Syrian Civil War Turns Proxy War With Military Mobilization

Source: Tribune
As Russia’s warships, weapon systems and arms continue to flow into Syria, Israel is not about to let Russia, Hezbollah and Iran tip the balance of power in the favor of its border enemy. Israel is one of the key players in the region that has attempted to remain quiet and let NATO handle much of the Syrian Civil War from Turkey without getting the publicity itself. Because of this, it has primarily been concerned with a defensive posture so far and the prevention in terms of restricting arms shipments to Hezbollah. But this is changing as Russia steams its way over with greater force and the US fails to play a counter-Syrian role.
Has Russia beaten the US with a decisive direct military engagement? Not yet. But all parties, whether foreign or of Syrian national origin, appear to be increasing their involvement and intensity with Syria’s dirty war.

Major Players

Pro-Syrian Government: The Syrian Regime and government loyalists; Iran, Russia and Hezbollah.
Anti-Syrian Government: The Syrian Opposition and anti-government rebels; the US, NATO, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
None of these actors are allies in any traditional sense of the word. Instead, the actors above are simply either for or against the current Syrian Government. These participating foreign states have no strong active military presence within Syria yet, but they are transitioning from backing tens of thousands of fighters, not including independent jihadists flocking from all over the world.
A senior US State Department official said that Iranian soldiers have been sent to join sides with the Syrian Army. Already there has been an exchange of fire between Israel and Syria.
Russia and Iran continue to conflate conditions both internally and regionally. Russia’s response to send a fleet to the Mediterranean is hinged to the desire of maintaining the warm water ports, which it currently enjoys.
The Russians are not interested in supporting President Bashar al-Assad of Syria as much as they are in securing their geopolitical interests first; however, the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. They also have no desire to see Assad’s Regime crumble and be taken over by terrorists or a US installed government that is unfriendly to them if they can do anything about it. Moreover, here are some economic benefits, but there are more economic costs than benefits at this point in time. Thus, the very issue for them is vastly geographic and political in nature.
The present move is further a direct response to a more likely US intervention rambling on Capitol Hill, seeking to take the initiative on behalf of the rebel forces opposing President Assad. Russia is thus further reacting to the US in a preemptive manner in response to increasing Congressional and White House pressures and talks of no-fly zones or the arming of the rebels. There operational strategy is to prevent a situation akin to Libya, where the US or NATO air superiority is jeopardized, diminished or challenged by the Russian fleet’s force of presence.
So far, official US involvement has been limited to passive support like intelligence sharing or medical aid to the Syrian Opposition. A no-fly-zone has not yet been established and it appears that Russia is far exceeding the US in its political and military commitments in regards to Syria.
Benchmarks of military mobilization by the Russians should not be so readily downplayed by the Pentagon. Ruling out any inadvertent entanglement between Russian forces, though a low possibility at present, would not be advisable. Such an unintentional, clumsy, escalation of war by an increasingly unstable power balance in and around Syria may also come from pairs like Russia and Israel, who face each other in direct geopolitical opposition.
Russia primarily seeks to secure their portion of Syria, their people and their interests. Only secondarily does it support the Syrian government by more overt and covert measures. After they establish a more secure beachhead in the chaos, once safe from Western threats to bases and interests, they will then be in a better position to funnel supplies through those ports uninhibited. The warships carry with them supplies and marines and they are a lot more than a show of the flag. They are a tangible, genuine, military build-up on Syrian waters.

Where does this leave Syria now?

The fact that the pro-Syrian forces are regaining the initiative is likely due to two critical factors: 1) the increased foreign support and commitment and 2) a stronger uniformity than the rebels.
Turkey is harboring the political Syrian Opposition leadership backed by the West, as well as over 400,000 refugees. More than a few will decide to join the ranks and fight back, pushing South. The rebels in the Northern Ar Raqqah, Northern Aleppo and Idlib provinces have witnessed the gains of an expanding Turkish/NATO sphere.
Toward the Northeast, Hassakah and Deir al-Zor, show the political influence of a large ethnic Kurdish rebel population, foreign Kurdish influence and the immigrating extremists from Iraq, filtering through cities like Abu Kamal.
In the West, on the Mediterranean, Russia is stationed in Latakia and Tartus Provinces as well as Hezbollah coming out of South Lebanon for aid. Both areas permit the Regime with a strong supply from its ports and through Lebanon. They also permit outward control of central Syria expanding out from these zones.
As for competing countries that have no direct border influence or access they may choose to funnel assistance through Jordan or Iraq, for example. In the meantime, Iran continues to sustain the Assad Regime without the advantage of a shared border through arms flights and limited ground access through Iraq. They have supplied not only continual stockades of arms but advisors as well. Iran continues to back Hezbollah and Saudi Arabia and Qatar are backing many hardcore Islamist and jihadist fighters into cities clashing cities of the extreme South, like Daraa.

Fragmented Development

The total Syrian war refugees hit over 1.5 million, with: over 400,000 in Turkey, almost 500,000 in Jordan, almost 500,000 in Lebanon.
There are over 70,000 Syrians killed and 4 million are estimated to be internally displaced within Syria. The United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees reports that 6.8 million are in need of aid and by the end of this year, about 10 million (half the population) will require humanitarian assistance.
Importantly, there is no single rebel force involved in the war. Also of note are the expanding bubbles of states into Syria’s Civil War. But ethnic cleansing, torture, religious murders, state terror, government massacres, terrorism, extrajudicial killings, kidnappings and chemical weapons and the larger scale jihad between religious sects are further quickening the quagmire of Civil War into a toxic powder keg. This powder keg threatens to ignite greater religious jihad in Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, Turkey and the greater region.
The indirect warring between state powers with eager geopolitical regional interests for the control are also compounded by the greater internal crisis of a sectarian warfare between the Shia and Sunni concentrated areas.
When the West dropped support at the discovery of more and more of the rebel groups turned out to be radical jihadists back by states like Saudi Arabia and Qatar, they began to backpedal further. One of jihadist faction, Jabhat al-Nusra, who is reported to have up to 10,000 fighters, even openly acknowledged an alliance with al Qaeda in Iraq.
There is also the legitimate concern of a growing jihadist infiltration of the Syrian Opposition. So there was not only an increase in Russian and Iranian support for the Syrian Regime that caused a recent operational advantage, but there was also a decline and disruption in US logistics to the Opposition force supply lines, which still remains a big issue.
After the chemical weapons reports and the success of the Syrian Military operations towards the West and to the North, Washington is planning on some sort of military action short of boots on the ground but they have been hesitant.
The second reason for Syrian advances is the in-fighting between the Syrian Opposition rebel groups. This has increased as the Civil War becomes more and more defined in terms of state rivalry and jihad.
Various terrorists or militant groups are not restrained in targeting others; even if they have the same ultimate objective of removing Assad from power. This has led to an increase in local warlords imposing strict religious standards or battling with another group to wrest control after Syrian forces incurred losses or retreated in those towns. Hezbollah itself can claim to hold towns for Assad as well until he Syrian Army arrives.
As the factions and infighting intensify, and as the Syrian Military realigns itself with emboldened allied support, the Syrian government continues to benefit from a clear advantage.

What does this mean for US and NATO options of future interventions?

Stronghold positions of various factions clearly demonstrate the impact of foreign power projection of either pro or anti-Assad bleeding into a proxy war from their border areas.
The US remains confident that Syria’s partners and recent developments do not restrict their operational control; however, this may not be a tenable position as the events unfold. Already, Russia has placed a good amount of forces in the region. They appear determined to tip Syria’s fate and to prevent Western control of the war’s aftermath.

About Brett Daniel Shehadey
Brett Daniel Shehadey is an analyst, writer, and commentator. His areas of interest include: strategy, political theory, foreign affairs, intelligence and security. He holds an M.A. in Strategic Intelligence from American Military University and a B.A in Political Science from UCLA.