed by the wholesale slaughter of the hated Alawite minority (and perhaps of other minorities such as Druse and Kurds who remained loyal to Assad) – hardly promises to be an improvement.
    From Israel’s point of view, regime change in Syria and a warming of ties with Turkey would be welcome developments … But when it comes to changes in the Arab world, as we learned in the Gaza Strip and then with the so-called Arab Spring, one must be careful what one hopes for.

At the political magazine CounterPunch, Ramzy Baroud demolishes the argument Turkey is being dragged into a conflict not of its making.

    When Syrians rebelled, Turkey was prepared. Its policy was aimed at taking early initiative by imposing its own sanctions on Damascus. It went even further as it turned a blind eye while its once well-guarded border area became awash with smugglers, foreign fighters, weapons and more. Aside from hosting the Syrian National Council, it also provided a safe haven for the Free Syrian Army that operated from the Turkish borders at will. While much of that was justified as righteous Turkish action to deter injustice, it was one of the primary reasons which made a political solution unattainable. It turned what eventually became a bloody and brutal conflict into a regional struggle. It allowed for Syrian territories to be used in a proxy conflict involving various countries, ideologies and political camps.

Finally, an editorial in the pan-Arab daily al-Quds al-Arabi offers a cynical view, according to a translation provided by the Co-Generation & Onsite Power Production website.

    We do not believe that [NATO], which has been fighting a losing war in Afghanistan over the past 11 years, is ready to fight another war in Syria which could develop into a regional war —  into a Third World War, in fact. After all, Turkey is a Muslim country, and there is no oil in Syria. NATO can intervene to protect Israel, even though it is not a member of the alliance. It can intervene to abort any possible threat to it, as happened when it invaded Iraq. Or it can intervene to serve strategic Western economic interests, such as Libya’s oil wells. But we doubt that it will intervene in Syria militarily as long as the victims on both sides in case of war would be Muslims. Its stance will be simply: “Let them destroy each other.”

compiled by Araminta Wordsworth
awordsworth@nationalpost.com

 

[Edward Campbell]

There's nothing really new or earth shattering in this report which is reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from Xinhua, but it does give you a pretty clear picture of the official Chinese  position on Syria:

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2012-10/31/c_131942913.htm

China announces new proposals on Syria

English.news.cn

2012-10-31

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Chinese FM Wednesday elaborated China's proposals on a political resolution to the Syrian conflict.
• Yang said, "A political resolution is the only pragmatic option in Syria."
• China has always supported the diplomatic mediation efforts of Brahimi and former envoy Kofi Annan

BEIJING, Oct. 31 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi on Wednesday elaborated China's new four-point proposals on a political resolution to the Syrian conflict, urging all parties in Syria to cease fire and violence and begin political transition at an early date.

Yang made the proposals during his talks with UN-Arab League Joint Special Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who is visiting China for the first time since replacing former UN chief Kofi Annan as the international mediator on Syria on Sept. 1.

The situation in Syria is at a crucial stage, and is important to the fundamental interests of the Syrian people as well as peace and stability in the Middle East, Yang said, adding, "A political resolution is the only pragmatic option in Syria."

The future of the Middle Eastern country should be determined by the Syrian people themselves, and its sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity should be respected and preserved, according to Yang.

He called on the international community to spare no efforts to collaborate with and support diplomatic mediation, while enhancing humanitarian assistance to Syria.

Yang said the Chinese government attaches great importance to Syrian mediation and expressed appreciation for Brahimi's active role in the area.

China has always supported the diplomatic mediation efforts of Brahimi and former envoy Kofi Annan, and is willing to work with the international community to make continuous efforts to achieve a "fair, peaceful and appropriate" resolution, Yang said.

Brahimi introduced the latest developments in Syria and his recent mediation efforts, especially his visit to the country itself and related nations. He said political resolution is the only feasible approach to the complicated and sensitive situation in Syria and all parties involved should cease fire and violence so as to create conditions for a political resolution.

Brahimi thanked China for its firm support for his mediation. He also expressed appreciation for Chinese efforts toward a political resolution in Syria, as well as his hope that China will continue to play a positive and constructive role in this regard.

This means that any actions the UN Security Council might propose needs to satisfy these four principles, outlined here:

1. "Urge in a balanced way the Syrian government and the opposition to earnestly implement Mr. Kofi Annan's six-point proposal and relevant Security Council resolutions, put an end to fighting and violence, protect civilians, start as soon as possible an inclusive political dialogue with no preconditions attached and no prejudged outcomes, and jointly push forward the political process;"

2. "Give firm support to [UN sponsored] mediation efforts;"

3. "Respect the independent choice of the Syrian people:' and

4. "Have a sense of urgency and at the same time remain patient in seeking a political settlement."

They are very, very Chinese and equally self serving principles but the Chinese are unlikely to change course any time soon.