Why Obama Now 'Owns Syria'

[xchrom]

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/06/why-obama-now-owns-syria/276901/


A boy looks back at a building damaged by what activists say was shelling by forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in Raqqa province, eastern Syria, on March 13, 2013. (Hamid Khatib/Reuters)

As he has done all along, Barack Obama is edging his way up to the precipice in Syria, and even now the president very much does not want to jump in--not into America's third major war in the past decade. Even while announcing what was billed as a major shift of policy Thursday, Obama signaled that he is unwilling to put American boots on the ground or even to be seen as taking the lead in the conflict in Syria.

Judging from the latest signals from the White House, Obama wants the newly announced U.S. military aid to the Syrian rebels to be kept to a stringent minimum, and he wants it to be seen as part of a broader Western aid effort. The issue now is whether the president is deluding himself that he can limit involvement that way.

"In a sense, Obama owns Syria now," says Joshua Landis, a highly regarded Syria expert at the University of Oklahoma. "I presume he'll try to go in toe by toe.... But he has to decide what his objectives are, which he hasn't. Does he want to provide just enough arms to keep the status quo and divide Syria in two? Does he want to give them enough to take Damascus and drive the Alawites [President Bashar al-Assad's ruling sect] into the mountains? Does he want he want to see them take over the entire country?"

The evidence so far is that the administration will go no further than to try to maintain the bloody standoff, which has cost more than 90,000 lives, for the time being. "I assume they're just stirring the pot at this point," Landis says. "He's obviously going to play it by ear, as he's done it so far. He doesn't know how reliable these militias are." As President Clinton did by intervening in the Bosnian war in the mid-1990s, Obama may hope to tilt the balance just enough to lead to a peace settlement, lending credence to Secretary of State John Kerry's efforts to open negotiations between the regime and the leading rebels. Still, Assad may be less willing to talk now that his forces have enjoyed a major victory at Qusair, near the Lebanese border, and appear to be preparing for offensives against Homs and Aleppo.

[Kolesar]

1. It always helps to use loaded language in the article title

[Comrade Grumpy]

6. The language you object to was the money quote from the expert.

What about the content of the article?

[Laelth]

2. k&r for exposure. n/t

-Laelth

[Pryderi]

3. Good. I'm glad Assad stepped out of the way of our ownership. n/t

[The Link]

4. Obama era regime change.

[Comrade Grumpy]

5. "...the administration will go no further than to try to maintain the bloody standoff..."

That sort of lays this policy of intervention bare for the exercise in cynicism and hypocrisy it is.

What next, Obama, when your rifles fail to make a difference? Bleed Syria some more?

[byeya]

7. 0bama is still making serious foreign policy mistakes and supporting taliban-types over

even a despot like Assad will make things worse not better.