"War is often...a mass discharge of accumulated internal rage (where)...the inner fears of mankind are discharged in mass destruction."
So war is an ire drummed up in response to our internal fear manifested by aggression? What are our fears? Fear of losing our social strata in society, fear brought on by the greed to have more, fear stemmed from jealous or even love? Yes, humans have gone to war for little else.
Is war normal?
Some psychoanalyst believes so. They say humans are filled with frustrations and grievances over their circumstances that they channel this into bias against other races, religions or social strata. To believe this, then we must agree that man is an animal. Scientifically we are animals, higher animals. The ‘higher’ is there for a reason because our superior nervous system should give us a rationale to withdraw behind, think and come up with practical solutions to our problems and adequate responses to questions in our environment.
The highest number of deaths laid before the ‘war altar’ in history in the second world war which saw over 60 million people dead. To put this number in perspective, that is if you don’t already find it mind-boggling, that represents 3% of the world population in the year 1940.
They say some wars are justified.
Justified war
Jus ad Bellum is the right to war. This school of thought is based on the principle of discriminality and proportionality. It basically attempts to answer the impossible question: who is right and by what degree should the guilty be punished. What right do we have to determine who lives or dies? I guess it’s a question of ethics. Religion doesn’t even come into this because she’s even guiltier than those who go to war for greed. Religious wars are as irrational and senseless as those who fight them. Even worse are those who take sides. I guess Jus ad Bellum, the right to war explains the stand and decision some countries have made regarding the Syrian crisis.
History of the Syrian Crisis
General Hafez al-Assad has long been a key figure in Syrian politics. In fact, some claim he had the authority while the then Syrian General Salah Jadid held the ‘pretence’ of power and a formal title. His position came under attack following his decision to intervene in the black September crisis in Jordan against the wishes of his Defence Minister Hafez al-Assad. Following the failure of the Black September Crisis, Hafez al-Assad on 13 November 1970 successfully seized power.
He immediately made moves to cement his position and push its aim to build a social state and improve the Ba’ath Party. He succeeded and ruled until his death in 2000.
His son Bashar al-Assad came into power. From 1962 to 2011, Syria was thrown into a state of emergency in response to the conflict with Israel. As you can imagine this state of emergency completely placed the whole country under Assad’s rule until the 2011 protests.
The perceived failure of Assad to improve on the policies of his father, his inability to deliver on his promises, the more than five-year drought that saw a mass migration of farmers to the city and the harsh socioeconomic environment drove the protests. In response, Assad arrested and imprisoned key protesters, but like a wave, this action only exacerbated the situation as protesters demanded the release of ‘protesters.’
The protests began on 15th March 2011. With the increasing waves of violence came reports of torture and death by the government on children. Even the shift from a unitary government to a multiparty state did nothing to help. Assad blamed foreign governments for inciting his people to rebellion. In a previous interview, he had said, ‘there is not even a moderate opposition to my government.’
He was made to swallow those words when the protesters changed tune and began demanding the end of his reign in 8th April 2011. As the protests grew, so did the death toll. By May 2011, 1000 civilians and 150 soldiers lost their lives while thousands were detained.
This was just the beginning.
Perhaps to Assad’s fury reports of defection in his own ranks as some soldiers and policemen left to join the protesters continued to rise. The war turned inwards as defectors and ‘hesitant’ soldiers were executed.
Matters took on a serious note when a majority of the protesters and defectors coalesced to form a rebel army, the Free Syrian Army on 29 July 2011. The ‘protests’ became a full-fledged civil war with its own highlights like the Houla massacre that saw 108 people executed. But the rebels were not deterred. By 6 March 2013, they successfully marched on and captured the city of Ragga.
Assad also had his ‘moments.’ With the help of the Lebanese based militant group, he marched on and captured the towns of Burhaniya, Saqraja, and al-Radwaniya near the Lebanese border. The war continued to go back and forth with each side conquering and losing territories until 21 August when chemical weapons were used for the first time.
It’s almost like watching children argue. You sit there indulgently waiting for them to get it out of their system until one of them suddenly produces a knife. That’s the closest similarity to the use of chemical weapons in the back and forth warfare.
As if the Assad forces with their chemical weapons were not enough to deal with, ISIS captured the town of Azaz, prompting the rebel forces to turn their attention towards driving ISIS from their territory. Another group, the al-Nusra Front joined the war and helped the rebel forces drive out ISIS from their region. ISIS then retreated to Ragga.
The fighting, winning and losing of territory and deaths continued. In the midst of these, a general election was held on 3 June 2014. Assad, of course, won overwhelmingly.
The war continued. What followed was a lot of back and forths with ‘intending interventions,’ expressions of outrage and concern by the media and powerful figures. At this point, I wonder if the lines had not become blurred. Do they still know what they are fighting for? is Assad and his family wondering if they’ve gone too far? Are the international community regretting taking a spectator’s stand this long?
| Column 1 | Column 2 | Column 3 |
|---|---|---|
| S/N | Date | Action |
| 1 | January 2, 2012 | The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Nabil Elaraby, acknowledges during a press conference that Syrian security forces continue to kill protesters in spite of the presence of Arab League monitors. Elaraby says that monitors have confirmed that the Syrian government has withdrawn armored vehicles and tanks from cities, partially complying with the Arab League plan. |
| 2 | January 4, 2012 | Opposition groups accuse the Syrian government of sidestepping its agreement to withdraw military forces from cities by replacing some military armored vehicles with similar vehicles belonging to the police and concealing other vehicles in dugouts and behind barriers. |
| 3 | January 28, 2012 | Citing an increase in violence in Syria, Elaraby announces the suspension of the Arab League monitoring mission. The announcement comes after several Arab countries withdrew their members of the monitoring delegation over concerns for their safety. |
| 4 | February 4, 2012 | Russia and China veto a UN Security Council resolution that condemns the Assad regime’s violent crackdown and calls for a transition to a democratic political system in Syria. Chinese and Russian officials say that the resolution places excessive pressure on the Syrian government, decreasing the likelihood of a political settlement. |
| 5 | The Syrian army begins an assault on the city of Homs, an opposition stronghold. Predominately Sunni districts of the city are hit by artillery and sniper fire, causing large numbers of civilian casualties. The attack continues for several weeks. | |
| 6 | February 15, 2012 | The Syrian government announces that it will speed up its plans to hold a referendum on a new draft constitution, scheduling the referendum for February 26. The draft constitution, praised by Syrian officials for incorporating democratic reforms, is dismissed by the opposition and much of the international community as a ploy meant to draw attention away from violence in the country. |
| 7 | February 16, 2012 | The UN General Assembly passes a nonbinding resolution condemning the Syrian government’s crackdown and calling on Assad to resign. |
| 8 | February 23, 2012 | Kofi Annan, former secretary-general of the UN, is appointed as a joint UN and Arab League peace envoy for Syria. |
| 9 | February 26, 2012 | As violence continues, Syria holds a referendum on the new draft constitution. |
| 10 | February 27, 2012 | Syrian officials announced that the constitutional referendum passed with nearly 90 percent of the vote and that voter turnout was high. The opposition says that the referendum, held on short notice amid widespread violence, must be considered illegitimate. |
| 11 | February 29, 2012 | A UN official says that the Syrian government’s crackdown has resulted in the deaths of more than 7,500 civilians since protests began. |
| 12 | March 11, 2012 | Annan’s first talks with Assad end with little sign of progress. |
| 13 | March 16, 2012 | Annan submits a peace plan to the UN Security Council, calling on the Syrian government to stop using violence against the opposition and to accept a cease-fire monitored by the UN. |
| 14 | March 22, 2012 | All 15 members of the UN Security Council agree to a statement threatening Syria with further action if it fails to end the violence. |
| 15 | March 27, 2012 | Annan announces that Syria has agreed to the UN-backed peace plan. |
| 16 | April 2, 2012 | Annan announces that Assad has accepted April 12 as the deadline for the implementation of the cease-fire and the withdrawal of heavy weapons from cities as required by the UN peace plan. Over the next several days, media reports indicate escalating violence. |
| 17 | April 12, 2012 | The UN-sponsored cease-fire takes effect. Violence by Syrian forces reportedly decreases. |
| 18 | April 14, 2012 | Amid reports that Syrian forces have resumed attacks on civilians and opposition fighters, the UN Security Council passes a resolution authorizing the deployment of a team of monitors in Syria to observe the cease-fire. The first monitors arrive in Syria the following day. |
| 19 | April 19, 2012 | As violence escalates, Ban Ki-moon, the secretary-general of the United Nations, states that Syria has failed to adhere to the terms of the UN peace plan and that both government and opposition forces have been responsible for breaching the cease-fire. |
| 20 | May 7, 2012 | The Syrian government holds legislative elections. The elections are dismissed by the opposition as meaningless, given the weakness of the Syrian People’s Assembly and the ongoing violence in the country. |
| 21 | May 10, 2012 | More than 50 people are killed in a double suicide bombing at a military base in Damascus. The Syrian government blames opposition groups, while members of the opposition contend that the Syrian government staged the attack to discredit the opposition. A video statement purportedly released by the Nuṣrah Front, an Islamist militant group operating in Syria, claims responsibility for the bombings. Days later, however, spokesmen for the group denounce the video as a forgery and deny responsibility for the attack. |
| 21 | May 25, 2012 | More than 100 people are killed in the area known as Ḥūlah, north of Homs, with most of the victims concentrated in the village of Tall Daww. UN observers confirm that most of the dead were killed in house-to-house raids and that about 50 children died in the attacks. Witnesses and members of the opposition claim that the attacks were carried out by Syrian security forces and government-aligned civilian militias, while the government blames opposition militias. |
| 22 | May 28, 2012 | The governments of several Western countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany, expel Syrian diplomats in response to the killings in Ḥūlah. |
| 23 | June 6, 2012 | Assad names Riyad Hijab, a senior figure in the Baʿth Party, as prime minister. |
| 24 | June 16, 2012 | The UN suspends its monitoring operations in Syria, citing difficulty of guaranteeing the monitors’ safety amid ongoing violence. |
| 25 | June 22, 2012 | A Turkish reconnaissance jet crashes into the Mediterranean Sea near Syrian airspace. In the following days, both Turkish and Syrian officials acknowledge that the jet was downed by Syrian air defenses, but Turkey and Syria provide differing accounts of when and for how long the plane entered Syrian airspace. The incident deepens military tensions between the two countries, which are already at odds over Turkey’s support for Syrian opposition fighters. |
| 26 | July 14, 2012 | The International Committee of the Red Cross announces that it will classify the conflict in Syria as a civil war. The new designation means that combatants are subject to international humanitarian law and may be prosecuted for war crimes. |
| 27 | July 18, 2012 | An explosion at the National Security Building in Damascus kills or injures a number of senior Syrian military and security officials responsible for the crackdown against the opposition. Those killed in the blast include Assef Shawkat, Bashar al-Assad’s brother-in-law and one of his closest advisers, and Daoud Rajiha, the minister of defense. Syrian state media claim that the attack was conducted by a suicide bomber. Senior members of the Free Syrian Army claim that the explosives were placed by a double agent within the Syrian security services and detonated remotely. |
| 28 | August 2, 2012 | Unable to broker a resolution to the crisis, Annan resigns from his position as the UN and Arab League peace envoy for Syria. Lakhdar Brahimi, an Algerian diplomat, is appointed as Annan’s replacement. |
| 29 | August 6, 2012 | Riyad Hijab, Syria’s newly appointed prime minister, defects, fleeing to Jordan with his family. Following his defection, Hijab predicts the imminent collapse of the Assad regime. |
| 30 | August 16, 2012 | The UN formally ends its monitoring mission in Syria. |
| 31 | September 13, 2012 | Brahimi arrives in Damascus to meet for the first time with Assad and other senior Syrian officials. |
| 32 | September 2012 | Speaking at the UN headquarters in New York after his first trip to Syria, Brahimi states that the situation in Syria is continuing to deteriorate and that he is pessimistic about the chances for a negotiated peace in the immediate future. |
| 33 | September 25, 2012 | Amid heavy fighting in Aleppo, a fire destroys hundreds of shops in the city’s historic covered market, parts of which date back to the 15th and 16th centuries. |
| 34 | November 11, 2012 | After a week of negotiations in Qatar, Syrian opposition leaders announce the formation of a new Syrian opposition coalition, called the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (and sometimes also called the Syrian National Coalition). The Istanbul-based Syrian National Council, which had come to be regarded as too narrow to effectively represent the opposition, holds about a third of the seats in the new coalition’s leadership council. Over the next month the coalition receives recognition from dozens of countries as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people. |
| 35 | January 2, 2013 | The UN estimates that 60,000 people have been killed since the beginning of the conflict in 2011. |
| 36 | January 30, 2013 | Syrian officials accuse Israel of launching air strikes against a Syrian military research facility near Damascus. Israel does not formally acknowledge the attacks, but unofficial reports suggest that Israeli jets bombed a convoy carrying advanced weaponry to Hezbollah in Lebanon. |
| 37 | March 19, 2013 | Rockets carrying chemical weapons are reportedly used in a town near Aleppo. Each side accuses the other of having deployed chemical agents, but the allegations remain unproved. |
| 38 | May 19, 2013 | The Syrian army launches an offensive against al-Quṣayr, a strategically important town held by the rebels in western Syria. Thousands of fighters belonging to the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, an ally of the Syrian government, reportedly take part in the battle. |
| 39 | July 25, 2013 | UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announces that the UN estimates that more than 100,000 people have been killed since the start of the conflict. |
| 40 | August 21, 2013 | The Syrian opposition accuses pro-Assad forces of having killed hundreds in chemical weapons attacks in the suburbs of Damascus. Amateur video at the scene of the alleged attacks appears to show victims, including many children, suffering from respiratory distress and convulsions. Other videos show large numbers of dead adults and children with no visible signs of injury. Syrian officials deny having used chemical agents and assert that if such weapons were used, rebel forces are to blame. |
| 41 | August 22, 2013 | Officials from the UN, Europe, and the United States demand that UN weapons inspectors who entered Syria in early August to investigate earlier allegations of chemical weapons use be given immediate access to the sites of the most-recent alleged attacks. |
| 42 | August 25, 2013 | Assad grants UN inspectors access to the sites of alleged attacks. |
| 43 | August 26, 2013 | UN inspectors encounter gunfire from unidentified gunmen while en route to the sites of alleged attacks but are ultimately able to reach the sites to begin collecting evidence. |
| 44 | August 30, 2013 | U.S. Pres. Barack Obama announces that he is considering limited military action against targets in Syria in response to the Assad regime’s alleged use of chemical weapons. |
| 45 | September 9, 2013 | Russia proposes a plan to put Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile under international control. |
| 46 | September 14, 2013 | The United States, Russia, and Syria reach an agreement for a plan to place Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile under international control. |
| 47 | September 16, 2013 | The UN inspectors’ report confirms that rockets carrying the nerve gas sarin were used on a large scale in the attacks on August 21. The report, however, does not specify which side was responsible for the attacks, and it does not give an exact number of victims. |
| 48 | January 22, 2014 | An international conference, Geneva II, is held in Switzerland in hopes of arriving at a negotiated end to the conflict. No progress is made, and the sessions are suspended in February. |
| 49 | June 23, 2014 | The last of the Syrian government’s declared stockpile of chemical weapons are removed from the country under the terms of the U.S.-Russian agreement from September 2013. |
| 50 | June 30, 2014 | After making significant territorial gains in Iraq in addition to its territory in Syria, the extremist militant group Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) declares itself a caliphate, with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as its leader. |
| 51 | September 23, 2014 | The United States and a coalition of Arab countries expand their air campaign against ISIL to strike targets in Syria as well as Iraq. |
| 52 | May 20, 2015 | ISIL takes control of Palmyra, an ancient city in eastern Syria with a rich collection of Greco-Roman monuments. ISIL later disseminates photographs and video of its fighters demolishing artifacts and structures. |
| 53 | September 30, 2015 | Russia carries out its first air strikes in Syria. |
| 54 | March 2016 | Syrian troops, bolstered by Hezbollah fighters and Russian air support, retake Palmyra from ISIL. |
| 55 | September 22, 2016 | After a brief cease-fire fails, Russia and Syrian government forces begin heavy bombardment of rebel-held territory in Aleppo. |
| 56 | December 22, 2016 | The Syrian government declares victory in Aleppo after the last rebel fighters are evacuated from the city. |
| 57 | April 7, 2017 | The U.S. strikes Shayrat air base, a government-controlled air force base, with dozens of cruise missiles in retaliation for a chemical weapons attack carried out by government forces against rebels in Khān Shaykhūn. |
| 58 | June 6, 2017 | The Syrian Democratic Forces, a U.S.-aligned predominantly Kurdish force, launch an attack on Al-Raqqah, ISIL’s de facto capital in Syria. The attack is supported by U.S. air strikes and special forces. |
| 59 | October 17, 2017 | The Syrian Democratic Forces announce that Al-Raqqah has been cleared of ISIL fighters. |
| 60 | November 3, 2017 | Pro-government Syrian troops expel ISIL from Dayr al-Zawr in eastern Syria. |
Timeline of the Syrian civil war from 2012-2017
Culled from the
ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA, Syrian civil war. From https://www.britannica.com/event/Syrian-Civil-War. Retrieved, 20th April 2018
The recent Douma chemical attack of 7th, April 2018 is on everyone’s mind. But I don’t think it’s the real issue here. This is not the first time (nor would it be the last if nothing concrete is done) that Assad has been accused of using chemical weapons. I see this as an ‘evolution’ of warfare in a war that has been allowed to rage for too long.
What began as a protest changed into a war that shows no sign of cessation. Why shouldn’t the weapons being used change too?
Mr. Putin’s fury and finger pointing at Israel over the fighter jet bombing of a Syrian airbase and the hide and seek between the two nations is an example of the conflict of interest that has seen the Syrian war last the past seven years.
The long civil war has seen Syria become a solitary figure in the international community, but some countries remain allies. Knowing these country helps to understand some of the politics behind certain decisions.
France, Israel, Qatar Saudi Arabia, Turkey, United Kingdom and the United States are in support of taking military action to alleviate the problem in Syria. China, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan and Russia and Lebanon have good relations with Syria and prefer a political move to resolve the crisis than a military one.
I am not a political analyst by any means. This is me trying to understand the Syrian Crisis. After years of war, guess who has suffered most? Can any of the deaths, of children, adults, man or woman be justified? At the end of it all, those who have benefited have undoubtedly done so. But at what cost, and to what end?
References
Syria’s allies and enemies at a glance
Foreign relations os Syria
Politics Of Syria
[Corrective movement(Syria)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrective Movement, Syria)
Syrian civil war
War
Israel and Russia in delicate balancing act over Syrian war
Syrian civil war explained from the beginning