Podcast: In Syria it’s ‘Mission Accomplished’ (For Assad)

TRANSCRIPT: In Syria it’s ‘Mission Accomplished’ (For Assad)

Lara Setrakian:

He's on the brink of declaring all-out victory in this war. If there's anyone who gets to say mission accomplished right now, it's Bashar al-Assad.

Ian Bremmer:

Hi, I'm Ian Bremmer and welcome to the GZERO World Podcast. I'm host of the weekly show "GZERO World" on Facebook Watch. In this podcast, we share extended versions of the big interviews from that show. Let's get to it.

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Ian Bremmer:

And I'm here today with Lara Setrakian. She is CEO and executive editor of News Deeply. Also was the founder some six years ago over their flagship site, Syria Deeply. Of everyone I know in the West, the Syria war has probably had more of an impact on your career than anyone I can think of.

Lara Setrakian:

So in 2011, I was the correspondent for ABC News and Bloomberg TV covering the Middle East. It struck me then as it had struck me before, that media systems as they currently operate, are ill-equipped to follow multiple unfolding crises. So I left the TV job. I started an all-in-one platform called Syria Deeply. We assigned specialized editors to cover the conflict and to maintain deep networks of correspondence inside the ground. Right now, that's Alessandra Massi and Hashem Osseiran. They're based in Beirut, and they do an incredible job of tracking the conflict every day and seeing that merging threats and trends up ahead.

Ian Bremmer:

So let's start with the big news, which is the United States said they were going to bomb again, have bombed again. Russians aren't doing anything. A win? A loss? Does it matter? How do you view it?

Lara Setrakian:

Each side is living in its own reality and pushing its own storyline, and in this case, they don't match. The Russians say the Syrians swatted down some of those missiles. The US patently denies that. So it's very hard to tell from the rhetoric alone who had the upper hand.

Ian Bremmer:

Does that make it more stable? Does it make it a forever war? I mean, if all sides can accomplish... if everyone can have prizes in Syria, then sort of how long does that persist without any change?

Lara Setrakian:

With this administration in the US and the systems that we've seen in Syria, Iran, and Russia continuing on in the course of the conflict, it's fair to say that everyone does get a trophy to take home to their domestic constituency. But in terms of what's going to bring this war to a close or even alleviate a tiny bit of the suffering of the Syrian people, I don't see the stakeholders of the status quo doing anything differently. US says mission accomplished, but the US also called for Assad to step down seven years ago. So what mission was accomplished? The narrow strike on some chemical-weapons-producing facilities in the middle of the night with no personnel. So basically no human capital lost on the Syrian side.

Ian Bremmer:

You would argue that the Russians are now complicit, directly complicit in terms of supporting Assad's use of chemical weapons?

Lara Setrakian:

It's hard to say. Even though Iran and Russia supported his strategies and have supported his regime, it's still not clear how much leverage they really have, how much direct participation in Assad's own policy making. So I don't think it's necessarily fair to say Russia is directly complicit in a particular strategy. We don't actually know, but systemically they have of course stood behind him holistically, and so that has given him license and a lot of confidence that he can do basically whatever's necessary. The strategies he's used have been brutal, but they've been very effective, and so they have insured his political survival. He's on the brink of declaring all-out victory in this war. If there's anyone who gets to say mission accomplished, right now, it's Bashar al-Assad.

Ian Bremmer:

Now, we've talked a lot more in the United States about the Russians, because we care more about them, than the Iranians in terms of their role in Syria, on the ground in Syria. Is that appropriate?

Lara Setrakian:

Iran has had a tremendous role not only in maintaining Bashar al-Assad's position in Syria, but in expanding its footprint, military, commercial, and otherwise over the course of this conflict. It has really expanded by some count 60,000 troops, Iran backed. So both Iranians and Shi'ite militias or just Iran backed militias on the ground. That's tremendous. All reports I hear from Syria now, from Syrians themselves, Iran is buying up real estate. They're investing in redevelopment. They're even giving out humanitarian aid. Iran is playing this Syrian moment extremely well, and we really don't hear much about it.

Ian Bremmer:

More so than the Russians then?

Lara Setrakian:

Iran and Russia have played the Syrian conflict to their maximum national gain, their maximum individual interests on the ground. For Russia, that's meant keeping Tartus, their warm water port, so their ships aren't stuck in ice some parts of the year, and of course some other political gains. For Iran that has meant having this expanded footprint on Israel's doorstep. And again, I don't think we should underestimate the value of this case study for Iran and Russia. They get to tell any of their allies and any future allies who come on board, "Look how effective we are at helping you when times are tough."

Ian Bremmer:

With 2000 American troops on the ground in Syria, do they have a mission?

Lara Setrakian:

When it comes to the physical presence, 2,000 troops on the ground as one vet told me recently, that means 5,000 contractors with those 2,000. So a real presence. It has fortified and achieved a lot of capacity building for the Syrian democratic forces, essentially the Kurdish led coalition, which now controls a broad swath of territory in northern and eastern Syria, including the oil producing regions. So in a sense, that mission of the US going in to support the Kurds as the tip of the spear against ISIS has worked.

Ian Bremmer:

How does Assad then declare victory, as you suggested, given that the Kurds are doing so well?

Lara Setrakian:

Assad doesn't really mind. Regime forces withdrew from Kurdish areas pretty early on in the fight, in this overall war. So Assad doesn't seem particularly bothered by Kurdish autonomy at this moment at least. Turkey on the other hand-

Ian Bremmer:

Turkey does.

Lara Setrakian:

... is plenty pissed. But the idea that Kurds are operating, that hasn't been particularly bothersome to the Assad regime,

Ian Bremmer:

How dangerous in reality do you think it is? Where are the fault lines where this could get a lot bigger, a lot worse?

Lara Setrakian:

So not only do you have nation states and dozens of armed militia groups on the ground, but you have irregular forces from nation states, like I said, Iran-backed militias, Russian contractors, it's an insane soup of fighting forces in Syria right now. The fault line that is most likely to escalate is Iran to Israel. The status quo this moment involves Iran having a very significant capability set in Syria on Israel's border. The US doesn't seem to mind in the sense that there's no US pushback on that aspect of the conflict, but there has been Israeli pushback and we don't know what that's going to look like going forward.

Ian Bremmer:

The Russians and Iranians haven't done much to respond when the Israelis have engaged in strikes.

Lara Setrakian:

This is an asymmetric conflict of global proportions. It's not in the interests of Iran and Russia to escalate in a way where it becomes a conventional military confrontation. So if there's an occasional loss of life here or there on striking a base or striking some empty buildings in the middle of the night, I don't think that's particularly problematic for them.

Ian Bremmer:

Would you say the same thing about Turkey?

Lara Setrakian:

One of the great successes I think of the Russian Iranian block in this conflict has been functionally pulling Turkey away from NATO. You have a photo of the Iranian, Russian, and Turkish presidents in Ankara, as if it were like a team huddle on a baseball field.

Ian Bremmer:

And yet, Erdoğan quite quickly publicly supported the strikes by the United States, France, and the UK.

Lara Setrakian:

Turkey has played a dual role throughout this. They've been very strategically flexible, but for the million plus refugees in their country, and no real clear strategy for how to integrate them or handle that burden, I think that they've actually done pretty well out of this conflict.

Ian Bremmer:

What are the lessons as a consequence of the last seven years?

Lara Setrakian:

I've learned three big lessons from this war. The first is that the US is being definitively outwitted by Russia and Iran. There's a strategic gap between US capabilities and Russian and Iranian capabilities. The second lesson is that the norms and laws that have governed modern military engagement, so the rules of war, as we've known them, are completely defunct, and we're going to have to come up with new ones or find new ways to enforce the old ones. Otherwise, we should expect that this is what war will look like going forward. And the third is that global governance itself is broken. The mechanics of deescalation no longer exist if they ever did, whether it's a paralyzed security council or a lack of enforcement of agreed-upon deals like the 2013 chemical weapons deal between the US and Russia. These are things no one is willing to enforce right now. There's a lack of political will at a global level to step in and do what would truly be necessary in order to pull this conflict apart and really resolve it.

Ian Bremmer:

All the countries engaged in Syria, the US has in a sense, given up the least in terms of what it's done.

Lara Setrakian:

Mm-hmm.

Ian Bremmer:

Why does that necessarily mean that the Americans are having circles run around them by everybody else?

Lara Setrakian:

So if the US said at the outset of the Syrian conflict, "Our goal is to spend the minimum dollar amount on this conflict." You could say, okay.

Ian Bremmer:

Trump is kind of saying that, right?

Lara Setrakian:

In retrospect, that's different than having had a strategy to begin with. But no, Trump has kept it contained. He has been clear up front. The US under Obama was much more of a wayward voice in the Syrian conflict. Under the Obama administration, the president himself didn't seem to take the advice of people in his own government who knew Syria well. Ambassador Robert Ford, the last serving US diplomat in Syria, Fred Hoff, former advisor. These guys saw all of this coming and Obama sort of willfully ignored them. I think that there's a lot to be said about the failures. I'd give, at best, the Obama administration a D minus for its Syria policy.

Ian Bremmer:

If the United States president were to articulate a proactive strategy, an interventionist strategy, whatever that means for Syria, that would work in your view, what is it?

Lara Setrakian:

The best thing the US could do for its own interests right now is minimize the space for radical groups to continue to operate in Syria, minimize the risk of radicalization of millions of Syrians living in desperate conditions in neighboring countries, 5 million inside the country, 6 million just from the displaced. So we have 11 million very unhappy Syrians living in terrible conditions. That has the capacity to create a lot of problems 20, 30 years down the line.

Ian Bremmer:

You talk to a lot of Syrians. What do they tell you that people don't understand?

Lara Setrakian:

There are consequences of this war that are not being accounted for around the world, and that includes, what does it mean that at this point war crimes are used lightly and strategically? I mean, what does it mean that you can push that many people out of their homes and over the borders into another country? I mean, this has given a case study, a perfect to-do list for any authoritarian government that wants to maintain power at any cost. You think of that statement, what it means to maintain power at any cost. The Syrians now know very personally that cost, and so this can happen anywhere in the world now. But if you ask Syrians who support Bashar al-Assad, how they feel about this moment, they're on the brink of victory. They're very relieved that in some ways order has been restored.

Ian Bremmer:

Before we go, give the audience a little hope, what's a silver lining we can look at?

Lara Setrakian:

I've been continually inspired by the resilience and resolve of individual Syrians doing things that whatever they need to do to survive, to educate their children. It's dire, but the individual Syrian entrepreneurs or the women setting up schools in their basement when kids can't get to the schoolhouse, the whole evolution of what they call siege medicine, how do you take care of people, whether it's a diabetic or a war wound, when no medical supplies are getting in? There have been incredible acts of invention and innovation. And so I have had a great privilege of witnessing that in action.

Ian Bremmer:

A lot of talent in this part of the world. That's not going to change anytime soon. Lara Setrakian, good to be with you.

Lara Setrakian:

Thank you.

Ian Bremmer:

Okay. That's your show this week. Come back next week. We've got Mary Louise Kelly. She is the co-host of National Public Radio's "All Things Considered." You've heard her, you'll see her next week.

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