The Regime Change in Syria and the Responsibility of Great Powers

The sudden fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria, as far as one can judge, came as a complete surprise for all external actors, Moscow including. Of course, many Russian area studies experts for a long time warned about the growing economic and social problems in Syria, as well as about incredible corruption and state governance inefficiency. They questioned the combat capability and motivation of the government armed forces and drew attention to the growing military potential of radical Islamic groups, especially in the breakaway province of Idlib. In the Russian expert community, there was also disappointment about the apparent inability of Damascus to engage at least some moderate factions of the opposition forces into a meaningful process of national reconciliation. The so-called Geneva process aimed at orderly constitutional reforms got stalled mostly due to a very inflexible positions taken by Damascus.

Yet, no one could have predicted the dramatic events of late November—early December, especially the complete unwillingness of the Syrian army to defend the national leader who stood in power for almost a quarter of a century (and with the Assad dynasty ruling the country since 1970.

The Syrian regime change constitutes a new strategic challenge for the Kremlin and the name of the game that Moscow has to play now in Syria and in the Middle East at large is damage limitation rather than anything else.

A lot in defining a new approach to Syria depends on the likely evolution of the former political opposition that is now fully in power in Damascus. This rather amorphous coalition includes many assorted factions—from Islamic fundamentalists and uncompromising proponents of the Sharia law to champions of Western Neo-liberal political models. The fragile balance between the factions might change literally overnight in the direction that is hard to foresee. None of the groups that turned out to be victorious in Syria today should be considered Russia’s strategic partners or supporters, but not all of them are consistent and adamant Russia’s enemies either. Most of these groups are much more hostile to Iran, rather than to Russia, simply because Iranians have been much more visible on the ground than Russians.

Of course, the fate of Syria ultimately depends on the Syrians themselves, and neither Turkey, nor Iran nor Russia, nor the United States can have a decisive voice in defining this future. However, the reality is that the country has been for many years a hotbed of international standoff, with powerful foreign partners and sponsors behind every political and military Syrian group. Therefore, the role of external actors in the post-Assad political transition that has begun cannot be ignored and policy-makers in the Kremlin now have to navigate their way through uncharted political waters keeping a close eye on other influential regional and non-regional players.

After all, great powers claim to be great because they cannot afford the luxury of pure situational opportunism, typical for many other international actors. By definition, they must think and act strategically keeping in mind not only immediate consequences, but also long-term repercussions of their actions. It should also be noted that great powers should consider not only their own interests and preferences, but global and regional public goods as well. This is fully applied to the ongoing crisis in Syria.

The UN Security Council meeting on Syria, which was held behind closed doors on December 9, demonstrated a unity of principled approaches of the great powers to the events taking place in Syria, which is so rare in our days! Russian Permanent Representative Vasily Nebenzya stressed that the commonality of positions extends to the issues of “preserving the territorial integrity and unity of Syria, ensuring the protection of civilians, ensuring the delivery of humanitarian aid to the population in need.”

The sudden fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria, as far as one can judge, came as a complete surprise for all external actors, Moscow including. Of course, many Russian area studies experts for a long time warned about the growing economic and social problems in Syria, as well as about incredible corruption and state governance inefficiency. They questioned the combat capability and motivation of the government armed forces and drew attention to the growing military potential of radical Islamic groups, especially in the breakaway province of Idlib. In the Russian expert community, there was also disappointment about the apparent inability of Damascus to engage at least some moderate factions of the opposition forces into a meaningful process of national reconciliation. The so-called Geneva process aimed at orderly constitutional reforms got stalled mostly due to very inflexible positions taken by Damascus.

Yet, no one could have predicted the dramatic events of late November—early December, especially the complete unwillingness of the Syrian army to defend the national leader who stood in power for almost a quarter of a century (and with the Assad dynasty ruling the country since 1970. This is a peculiar feature of all personalist regimes of Syrian type—they look very strong and practically invulnerable exactly until the very moment when their rapid and uncontrolled disintegration begins.

The shock of what is happening in Syria is comparable, if not greater, than the emotional effect of the Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7 last year. The two phases of the regional crisis are closely linked; it would not be an exaggeration to say that December 2024 has become a direct, albeit postponed in time, continuation of October 2023. Without the successful Israeli efforts to weaken both the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Islamic Republic of Iran, the swift implosion of the Syrian regime would have been impossible. However, the likely impact of the regime change in Damascus will undoubtedly have much broader implications than just a shift of power balance between Israel and Iran in favor of the former.

Aleksandr Aksenenok:
Syrian Reconstruction in a Changing Regional Context: Challenges and Opportunities

These days in Moscow, there is a lot of lamenting about Russia’s large-scale political, financial and military investments in Syria, including the two military bases in this country. The Tartus Naval Base is Russia's only full-fledged naval facility in the Mediterranean, providing critical access for naval operations and logistics. It serves as a refueling and repair station for Russian vessels, enabling them to operate without returning to Black Sea ports, which is of particular importance today, given the ongoing conflict with Ukraine that limits Russia’s free access to a part of the Black Sea waters. The base can accommodate nuclear submarines and it has undergone major modernization since the onset of the Syrian civil war in 2011, with a treaty signed in 2017 allowing Russia to use it free of charge for 49 years.

The Khmeimim Air Base established in 2015, serves as a key air hub for Russian operations in Syria, housing a variety of aircraft including fighter jets and helicopters. It has robust infrastructure and has been integral to air operations against radical opposition forces throughout the civil war. Moreover, this airbase has served as a key personnel and cargo transit facility assisting Russia’s operations in various countries in Africa. Both bases remain safe and fully under the Russian control for the time being, their future remains uncertain and there are reasonable doubts to believe that Moscow can retain its possession of these facilities for a long time in future—at least on the terms that it got from the Assad government.

Russia has a number of other valuable assets in Syria. It is one of the major Syrian trading partners; its overall accumulated investments in the country including projects in energy, transportation and logistics amount to more than USD 20 bln. There are many Syrians, who have received their education in Russia or in the former Soviet Union and remain attached to Moscow politically and culturally. Russia can claim a relatively small, but quite economically successful and socially active Syrian Diaspora. One cannot underestimate close links between Russian and Syrian uniformed men tested by many years of military brotherhood. In sum, many practical things are at stake in Syria for the Kremlin, not to mention potential implications for Russia’s overall international image as a credible security provider.

Of course, one can argue the Russia’s engagement in Syria has always been quite modest, limited primarily to providing air support for Damascus, while Iran and the local Shia militia backed by Tehran were in charge of a more important ground support. Some would also argue that Bashar Assad, given his political inflexibility and resistance to reforms, has been a burden rather than an asset for the Kremlin and that his departure from the Syrian political scene should not be regarded as a historic tragedy. In fact, there has been no personal chemistry between the former Syrian leader and Vladimir Putin. Still, the Syrian regime change constitutes a new strategic challenge for the Kremlin and the name of the game that Moscow has to play now in Syria and in the Middle East at large is damage limitation rather than anything else.

A lot in defining a new approach to Syria depends on the likely evolution of the former political opposition that is now fully in power in Damascus. This rather amorphous coalition includes many assorted factions—from Islamic fundamentalists and uncompromising proponents of the Sharia law to champions of Western Neo-liberal political models. The fragile balance between the factions might change literally overnight in the direction that is hard to foresee. None of the groups that turned out to be victorious in Syria today should be considered Russia’s strategic partners or supporters, but not all of them are consistent and adamant Russia’s enemies either. Most of these groups are much more hostile to Iran, rather than to Russia, simply because Iranians have been much more visible on the ground than Russians.

This situation offers Russia some windows of opportunity. For instance, Moscow has supported Bashar al-Assad in his fight against Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS)[1]—a group, which has roots in al-Qaeda and may have the most radical post-Assad political agenda; however, now Russia is negotiating with HTS its future presence in Syria. The Russian side has contacts to other influential groups in Syria including Turkey-backed Syrian National Army and Kurdish-based Syrian Democratic Forces. One should not underestimate deep Russia’s links to the Alawite community in the West of the country.

Of course, the fate of Syria ultimately depends on the Syrians themselves, and neither Turkey, nor Iran nor Russia, nor the United States can have a decisive voice in defining this future. However, the reality is that the country has been for many years a hotbed of international standoff, with powerful foreign partners and sponsors behind every political and military Syrian group. Therefore, the role of external actors in the post-Assad political transition that has begun cannot be ignored and policy-makers in the Kremlin now have to navigate their way through uncharted political waters keeping a close eye on other influential regional and non-regional players.

With neighboring states, everything seems to be more or less clear. None of them has sufficient military and economic resources, nor the necessary political commitment to take responsibility for the future of Syrian statehood. Therefore, the algorithm of actions of the Syrian neighbors in one way or another will be defined mainly by their current opportunistic interests and will be subject to change depending on the dynamics of events in Syria. They will definitely engage into various alliances and coalitions with each other in order to address specific dimensions of the Syrian crisis, but their interests are too divergent for building long-term strategic partnerships.

For Turkey, it is important to retain maximum influence on the new leadership in Damascus, as well as to return at least some of millions of Syrian refugees now stationed in Turkey to their homeland. At the same time, Ankara will try to the extent possible, to prevent the emergence of a radical Islamist state on Turkish borders. Probably, Recep Erdogan would be much more comfortable if Damascus was under control of the Syrian National Army units, and not by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militants, but it is the latter, not the former that now has the upper hand in the Syrian capital.

Israel's priority is to inflict irreparable damage to Syria's remaining military potential, which is exactly what the Israeli air force is actively doing now hitting the Syrian military hardware all over the place. In addition, Benjamin Netanyahu's goals include the complete ousting of Iran from Syria (if at all possible) and the ultimate consolidation of the earlier occupied Syrian Golan Heights as an organic part of the Jewish state.

Iran, in its turn, is forced to deal with the task of minimizing damage to its positions and the positions of the Syrian Shiite minority, which are likely to be further challenged by the victorious Sunni groups. Iranians have a lot of property in Syria, and the future of this property for the time being is unclear. Iranian leaders (above all, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders) also have to find ways for continuing supporting Tehran's ally Hezbollah in conditions when the land bridge to Lebanon, which has been operating for a long time, is being consistently destroyed by Israel.

Iraq needs to be wary of the destabilizing impact of the Syrian events on its eastern regions. The common border of the two countries is almost six hundred kilometers, through which there is now a flow of refugees, including large numbers of uniformed men from the former Syrian army.

The same fears of a possible cross-border overlap of Syrian instability should prevent the Prime Minister of Lebanon and the King of Jordan from sleeping peacefully at night. In Egypt, they should be concerned about potential impact of the regime change in Syria on its own radical clandestine groups, in particular—on the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood that was ousted from power by the military back in 2013.

Let us argue once again that the role of regional actors in the Syrian political transition will be very important and that these actors are likely to communicate actively with each other, form situational alliances and coalitions around specific issues of security and development. Still, given resource limitations, their conflicting interests and the apparent lack of mutual trust they are hardly in a position to find lasting solutions to fundamental problems of the war-torn country. An engagement of overseas great powers looks almost indispensable.

After all, great powers claim to be great because they cannot afford the luxury of pure situational opportunism, typical for many other international actors. By definition, they must think and act strategically keeping in mind not only immediate consequences, but also long-term repercussions of their actions. It should also be noted that great powers should consider not only their own interests and preferences, but global and regional public goods as well. This is fully applied to the ongoing crisis in Syria.

Ivan Bocharov:
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Of course, now is not the best time to search for a consensus between great powers—the world is in a state of fierce geopolitical confrontation. The situation is further complicated by the upcoming political change in Washington in just a month, which may well be followed by some shifts in US policy in the Middle East. And yet, political rhetoric aside, the great powers' interests vis-à-vis post-Assad Syria largely coincide.

First, no one is interested in the breakup of Syria into several mini-states. Not only because these mini-states are not likely to be sustainable, but also because an encroachment upon the territorial status quo can set off a chain reaction of redrawing borders in the Middle East region with unpredictable but extremely dangerous consequences.

Second, no responsible player can possibly benefit from Syria's transformation into a major new hotbed of political extremism and international terrorism at the heart of the Arab world. The tragic fate of Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime by Washington and its allies in the spring of 2003 should serve as a warning to everybody. A repetition of the Iraqi events in Syria would have affected everyone—not only Damascus's closest neighbors, but also the overseas great powers.

Third, it is in everyone's interest to prevent the restoration of the chemical weapons potential that Damascus once possessed and which was destroyed as part of the Russian-American agreement reached in September 2013. The ability of any political regime in Damascus to get back to old plans regarding chemical weapons is not clear, but this option should be ruled out once and forever.

Fourth, there is a common interest in ensuring that the vast and diverse arsenals of conventional weapons accumulated by all those involved in the country's decades-long civil war do not fall into the hands of irresponsible extremist groups, whether inside or outside the country. Israel is now partially solving this problem by force, but the Israeli air strikes are not in a position to solve the problem of small and portable arms that are now in abundance in all corners of the country.

Fifth, it is important for everyone to deal with the prospect of a large-scale humanitarian catastrophe in Syria caused by shortages of food, fuel, basic medicines, the collapse of state and municipal systems, the persistence of hotbeds of armed violence, the increased activity of criminal groups and other factors. Unilateral sanctions imposed on Syria by the West have to be lifted as soon as possible and all the existing restrictions of the way of international humanitarian assistance should be eliminated as well.

Sixth, everyone would like to hope that the new political regime in the country will be inclusive, that Syria will soon have a modern constitution, and that in the new political system there will be a place for representatives of all the very diverse ethnic and religious groups of the complex Syrian society. Nor would anyone want to see an era of medieval gender discrimination and segregation in Syria. Syria can and should do better than Afghanistan did after Taliban seized power in Kabul in late August of 2021, but a consorted great powers’ position is needed to incentivize the new Syrian leadership to move in this direction.

Seventh, it is in everyone's interest to prevent a new wave of migration from Syria, which could overwhelm neighboring countries and reach other regions. Moreover, it is desirable that at least some of the eight million Syrian refugees now settled in the Middle East, in Europe and elsewhere return to their homes and take part in the reconstruction of the country destroyed by the civil war. The vast Syrian Diasporas scattered all over the globe could and should play a critical role in rebuilding the country.

Eighth, there is a clear common interest in a post-Assad Syria continuing the process of returning to the Arab family that began several years ago, ceasing to be one of the many problems of the Arab world and becoming a constructive participant in the efforts to create a new system of regional security and development.

Andrey Kortunov:
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Are these common interests enough to insulate the Syrian case from the negative global geopolitical context? Skeptics will no doubt say that all this is not enough, and that further developments in Syria will inevitably be perceived in Brussels and in Moscow, in Washington and in Beijing, as a "zero-sum game." Indeed, in the current circumstances, it is difficult to count on the adoption of any long-term multilateral programs for the post-conflict reconstruction of the country, or at least on the approval by the UN Security Council of a road-map for promoting state-building in Syria. Some twenty years ago, great powers were able to put together the so-called Quartet on the Middle East (Russia, the United States, the European Union and the United Nations) to jointly address the challenge of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the end of the day, the Quartet has failed to deliver a lasting solution to the problem. These days, a Syrian Quartet, Quintet, or any other similar grouping looks completely out of touch with geopolitical realities.

However, we should not rush to conclusions—the UN Security Council meeting on Syria, which was held behind closed doors on December 9, demonstrated a unity of principled approaches of the great powers to the events taking place in Syria, which is so rare in our days! Russian Permanent Representative Vasily Nebenzya stressed that the commonality of positions extends to the issues of “preserving the territorial integrity and unity of Syria, ensuring the protection of civilians, ensuring the delivery of humanitarian aid to the population in need.”

Of course, this great powers unity can be fragile and short-lived. The main external players in the Syrian conflict have a long train of mutual grievances, suspicions and disagreements that prevent each of them from acting as a natural leader in national reconciliation efforts. On the other hand, the actual “self-withdrawal” of the great powers from the Syrian problem according to Donald Trump's formula (“This is not our war, we must let this situation resolve itself”) actually means the delegitimization of the great powers as the leading and responsible players in world politics. What kind of great powers are they, if they turn their backs to the situation where they share fundamental interests and have similar concerns?

Under these conditions, the initiative for joint efforts to prevent negative scenarios for the further development of events in Syria could come from those nations that were not directly involved in the military confrontation in this country and can act as honest brokers. For example, China or India could come up with proposals to create a multilateral platform for post-conflict reconstruction projects in Syria. The approval of such a format by the UN Security Council would be an important incentive not only for national economic assistance programs, but also for private investors from the European Union, East Asia and the Gulf countries. Ideally, a P5 summit meeting on the Syrian agenda would have to take place in early 2025, but even a meeting at a lower level could be a major step forward under the circumstances.

The current situation in Syria remains highly volatile and fluid. The balance between moderates and radicals, between pragmatists and ideologues, between tolerance and intolerance, between order and chaos, between civil peace and civil war, can change at any moment. The coming months, weeks, and even days may prove decisive in determining the country's trajectory for many years to come. It is at such turning points in history that the special status of great powers in world politics is put to the test. History tells us that many great powers failed this test more than once. We can only hope that this time they will rise to the challenges they face.

First published in Chinese in the Guancha.

1. An organization recognized as terrorist and banned on Russian territory