Posted on 04/26/2005 11:41:32 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) - Syrian President Bashar Assad will always be remembered as the leader who lost Lebanon, one of the strongest cards Syria ever held in its standoff with Israel.
What was a policy coup 29 years ago for his father, the late President Hafez Assad - the dispatch of troops to a country that Syria had long coveted - turned into a disaster for the son, alienating the world's most powerful nations and threatening his own political future.
On Tuesday, after the last Syrian soldiers left Lebanon, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan dispatched a team to verify the withdrawal. Syria's compliance with the U.N. demand for withdrawal could relieve some of the pressure it has faced since the Feb. 14 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The Lebanese opposition blames Syria and its Lebanese allies for the slaying.
But the pullout won't end all of Syria's woes nor Assad's. It could weaken Assad at home. Or it could give him a chance to move against opponents within his regime by blaming them for a series of recent mistakes.
Either way, Syria faces trouble on all fronts.
"Syria failed to understand the political changes on the international chess board in the wake of the fall of the Soviet Union," said the general manager of Al-Arabiya television, Abdulrahman al-Rashed, writing recently in Asharq al-Awsat newspaper. "That has led to grave mistakes in its dealings with the world's central powers."
Internationally, relations between Syria and the United States are at their lowest, with Washington continuing to work to isolate Damascus. The European Union also has linked a billion-dollar trade pact with Syrian policies in Lebanon.
Regionally, relations with Saudi Arabia, Syria's closest Arab friend, have been strained since the assassination of Hariri, who also held Saudi citizenship and was close to the Saudi royal family.
And Syria is hemmed in on all sides by countries either close to Washington or reforming themselves: not just Lebanon, but also Turkey, Jordan, Israel and Iraq, where about 140,000 U.S. soldiers remain.
Perhaps most significantly for Assad politically, the pullout from Lebanon will weaken Syria's hand in talks with Israel.
Syria always insisted Lebanon cannot reach a peace deal with Israel unless Syria does so at the same time. Lebanese leaders largely have gone along with that, but it is something Syria can no longer take for granted.
In addition, Syria's ally, Hezbollah, which has fighters in southern Lebanon near the Israeli border, long has been seen as a tool to pressure Israel. Now, the group is moving toward a more political role in Lebanon and faces demands to rein in its weapons.
Domestically, Syria needs an overhaul, with a decrepit system of government mired in Cold War ideology. The Baath party dominates government, and Assad's efforts to reform the economy are reportedly stymied by a powerful old guard.
"In post-Cold War global relations, Syria does not have the luxury of antagonizing simultaneously the U.S., France with its influence over Europe, and Saudi Arabia," said Abdallah Bouhabib, a former Lebanese ambassador to Washington.
Bouhabib, writing in the Daily Star, said taking partial steps to satisfy the international community - the typical Syrian approach - will not work anymore. Instead, it will only "gradually weaken the regime and lead to its disintegration."
Syria made a series of miscalculations in Lebanon.
First, it forced the extension of President Emile Lahoud's term last year, angering Hariri and anti-Syria factions.
Next, it failed to ensure a serious probe into Hariri's killing, opening the door for the United Nations to order an international investigation.
Then, reports flourished of influential people on both sides of the border benefiting financially from Syrian control over Lebanon.
There were also strategic mistakes.
Some Syrians wonder why their country, which was never friends with Iraq, has allowed itself to be seen as a champion of Saddam Hussein's deposed regime. Washington says Syria is a staging ground for the Iraqi insurgency, a charge Syrians deny.
Analysts say the Syrians did not heed the message implicit in a 2003 U.S. law that accused Damascus of seeking weapons of mass destruction and sheltering Palestinian groups labeled as terrorist - the beginning of a tougher U.S. attitude toward Syria.
They also say Damascus failed to understand the significance of the U.N. resolution calling for the withdrawal from Lebanon. And they say Syria failed to appreciate post-Sept. 11 U.S. policies pushing for greater democracy.
Dennis Ross, a former Middle East mediator, said Syria's pullout "is the beginning of what is going to be a pressure for change, one way or the other."
"It could end up being a coup against the current regime," Ross said.
Or, he said, "It could end up being Bashar himself acting against others who he feels have held him back."
EDITOR'S NOTE: Donna Abu-Nasr has covered the Middle East and Mideast politics for The Associated Press since 1987.
A Lebanese boy holds portraits of Syrian President Bashar Assad at the Lebanese border point of Masnaa in the Bekaa Valley, east of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday April 26, 2005. The last Syrian soldiers left Lebanon on Tuesday, waving and flashing victory signs as they returned home in a surrender to international pressure and Lebanese demands that ended their country's 29-year military presence in its smaller neighbor.
Hopefully the Baathist pigs that run Syria will kill or ruin each other.
Hey MSM - Anyone remember when Syria massacred 20,000 of its own citizens about 20 years ago in retribution for a failed coup...yeah...didn't think so
The 98lb. weakling U.N. trying to take credit and act tough, after the fact.
If Bush follows the policy I hope he does, Lebanon is just the first course. Syria has to go the same was as Iraq. There are more than enough grounds to justify action. And that will be the last domino to bring down Iran, hopefully.
I am afraid that you are right, but North Korea needs to go too. Although ridding the world of Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad is one very good start.
This guy is a complete moron.
Funny how there's no mention of Lebanon being Syria's Vietnam. Oh, right, this is a victory for UN diplomacy, not a defeat of an arrogant military power (that's only how the US gets characterized).
So when are the Hot Lebanese Babes for Freedom returning to the streets?
Any Syrian who really does wonder that might be just a little out of touch. It could, of course, be that the Ba'ath party was the governing entity for both countries. It could also be the ex-Saddamite government and intelligence figures who turned up in Damascus after the war or the demonstrable attacks being conducted from Syrian soil.
It didn't have to be that way. Syria was a member of the coalition in Gulf War I predicated largely on the notion that Saddam was nuts and if he sent the armored divisions into one neighbor, why not another? The Saudis felt the same way, and I note that Osama bin Laden's contrived outrage against the presence of U.S. troops on "holy" Saudi soil waited to evidence itself until the coast was safely clear.
There were several factors behind the Syrian squandering of the goodwill this action had built up with the U.S. One was the instability resulting from the death of the old leader and the accession of his son. Another was a preference for anti-Israel posturing over using the U.S.'s newfound benevolence to wring concessions out of the Israelis behind the scenes. A third was the existence of a remarkably developed and pervasive intelligence machine that played a king-maker role and insisted on playing the Great Game under a set of rules that had changed in ways it did not appear to appreciate. (That is, after all, what intelligence services tend to do).
It was that last factor that placed the Syrians in the strategic position not of Saddam's pal, but of the enemy of his enemy. If, in consequence, the Syrians now find themselves retreating from Lebanon, they have no one to blame but themselves.
"BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) - Syrian President Bashar Assad will always be remembered as the leader who lost Lebanon, one of the strongest cards Syria ever held in its standoff with Israel."
I disagree.
Expect Assad to tout his withdrawl to show that Israel should exit the Samaria and Judea (the west bank)
Also now he has 14,000 more troops in Syria proper - good for him since he's hemmed in.
You did not expect them to send in the "blue helmets" while they were actually shooting at each other did you? LOL.
"Assad the daddy was a tyrranical, bloodthirsty dictator, but at least he was a (semi)-competent ruler. Little Boy Assad is a tyrannical, bloodthirsty dictator who's also an incompetent, idiotic weasel."
The dad was much more bloodthirsty. He killed all 40,000 people in the city of Hama, for example.
The son is just a dunce.
Funny how that works...Baby Doc, Kim Jong-Il, etc. Although in all these cases, once the more charismatic (or ruthless) father died, soon the rickety structure he erected to support his dictatorship soon came crashing down. Not having the rickety old USSR to prop them up also helped.
Isn't the guy a dentist or doctor? I feel sorry for him and am glad to know he has a career to fall back on, that and probably a billion in a swiss bank.
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