Americans Have Decided To Act via Proxies in Syria

From the moment that Syria talks in Geneva (officially started Jan. 29) were suspended on Feb. 3, information appeared in Western media about a joint ground military operation supposedly being prepared by Saudi Arabia and Turkey in Syria.

In particular, the British newspaper The Guardian, citing unnamed sources, wrote about the possible involvement of the Saudis’ “thousands of special forces” in the Syrian conflict. Reports from the Russian Defense Ministry have indirectly confirmed information about a mobilization of Turkish army strike forces on the border with Syria.

Yet at the same time, both countries are part of the so-called anti-terrorist coalition led by the U.S. In addition, as a member of NATO, Ankara must coordinate its actions with the alliance’s leadership. Given allied obligations, U.S. allies in the Middle East can’t implement such initiatives without the appropriate sanctions from Washington.

Does this mean that the Americans have decided to act via proxies in Syria, or is this part of a joint ground operation in Syria with the U.S. that American officials have been saying is necessary?

The Syrian opposition’s démarche at the talks in Geneva, as well as Turkey and Saudi Arabia’s activation in Syria, coincided with successes by Syrian government troops in the country’s north. In particular, on the evening of Feb. 3, the Syrian army, supported by Russia’s aerospace forces, succeeded in dislodging militants from Nubl and Zahra, two Shiite cities located just 20 kilometers northwest of Aleppo.

Syrian troops’ control of this strategic route means shutting down the main channel for the smuggling of guns and fighters between Aleppo and the Bab al-Salam checkpoint on the border with Turkey.

The blockade and the opportunity to take the militants’ largest stronghold — the city of Aleppo — would not only allow for shutting down the “problem” segment of the Syrian-Turkish border, but would also return control over the province of Idlib, which is in the hands of Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian cell of al-Qaida.

The normalization of the situation in the country’s northwest would, in turn, create conditions for the further advance of government troops, a passage to the Syrian Kurds’ positions and the encircling of the remainder of the militants in the north of Syria.

Perhaps that explains the ultimatum demanding an end to Russian airstrikes from the Syrian opposition’s Saudi-supervised High Negotiations Committee, which includes the Islamist group Jaysh al-Islam, recognized in Russia as a terrorist organization.

It’s known that representatives of the so-called Syrian opposition have made reference to U.N. Security Council Resolution 2254, according to which the [involved parties] in the conflict are obliged to cease shelling and airstrikes, with the exception of operations against terrorist groups.

But on a working visit to Oman, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov officially dismissed the demands of “capricious people” from the HNC’s delegation, “spoon-fed by their external sponsors.” The Russian foreign minister also added that he sees no reason to call off Russian strikes on the terrorists’ positions until the Islamic State group and Jabhat al-Nusra are completely destroyed.

Thus, the potential success of the talks about settling the Syrian conflict is yet again made dependent upon which of the more than 160 groups in Syria can be considered the opposition and which are terrorists.

Perhaps the dispute could be resolved by creating a special Russian-American contact group to agree on targets for the airstrikes. But the Americans stubbornly ignore such initiatives by Moscow, which, of course, leads to certain suspicions.

All the international diplomatic efforts under the U.N.’s mediation aimed at establishing a political dialogue for a peaceful settlement of the Syrian conflict threaten to break down. And by no means has it happened because of Russian airstrikes and advances by the Syrian army over the past two months, but rather as a result of the sudden weakening of Istanbul and Riyadh’s positions.

A military invasion by Turkey and Saudi Arabia into Syria would lead not only to an escalation of violence but to a new round of confrontation between Sunnis and Shiites with absolutely unpredictable consequences for the entire region. In the event the negative scenario is realized, the theater of hostilities would promptly spread to neighboring Iraq, where the Shiite government is at war with Sunni provinces under the control of the Islamic State group, or Daesh.

If the objective of the predicted military invasion by Saudi Arabia and Turkey is to put the Sunni territories seized by the militants under the control of the pro-American coalition, it would effectively mean an occupation of part of Syria and possibly Iraq as well.

In one scenario, the next step would be the collapse of these countries and the creation — upon their fragmentation — of a Kurdistan, a Sunnistan and a Shiitostan — puppet states whose rich oil and gas reserves would be under external control.

That is, what couldn’t be achieved via the Islamic State group could theoretically be achieved through a ground operation by the U.S. and its allies in Syria and Iraq.

Fortunately, that scenario seems unlikely now. First of all, presidential elections are to be held in the U.S. on Nov. 8. Even if U.S. Middle East strategy doesn’t undergo significant changes with the arrival of a new president, the shadow of Barack Obama’s foreign policy failures will hang over the new boss of the Oval Office, who will try to distance himself from them, at least formally.

That is, neither the current nor the future president will risk going on such a dangerous adventure as a new war in the Middle East anytime soon. But that doesn’t exclude the possibility that Washington, in the old Anglo-Saxon tradition, will act via proxies.

As far as the U.S.'s Middle East allies Saudi Arabia and Turkey are concerned, Riyadh, exhausted by the conflict in Yemen, which is experiencing an economic crisis and is torn by internal conflicts, simply doesn’t have the necessary resources right now for a new military campaign. Besides, King Salman, who is predicted to be replaced by Prince Mohammad, is considered a lame duck.

The ambitions of yet another player — Turkish leader Erdogan — are obviously a real headache for NATO. As the situation involving the tragic death of a Russian pilot has shown, the North Atlantic alliance doesn’t have a common approach for assessing Turkey’s actions in the Middle East, to put it mildly.

Brussels understands full well that a Turkish invasion in Syria would inevitably lead to a military conflict with Russia, which has the world’s largest nuclear arsenal. Few in France or Germany are ready to start a third world war through the fault of an out-of-control Erdogan.

In any case, the situation surrounding Syria continues to grow tenser every day, and now is not the best time for military adventures, be it a build-up of Turkish troops on the Turkish-Syrian border or the Saudis’ militaristic moods.

Any misstep in the tight knot of conflicts known as the “Syrian crisis” is capable of spreading to neighboring countries, which would inevitably push the Middle East to the brink of a new global conflict.