A Chip Off the Old Dictator (Bashar al-Assad is unlikely to go quietly from Lebanon)

The Weekly Standard ^ | April 11, 2005 | Lee Smith

[RWR8189]

THE CEDAR REVOLUTION HAS TAKEN so many interesting narrative turns, it is easy to forget that the Lebanese opposition confronts a criminal regime in Syria that is more isolated than ever and for that reason quite possibly more dangerous than before. While some repentant skeptics have grudgingly begun to credit the Bush vision for democracy in the Middle East, the White House has prudently refrained from gloating because the outcome is far from resolved. For all the appeasing noises the Damascus regime has made, it may decide not to leave Lebanon without a fight. Some analysts believe that Bashar al-Assad cannot leave Lebanon lest his government fall, and others fear that he will depart only after he has set Lebanon aflame.

While Syria's foreign minister announced last week that the country's armed forces will be pulled out before Lebanon's May parliamentary elections, the pro-Syrian government in Beirut has initiated stalling tactics that could postpone the elections and consequently the Syrian withdrawal. The Syrian-controlled security apparatus appears to be in a state of disarray, but even when, or if, the Assad regime evacuates, it will continue to exercise considerable influence over Lebanese politics and the economy through the myriad intelligence services that have penetrated virtually every Lebanese institution over the last 15 years. Thus, even if Syria withdraws, Assad will continue to be a major force in Lebanese affairs.

Jacques Chirac reportedly has warned the White House that the Assad regime cannot afford to withdraw without risking collapse. A recent report in the Beirut Daily Star estimates that Syria earns more than $2 billion a year in Lebanon, almost half of which goes directly to Assad favorites. This number doesn't include revenues earned from illegal sources, like narcotics. Perhaps as significantly, Syria's regional prestige will take a major hit. The last Arab nationalist stronghold will have been chased from another Arab country by Western powers that didn't fire a shot. Maybe Iran will not brook a Syrian ally that is feeble. And if Iraq or Saudi Arabia smells fear in Damascus, Assad might expect a Sunni insurgency like the one he's assisted in Iraq to rise up at home against his Alawite regime. Further, a peaceable withdrawal from Lebanon means Syria will have lost what it considers its major bargaining chip in securing one of its key national interests--the return of the Golan Heights from Israeli control.

No one knows for certain whether the three bombings in Christian areas over the last few weeks were engineered by Syrian intelligence, local allies, or by other Lebanese actors who believe they can profit from the confusion. Regardless, there is concern that Assad intends to make good on his threat to bring armageddon to Lebanon, just to remind everyone who's in control, no matter what side of the border his troops are stationed on. This is the scenario that everyone fears.

"If the Syrians are willing to play it clean, the U.S. and the Europeans are not seeking to attack them," says Farid al-Khazen, an opposition candidate in the May elections and dean of the political science department at the American University of Beirut. "Ironically, what would be best for the [Assad] regime is if it fully implemented [U.N. Security Council resolution] 1559. Before, Syria was in trouble over Iraq; now its survival depends on how much it is willing to cooperate in Lebanon."

It was Bashar's continued support of the Iraqi insurgency that, well before the assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri, led many observers to wonder if the novice dictator was in over his head. Perhaps so, but his presumed weakness has afforded him a gambit unavailable to his late father, Hafez, with whom he is so frequently and unfavorably compared. Bashar has managed to convince many people inside and outside of Syria that he is hostage to his father's "old guard." People want to believe this is so because they had hoped the young, Western-educated, computer-literate president would be a real reformer. But if the "old guard" has prevented him from implementing internal reforms for five years, they did not stop him from appointing his brother-in-law Asef Shawkat chief of military intelligence, the top security position in the country, immediately after the Hariri murder.

To banish or kill your enemies and circle the wagons with relatives and tribal associates is a principle favored by all Arab regimes. Syria is a family business, and even without the aura and experience of his father, Bashar runs it very much the way the old man did. Bashar is thought dim-witted because he has backed the Iraqi insurgency and Palestinian terrorist groups despite U.S. warnings, and because he overplayed his hand in Lebanon. But what would Hafez have done in the same circumstances?

It is true that Hafez signed on for the first U.S.-led Gulf War in 1991, but if that Bush White House had decided to depose Saddam and maintain a large presence in neighboring Iraq Hafez would have perceived it as his son now does--a violation of his sphere of influence. "He would've stayed out of the war and supported an insurgency," says Khazen. Bashar is only following the example Hafez set when he backed groups that killed and kidnapped Americans in Lebanon in the 1980s.

Bashar, like his father before him, aids Palestinian terror groups for two reasons: First, Syria has always considered Palestine a national interest, if not in fact a part of Syria; second, as a way to pressure Israel to return the Golan Heights, which Syria lost in the 1967 war when Hafez was defense minister. Perhaps Bashar is foolish to assume the burden of his father's legacy, but that doesn't make him less flexible than the man who made the recovery of territory that he'd lost the cornerstone of his foreign policy for 30 years.

No one ever bothered when Hafez tampered with Lebanese election laws or targeted political figures. Why would Bashar think that his doing so would galvanize world opinion against him? As far as the international community was concerned, what happened in Lebanon stayed in Lebanon. The United States, among many others, agreed to look the other way. And here it's worth noting that many of the Western officials busily explaining to the press that Bashar is not as smart as his brilliant father have a vested interest in promoting the idea. If Hafez was not a tough negotiator/tactical genius/legendary trickster figure, then they were just easy marks for a typical Arab dictator. After all, we rewarded Hafez for his "pragmatic" decision to join the first Gulf War by giving him a free hand in Lebanon.

The significant difference is not between Assad 1 and Assad 2, but rather Bush 1 and Bush 2. Only a few Arab rulers have been able to comprehend how thoroughly 9/11 changed U.S. foreign policy. Being unelected themselves, most Arab leaders are not in the habit of thinking deeply about how democratically elected governments are accountable to their citizens. The catch is that since Arab rulers do not have to answer to popular constituencies, they can absorb blows that liberal democracies cannot. Hafez, for one, reigned for three decades after he lost the Golan. If Bashar really is like his father, he will get through this very rough spot slightly humiliated, but without any fatal internal challenges to his power.

To be sure, the regime has floated frightening tales about the rise of Islamic fundamentalism within its borders. Mostly this is intended to put the fear of God into Western officials, should they be tempted to try to push Assad from his perch. But no one really knows how much power Syria's Muslim Brotherhood wields. Even the ordinary Sunnis--a clear majority of Syrians--seem to be fairly satisfied with their lot under an Alawite regime at a time when the region's magic words are "free elections." If Syrians do want their regime changed, by hands foreign or domestic, they are disguising their wishes well. Remember that Hafez's 30-year rule followed several decades of coups and counter-coups. It should not be surprising if Syrians want stability. At this point, however, it's not just a matter of what Syrians want.

Last month, several hundred thousand turned out for a pro-regime march in Damascus, and while much of the fanfare, and attendance, was no doubt orchestrated, many Syrians really do seem to believe that Bashar wants to reform their country. And that's what he ought to be doing, addressing the country's dire economic situation and daunting minority issues and making life better for Syrians. Instead, he is making it miserable for Iraqis, American soldiers and civilian officials, Israelis, Palestinians, and Lebanese. He is counting on continued military, diplomatic, and political problems (which he will nurture) to keep the United States busy in Iraq and Israel, not to mention the advent of a nuclear Iran. All of these together, he must hope, will leave Syria a pretty low priority on the White House's agenda. The problem is not that Bashar is not like Hafez, but that he is too much like him, and this is no longer his father's Middle East.

 

 

Lee Smith is writing a book on Arab culture.

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.....and I thought he was a kindly opthamologist.

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Bashar al-Assad is unlikely to go quietly from Lebanon

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