02-25-2017, 03:59 PM
Quote:Have we tried it with a NATO ally like Turkey ready take over administration of the territory?
More seriously, there have been rumblings about replacing Assad and leaving a rump Syria on the coast, which would satisfy the Russians but not the Iranians.
I am of two minds on that. On the one hand, something similar to that is how I see things shaking out, eventually. You'd have an Alawite/Christian? state concentrated along the coast, a Turkish client consisting of Sunni Arab Iraq/Syria, an Iranian client state in Shia Iraq, and an actual Kurdish state (with Assyrian, Yazidi, and some other minorities) coming into existence. Maybe the Israelis would help carve out a Druze microstate in the Jabal-al-Druze and the Golan Heights as a buffer territory, and some population transfer between Lebanon and the Assad rump state with the Shia Arabs and the Christian ones.
I just don't see that happening soon. Assad is still fighting for maximal control of the Syrian territory with Russian/Iranian/Hezbollah support, the (Shia) Iraqi government recapturing Sunni territories from ISIS, Hezbollah and Israel still circling each other itching for another go, and the Turks far more interested in suppressing Kurdish separatists than administering restive Arabs. The parallels I (and others, admittedly) keep reaching for are the 30 Year's War, or the period in Europe between 1914 and 1945. It's probably going to take another 10-15 years to burn itself out, and all outside intervention is doing right now is helping add fuel to the fire.