WarSclerotic

United States special representative for Syria James Jeffrey confirmed that the Trump administration is not seeking to oust dictator Bashar al-Assad and accepts that Iran will play a diplomatic role in the process aimed at achieving a political solution to end the nearly eight-year conflict.

Jeffrey nevertheless stressed that Assad and his Russian and Iranian backers need to create a “fundamentally different” atmosphere in the country if they expect Washington to fund reconstruction projects once the war concludes. He estimated it will cost $300-400 billion to rebuild the war-torn country and contended that Western powers will not commit funds if their demands are not met.

The Syrian peace process has been focused around the so-called Astana talks between representatives from Moscow, Tehran and Ankara, with parallel United Nations-backed negotiations in Geneva being long-stalled in large part due to infighting within the Syrian opposition.

Though acknowledging Tehran’s diplomatic role, Jeffrey reiterated the US demand that all Iranian military forces vacate Syria, a position strongly advocated by Israel which over the past two years has conducted hundreds of aerial raids targeting the Islamic Republic’s military infrastructure therein. Jerusalem has repeatedly stated that it will not allow Iran to establish a military foothold in Syria from which its proxies can carry out attacks against the Jewish state.

In many ways Jeffrey’s comments can be construed as an about-face regarding US policy on Assad, given that former US president Barack Obama explicitly called for his removal from power in 2011.

“Yet it is not a total reversal of Washington’s stance,” Dr. Christopher Phillips, a Syrian specialist at the London-based Chatham House think-tank, told The Media Line.

“Since 2013, when Obama refrained from launching strikes on Damascus after the regime’s alleged use of chemical weapons, there has been a gradual softening of US policy against Assad.”

The Trump administration’s goal of remaining in Syria to block Iranian expansionism is a fairly new development, Phillips added. “Jeffrey’s statement is a recognition of the reality that pushing the Islamic Republic out of the country altogether is extremely difficult. Therefore, if Washington acknowledges that Assad is here to stay, it must also grant the Iranians a role to play.”

What is problematic about Jeffrey’s statement is that it damages US credibility, according to Phillips. “The Americans made a commitment to remove Assad under Obama, but, unfortunately, it is not rare for dictatorial regimes with blood on their hands to remain unprosecuted for long periods of time and the outside world doesn’t seem willing to do much about it.”

Lt. Col. (res.) Dr. Mordechai Kedar, a Syrian expert at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University, believes that Syria is on the verge of descending into further anarchy. “There has not been much reporting on Turkey’s threat to invade Syria in order to fight the Kurds,” he stressed to The Media Line.

In the event, such clashes could ignite wider hostilities between Turkish and American forces. “This explains the policy change because America is now torn between supporting the Kurds and trying to keep Turkey part of NATO,” Dr. Kedar explained.

In 2011, pro-democracy demonstrators in Syria staged a series of protests inspired by the “Arab Spring” in neighboring countries. Following a major crackdown, the ensuing civil war pitted pro-regime forces—including Assad’s army, Russian air power and Iranian-backed groups like Hizbullah—against primarily Sunni rebel fighters. It also saw the rise and near fall of Islamic State, one of the most brutal terrorist regimes in modern times.

In recent months, the Syrian regime has recaptured rebel-held territories except the last remaining holdout in northwest Idlib Province. Nevertheless, Damascus and its opponents still need to hash out a political deal to officially end the conflict, which has left more than 350,000 people dead—although some estimates peg the number at 500,000—and displaced millions.

As Israel’s Operation Northern Shield continues into its third week, the IDF’s 869th Shahaf (Seagull) Field Intelligence Battalion are the eyes and ears of the troops in the field.

“We are in charge of identifying and stopping enemy moves,” Lt.-Col. Tomer Meltzman told The Jerusalem Post. “We are the taking the eyes in the field and expanding it, looking across the border to make sure that no enemy targets our troops and, if we identify a threat, to stop it.”

While the IDF has various surveillance and intelligence gathering techniques nothing can replace the IDF field intelligence battalion unit made up of female observers and male combat troops who spend all day, every day watching Lebanon.

The IDF launched Operation Northern Shield in order to detect and neutralize cross-border attack tunnels dug by the Iranian-backed Shi’ite organization. Israel believes that the tunnels would have been used by the Hezbollah’s elite Radwan unit to infiltrate into Israel in an attempt to take control of several communities and kill as many civilians and troops as possible.

Dozens of Hezbollah tunnels are believed to have been dug along the 130-km.-long border between the two countries, and the military said the operation dubbed “Northern Shield” would take weeks or months to complete.

“From the first night of the operation, we have been a part of it and we will remain part of it until it’s over, and even after it,” Metzman told the Post, adding that “The soldiers were surprised about the tunnels on the northern border. We kept it a secret. But we have trained the soldiers to deal with surprises. We always have to expect the unexpected.”

The precious intelligence gathered by the battalion is not only crucial in the operation, but according to the IDF, Israel’s intelligence capabilities has increased dramatically since the Second Lebanon War in 2006 and has a significant number of targets in the north if another war were to break out.

Gathering intelligence in the field is always a challenge, especially when Hezbollah militants do not wear military uniforms or openly carry weapons because of Resolution 1701 which ended the Second Lebanon War in 2006.

The group also plants themselves in the middle of civilian areas. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that almost every second home in Southern Lebanon is being used by the Shi’ite militant group.

“It’s an organization which has been growing over the years, and we have been watching them and we have stopped them many times in the past few years,” Meltzman said, referring to the group’s fictitious environmental group known as “Green Without Borders.”

According to Meltzman, the battalion has also observed Lebanese troops, including intelligence officers, meeting with Hezbollah militants numerous times.

“The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) and Lebanese government is responsible for what is happening. While the LAF is not part of Hezbollah, the LAF should stop Hezbollah’s activities in south Lebanon, Hezbollah should not exist,” Meltzman said.

Early on in the operation, the IDF fired warning shots at three Hezbollah militants dressed in civilian clothes attempting to approach the border area where the IDF was carrying out tunnel excavation work. According to the military the three men – who fled back to Lebanon after IDF troops opened fire – took advantage of bad weather to steal IDF equipment deployed to uncover the tunnels.

Lebanon meanwhile said that IDF troops opened fire on a “Lebanese army patrol near the Blue Line in the Kroum al-Sharaqi region east of the village of Meis al-Jabal “because of heavy fog in the area.”

But, Meltzman said “the battalion lives the Lebanon border day in and out. We know people across the border and their faces. We know how to differentiate between Hezbollah and Lebanese armed forces.”

The female soldiers in unit monitor the feeds of remote controlled cameras set up along the border and locate any terrorist infiltration while at the same time alerting troops in the field and communicate with them to remove any threat. The unit’s male soldiers spent hours in the field every week, working quietly to set up forward camouflaged posts to watch the enemy across the border.

The battalion is also helped by the IDF’s “Mars” multi-sensory system developed by Elbit Systems and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems. The next-generation thermal imager operates using un-cooled sensor technology and combines a laser range-finder, GPS, compass, day channel and recording system. Due to its advanced observation and target acquisition capabilities as well as being a lightweight system, MARS is especially suited for the infantry and special units.

When US President Donald Trump was elected he leaned heavily on retired and current US military officers to guide his policies abroad and at home. Now, with the resignation of Secretary of Defense James Mattis, the generals are going home and with them their policies in Syria and other countries. This marks a major turning point for the administration and Trump appears poised for a new round of isolationism and global retreat that will change the Middle East and the US posture globally.

After Trump’s election he didn’t have a major team in place to transition into the presidency. A week after the vote, according to Bob Woodward’s account, Trump met with General Jack Keane at Trump tower. Keane recommended that Trump reach out to retired four-star Marine Corps general James Mattis. Mattis has been pushed out by the Obama administration in 2013. Keane said Mattis was very experienced in the Middle East and noted he was a combat veteran of Afghanistan and Iraq. “ In Fear, the Woodward account, Trump met Mattis in November. “We need to change what we are doing,” Mattis told Trump. “It can’t be a war of attrition, it must be a war of annihilation.”

John Kelly, who had left Southern Command in 2016, also joined the administration as head of Homeland Security. Joseph Dunford would continue on as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. He had been nominated in 2015 and like Kelly and Mattis had a Marine Corps background. In February 2017 Trump also named Army Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster as national security advisor after retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn had resigned for misleading statements that would eventually lead to his indictment.

The McMaster-Mattis-Kelly team would be a key trio in the first year of the administration. They also played a central role as Trump sought to delegate more to the military. John Kelly became White House Chief of Staff in July 2017. Trump wanted to delegate more to the military, not micro-manage issues. Foreign Policy pointed out that the actual shift in strategy was minimal because most of the policies on the ground, such as working ‘by, with and through,’ US partners would continue. Many of these generals had crafted the current approach of using a minimum number of troops and a maximum amount of airpower combined with intelligence gathering to defeat terror groups. A Defense official in April 2017 said that new policies were “beginning to take shape.” It was a sense that the commanders could “do a bit more.”

Some critics expressed concern at the military-heavy White House. They pointed out that Mike Pompeo also came from a West Point background and had been in the army during the Gulf War. He would lead the CIA and then the State Department under Trump. Lt. General Keith Kellogg would also come on board on the National Security Council. Derek Harvey, a former Colonel who had served in Iraq and wanted the US to be tough on Iran, would also serve on the NSC, but he would be pushed out by McMaster in July 2017.

Trump wanted to focus on the war on ISIS, while Mattis wanted a broader strategy for the Middle East, according to accounts. Early on it seemed that McMaster would focus on North Korea while Mattis would focus on a strategy to defeat ISIS. The war on ISIS was going smoothly under Trump. Mosul in Iraq was liberated in the summer and Raqqa, the ISIS capital in Syria, was liberated in the fall of 2017. That is when Trump appears to have first begun to think of getting out of Syria. Saudi Gulf Affairs Minister Thamer al-Sabhan visited Raqqa as part of a Saudi discussion about how the Gulf state could help stabilize Sunni Arab areas of eastern Syria.

At the time the US was doing most of the work of the 70-nation anti-ISIS Coalition. Trump had kept Brett McGurk, Obama’s anti-ISIS envoy, on as the point person for the Coalition. In early 2018 Trump began pressing for other US allies, such as Saudi Arabia, to foot the bill for post-ISIS Syria operations. The Coalition and US Department of Defense was saying that ISIS had lost 98 percent of its territory by March 2018. In mid-March the Trump administration indicated Riyadh might spend billions in Syria and Trump said the US would be leaving “very soon.”

However the US didn’t leave Syria in April. Instead John Bolton, who replaced McMaster in March, and Mike Pompeo replaced Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State. The changeover in March meant that the US decided in April to focus on Iran as a threat in the Middle East. This is clear because Trump left the Iran Deal in May. Bolton and Pompeo wanted to shift US strategy to confront Iran and use eastern Syria as leverage. With the US and its mostly Kurdish partners in eastern Syria controlling around a third of the country, this could be used to influence Damascus. Throughout the summer and fall the administration rolled out a new concept about stabilizing eastern Syria and using it to leverage against the Iranian presence in Syria. The US was planning for the long term.

Then Trump confirmed that John Kelly would be leaving as Chief of Staff. The announcement in early December came just days before Trump’s call with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan on December 14 when he decided to wrap things up in Syria. Numerous reports confirm that Trump didn’t consult with most of his administration. James Jeffrey, the US envoy for Syria engagement gave a talk about the future of Syria on December 17 without appearing to know anything about Trump’s plans to leave. Mattis also appears to have been stunned. Reports indicate that Trump and Kelly were also on cold terms ahead of Kelly’s leaving. This left Trump isolated, the exact opposite of his desire to delegate to his generals, instead he made the quick decision on Syria without the war cabinet anywhere in sight.

Mattis drafted a resignation letter and provided it to Trump on December 20. He doesn’t specifically mention Syria, but he does mention US allies and the need for the US to sustain global influence. “While the US remains the indispensable nation in the free world, we cannot protect our interests or serve that role effectively without maintaining strong alliances and showing respect to those allies,” he writes. He mentions US leadership in relation to the 74-nation global Coalition to defeat ISIS. That Coalition’s effectiveness is now in question as the US leaves Syria. The fight against ISIS is not over, with the US launching 200 airstrikes in the second week of December.

Trump’s decision to leave Syria, seemingly made in haste, but actually after around one year of Trump already questioning why the US was doing the heavy lifting in Syria, comes as the generals are being eclipsed in his administration. Their desire for a clear strategy and tendency towards caution and status quo appears to be leaving with them. Trump also wanted to leave Afghanistan in the first months of his administration. “I want to find out why we’ve been there 17 years, how’s it going and what we should do in terms of additional ideas,” he said in July 2017 according to Woodward. Lindsey Graham, who has also urged the US to stay in Syria, said the US needed to be working towards stabilization in Afghanistan as well.

Under the tenure of Mattis some of the US policies in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria could be delegated to his capable hands. With him gone, the policies will be less clear and Trump may take on more responsibility in decision making on these issues. This is precisely the opposite of what Trump initially wanted to do when he delegated authority and told the generals to decide.This is already reverberating around the Middle East where adversaries will see this as an opportunity to threaten the US and US allies.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan spoke on Friday following the US withdrawal from Syria.

Erdogan claimed his country will take command of the fighting against ISIS in Syria, and continue its fighting against the Kurds in northern Syria.

A US official speaking anonymously said that US considers putting special forces in Iraq, to respond to events in Syria.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo assured Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi that the U.S. is still committed to fighting Islamic State in Iraq and other areas despite its planned troop withdrawal from Syria, Abdul Mahdi’s office said on Saturday.

US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the US forces from Syria was followed by harsh criticism from Israeli intelligence officials.

“A feeling of abandonment,” An official told The New York Times. “Trump threw us under Israel bus – and in this case the bus is a Russian truck supplying weapons to Syria and Hezbollah.”

Trump’s decision also received criticism in the Republican camp. “It is an Obama-like mistake made by the Trump administration.” Senator Lindsey Graham called the withdrawal. “This will be a great victory for ISIS, Iran, Assad and the Russians.”