Syrian Middle Eastern knot
The weekly "MIC" has repeatedly referred to the events in the Middle East, in particular in the articles "If Ankara Angry ...", "Six Arab Monarchies Against Iran", "Syria: Intervention Is Eliminated" (No. 30, 2012). However, the situation in this region is constantly changing, as there are many hot spots here. But the Syrian question remains the most acute. The tenacity of Assad, the relative neutrality of the United States, the rejection by Russia and China of the forceful way of resolving the crisis preserve for an indefinite time the situation in Syria, which is closely watched by the West, Turkey, Israel and the Sunni monarchies. Decisive actions in this direction of one of the parties can be a catalyst for the exacerbation of the situation throughout the Middle East.
In the civil war in Syria, there has been a new turn. The Syrian opposition at a meeting in the capital of Qatar - Doha announced the unification under the auspices of the specially created for this Syrian National Coalition (SNK). After lengthy persuasion, the Syrian National Council (SNC) also joined the CPC, which for a long time sought to present itself as a spokesman for the interests of the entire opposition. In fact, the SNA consisted almost exclusively of emigrants, almost forgotten in their homeland. Under pressure from the West and the Arab monarchies, they agreed to enter the SNK. It is believed that the coalition united at least 80 percent of the forces fighting against Bashar al-Assad, or rather, its leadership wants to think so. The Islamic radicals, who form the basis of the rebel forces, immediately declared that they did not intend to submit to the CPC, but wanted to create an Islamic state on part of Syria.
Nevertheless, the external forces behind the Syrian opposition now have a formal opportunity to repeat the Libyan option, declaring the CPC to be the “legitimate government” of Syria to begin with. True, the Arab League has so far not gone so far, recognizing the coalition as the legal spokesman of the interests of the opposition. But all six monarchies - members of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC) said that the SNK is the legitimate force representing the Syrian people. Soon, France joined them. Paris (still under the former president Sarkozy) was also the first to recognize the Libyan opposition. And it was France that was the start of hostilities against Gadhafi’s troops, having drawn other NATO countries into the war.
True, this time it is unlikely to succeed. From France “Rafali” and “Mirages” will not reach Syria, and it’s unlikely that they will venture to send their only aircraft carrier Francois Hollande to the Syrian coast. All carrier aviation France today includes only 23 Rafale M F3 aircraft (another 9 Rafale M F1 are in storage pending modernization to version F3) and from 30 to 40 extremely obsolete Super Etandars. This is too little to fully combat the Syrian air force and air defense. Moreover, for the Etandars, even the MiG-21 poses a mortal threat. Yes, and Charles de Gaulle and the security ships are at risk due to the presence of the Bastion SCRC. And drawing NATO allies into war this time is risky. It was safe to fight with Libya due to the fact that it did not have an air defense system. Syrian air defense is still quite combat-ready, so if the French climb into battle again without asking allies, they may not understand them.
The leadership of Israel quite openly declares that the conflict in Syria must be resolved by the hands of the Arabs, that is, it calls for the intervention of the monarchy of the GCC, which, of course, themselves will suffer very significant losses. For Tel Aviv, the best option would be to defeat direct enemies (Syria and, maybe, its supporter - Iran) tactical allies (according to the principle of a common enemy in the face of Iran) - Sunni monarchies, but strategically, enemies are no less. But the monarchies made the first step, recognizing the CPC, but in no further rush to go.
However, it is clear that Hollande, the Arab kings and sheikhs are waiting for the United States to start fighting against Assad. After all, the winning Barack Obama’s hands now seem to be untied. However, while Washington does not show any enthusiasm, their support for the Syrian opposition remains exclusively political.
Turkey remains another potential organizer of aggression. She wants more and more, but is still very prickly. Nevertheless, the Turks begged the NATO Patriots for NATO allies to be located near the border with Syria.
This, like any other, air defense system is purely defensive weapons. However, in this particular case, everything is somewhat more complicated. The firing range of the first modifications of the "Patriot" is 70, later - 160 kilometers, which means that from the territory of Turkey they can shoot down planes over most of Syria. What will become in fact aggression and the Syrian side will receive the right to respond. Moreover, such a step can be quite successful in the first place with regard to air defense missile systems, which are very vulnerable. The result will be a classic escalation to a state of full-scale war. Moreover, no one is going to manufacture new “Patriots” specifically for Turkey and train Turkish soldiers, there is simply no time for this. The air defense system is likely to come to Germany or the Netherlands, and with personnel from these countries. Accordingly, a blow to them will be a blow not to Turkey alone, but to the North Atlantic Alliance as a whole.
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said that it was not planned to establish a no-fly zone over Syria, the purpose of deliveries to the air defense system was solely to cover the Turkish airspace. Most likely this is true, since neither the Dutch, nor even the Germans will not substitute their servicemen for a possible Syrian strike. Too much scandal in their own countries, this will turn out.
Therefore, everyone will continue to wait for the rebels to destroy the Assad regime without open external intervention. However, the possibility of a NATO military invasion of the monarchy is kept in mind. That is why the rebels constantly attack Syrian air defense objects and sometimes even capture them. And the opposition itself gives almost nothing, with the help of MANPADS no more than a dozen government aircraft and helicopters have been shot down so far. It is quite obvious that these attacks are carried out on external orders in order to eliminate the factors that could prevent the intervention. But the conditions for it, including the destruction of the air defense system and the general collapse of the armed forces, have not yet been created, so the war will remain civil.
Against this background, the “eternal” conflict between Israel and Palestine suddenly intensified. Israeli armed forces destroyed the Hamas military leader Ahmad Jabari, and then launched massive air-missile strikes on the military infrastructure of this movement. In response, the Islamic group fired several hundred missiles from the Gaza Strip under its control through Israel, some of which reached the Tel Aviv and Jerusalem neighborhoods.
It seems that the Israeli leadership decided that Obama’s hands were now free, and they began to seriously prepare for a strike on Iran, clearing the rear. Hamas is considered one of Tehran’s main resources for delivering an asymmetrical counter strike to Israel. By destroying the group’s military infrastructure, destroying its stockpiles of missiles, including knocking them down with anti-missile defenses, the Israelis removed this problem for a long time. Accordingly, the risks are reduced when solving the main task - the destruction of the Iranian nuclear infrastructure.
However, the capabilities of the Israeli Air Force are objectively limited by the lack of strategic bombers, heavy air bombs, cruise missiles, and lack of tanker aircraft. Therefore, in Tel Aviv, they very much want that for them in Iran a part of the work, and even better, all the work was done by the Americans, who have just enough of the above.
But there is no enthusiasm for the US president here. Moreover, the Americans made every effort to prevent the Israeli ground operation in Gaza. Their main ally was the new president of Egypt, Mohammed Mursi, who was rapidly gaining political weight in his own country and in the Middle East as a whole. He very quickly turns into the same dictator as Hosni Mubarak, only less pro-American.
In addition, the Americans reported that the repair of the aircraft carrier "Nimitz", which was supposed to come in January 2013, to the Persian Gulf to replace the "Dwight Eisenhower", is delayed at least until summer. “Eisenhower” will leave the Persian Gulf before the end of the year and will undergo deck repair in the USA in order to return to the Middle East for four months in February of 2013. Thus, in December 2012 - January 2013, only one US Navy aircraft carrier, the “John Stennis”, will remain in the region. And despite the fact that even for a limited strike on Iran, at least three aircraft carriers are needed, and for the destruction of the entire nuclear-missile infrastructure and the main objects of the Iranian armed forces, at least five.
It is possible that the Nimitz reactor, which in any case will be written off in the 2018 year, after serving the “fifty dollars” it has served, is really faulty. But maybe Washington makes it clear to Tel Aviv that even substituting it by striking Iran without prior arrangement (like France in Libya) will not work. Let Israel itself do everything without any American help.
Obama does not need to think about re-election, his hands are now actually untied. But for some reason all over the world they cannot understand in any way that Obama is not Bush, but quite the opposite. At least by American standards, he is an outspoken pacifist, and he also works off the Nobel Peace Prize awarded in a clear advance. Hence the withdrawal of troops from Iraq without retaining military bases in that country, the steady curtailment of the Afghan operation, and almost complete withdrawal from intervention in Libya. Losing hands does not mean that Obama, like Bush, will start bombing everyone, but that he will even more avoid participating in any wars and conflicts without looking back at the opinion of conservative Republicans. Moreover, the administration’s intentions were announced to significantly reduce the military budget. Consequently, the reduced US capabilities will be reoriented to East Asia in order to contain China. And all the aspirations of Paris, Riyadh, Doha, Ankara, Tel Aviv about the fact that the Americans will soon begin to fight against Syria and / or Iran, appear to be groundless.
On the other hand, it is extremely difficult to admit that the situation in the Middle East will be resolved without a big war, the situation in the region is too tense. On one flank - the West, Turkey, Israel, Sunni monarchies, on the other - Syria (while Assad is in power) and Iran. If the United States is included in the concept of “West”, then the outcome of the war is obvious (even without the participation of Israel). But with the self-withdrawal of Americans, the outcome is absolutely not obvious. Even more so, Israel and the monarchies equally hate Iran, but they will not openly conduct joint operations against it or against Syria, their people will not understand such a peculiar union. Egypt, having the most combat-ready armed forces in the Arab world, is unlikely to take part in the war on the side of monarchies. Mursi, although Islamist, but with his plans and ambitions. The armies of the monarchies themselves are well armed, but their servicemen were not hired there to die in a real bloody war, but also against the co-religionists. The European countries of NATO, as the Libyan experience has shown, can only participate very limitedly in a purely air operation (more than 100 planes are totally incapable of aircraft), participation in a ground operation is out of the question (except for small special forces units). And in such a situation, Turkey does not want to be stupid of all and to be lost essentially alone.
As a result, the sustainability of the regime of Bashar al-Assad becomes a decisive factor. The Syrian leader, by the way, is by no means engaged in the destruction of his own people, as claimed in the West, and what is particularly funny - in medieval Arab despotisms led by Wahhabi Saudi Arabia. It reflects the interests of a significant part of the Syrian people, especially minorities (Alawites, Christians, Kurds), which together make up almost half of the country's population. In this regard, he is very similar to Obama, who also won the election with the votes of various groups of people who are not dominant in the country. Moreover, apparently, for him and a considerable part of the Sunni majority, who see how many radical Islamists among the rebels, mostly foreigners. And this, despite the seeming hopelessness of the situation, gives Assad this very stability. In addition, the Syrian leadership, apparently, was able to adequately assess the external situation, not falling into the superstitious horror of the "omnipotent" NATO and seeing in it only a "paper tiger".
If you refer to the recent stories, it can be noted that the concept of aggressive nature and the gigantic power of NATO greatly captivates all opponents of the alliance and deprives the will to resist. In 1990, NATO, of course, was many times stronger than it is now (both militarily and psychologically). When the deployment of the Western grouping in Saudi Arabia was just beginning, it was already clear: this was not for intimidation (if only because it was too expensive), but for a war against Iraq that had seized Kuwait. Nevertheless, the massive attack of the Iraqi army at that moment would be extremely difficult to repel. However, Saddam Hussein, like the overwhelming majority of dictator-aggressors, was stupid and cowardly. It did not prevent the full-fledged deployment of the grouping of the armed forces of the United States and its allies, and only watched in a spell of the process. Then, having shown absolute passivity during the war, naturally doomed itself to a crushing defeat.
At the end of the decade Slobodan Milosevic behaved in a similar way. He was confident that he had bought NATO's favor with the Dayton Accords and the surrender of the Serb Krajina to the Croats. And he didn’t even bother at least strengthening air defense. For this, it was logical to receive the NATO aggression in the 1999 year, during which it capitulated at the very moment when the operation essentially reached a dead end, because it did not reach its goal. The only way out for the alliance was the start of the ground operation in conditions when the Serb ground forces, unlike the Iraqi, practically did not suffer losses and did not lose their morale. But the Serbian president of NATO saved, surrendering at that very moment. Moreover, even during the air campaign, Milosevic could launch active hostilities against Albania and even try to launch air strikes against NATO air bases in Italy. This could give an extremely significant military and, most importantly, a psychological effect. The enemy would face the threat of unacceptable damage. However, this chance was not used.
Well, in the last years of his life, Gaddafi very actively spread out before the West, forgetting about the strengthening of the Armed Forces. And also got his. But he would have bought, like Asad did, at least a couple of divisions of the Buk-М2 air defense system, most likely would not only be alive, but would still lead Libya. It may be recalled that France began to strike at government forces at the moment when they launched an attack on Benghazi, and with very good chances for success. There would be a "Buk" - there would be no strikes.
Looks like Assad decided to be an exception. Perhaps there were adequate people in Damascus who were able to look at NATO realistically, and not through the prism of the concept described. Perhaps there they managed to adequately assess the misery of the Libyan campaign of the alliance and understand that even a relatively small number of “Bukov” and “Pantsira” is enough for the desire to fight the Europeans to disappear. And if the United States is not going to participate in hostilities, then there is absolutely no need to be afraid of everyone else.
The main thing here is that psychological stability is impossible without a powerful army, even if it is equipped with mostly obsolete weapons and military equipment (IWT). This is the most important Syrian lesson. The supply of weapons and military equipment of the 90s is sufficient both for a full-scale war with rebels receiving weapons from abroad and for deterring possible aggression from outside. How long is enough - that is the question. After all, aid with weapons and that extremely insignificant (due to the limitations of their own capabilities) is provided by Assad only by Iran. Russia and especially China only talk a lot. But Turkey, monarchies and Libya who joined them, are very actively pumping the opposition with arms and people. At some point, their quantity may turn into quality ...
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