Featured Post

The white-Left Part 1: The two meanings of white

Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Assad's strategy & why exposing his crimes is so critical

As the Syrian conflict grinds into its forth year, the sad truth is that most people wish that it would just go away. The Syrian people would like to see it end much more than most. They most badly need to see an end to the killing and the dying. The children need to get back to being children and the refugees need to be able to go home. This requires not the end of the uprising, but its successful conclusion. People vested in the revolution understood that even when victory seemed remote, as it did in the beginning .

Others, less personally involved, especially the broad mass of people in say, United States, that haven't paid close attention and just know something very ugly and terrible is happening in Syria, may well settle for any outcome that just makes it go away, even if that means the same violence is going on at night and behind "detention center" walls.

Bashar al-Assad is well aware of that and he hopes to sell the "international community" on the notion that the quickest and easiest way to resolve the Syria mess is to let Assad win, i.e. turn a blind eye to his atrocities, foreign armies and foreign suppliers, while putting the kibosh on support for the revolution. That is why he is putting the hard sell on the idea that he is winning, and acting as if he has already won, planning his re-election and such. Nevermind his recent loses in Aleppo, Latakia and Homs. That is why he has his minions preaching this fable high and low. That is why he used the CW concessions to show that he is a reasonable guy that can be worked with, even while he continues to use CW to kill.

Like the guy in the movie, who while trying to save a life, starts thinking "it might be better for me if this person dies" and then shrinks back, Assad is hoping that Western fears of the "jihadist threat" that he has so carefully nurtured will cause them to shrink back and leave the Syrian people at the mercy of the lions.

The thought of allowing such a war criminal to not only go free, but to continue to run a country, should be an anathema, but that is exactly the proposition that Assad is trying to sell. Therefore it is incumbent on those of us that have made it our business to expose the crimes of the Assad regime to redouble our efforts.

These are some of the aspects of the struggle that make the work of social media activists for a free Syria indispensable to the victory of the Syrian revolution. The fascists certainly understand that the blogosphere is a battlefield. That's why Putin pays bloggers and Assad spends millions on the Syrian Electronic Army. We know that too. In the face of the silence of the mainstream media about Assad's daily atrocities, we are the ones spreading the news. We are now set with the strategic task of making that news so well known that anyone still in touch with reality would be too embarrassed to say he is an acceptable leader for Syria. 

While leaders of the so-called "international community" may be willing to shake the blood-soaked hands of Bashar al-Assad and welcome him back into the exclusive club of world leaders, it should be such a moral outrage to the people of Earth that they would never allow a war criminal like Assad to stand for president in any country.

Therefore, we must strengthen our efforts to expose the criminal deeds of this regime. Bashar al-Assad needs to be in custody and preparing his defense before the International Criminal Court, not ruling a country and running for re-election.  

Click here for a list of my other blogs on Syria

1 comment:

  1. "...This requires not the end of the uprising, but its successful conclusion..."

    Gawd.. successful conclusion? So you think that no matter how much more suffering or death the Syrian people have to endure, it's worth it as long as the opposition wins?

    *When* the U.S. and GCC *allow* the opposition to win, the Syrian people will be left with this enduring treasure: life on their knees - a vassal state of the US/GCC - begging for economic crumbs from their master's table.

    The opposition has continued feeding Syrians into a meat-grinder for fantasy self-determination that was lost a long time ago. They only need to look as far as Iraq to understand they have been used. The opposition's victory today would ensure they have no chance of defending themselves from land-grabbers in the south or exploitation by every western corporation that can make a buck from their sweat. They won the right to host pipelines that enrich the foreign owners, not them.

    Syria's economic destruction is almost done. Their children will grow up utterly dependent on the state, which means utterly dependent on the generosity of their foreign masters. They can look forward to a lifetime of freedom - being pipeline guards.

    When the Syrians are booted out of the Zaatari death camp, Jordan will string miles of barbed wire along the border and sew mines to make sure their 'guests' will never return. Turkey already has the concentration camp walls going up in the north and will be equally eager to send Syrian refugees packing. NATO will clean out any in Lebanon.Two million Syrian refugees will be sent to ruined cities to fend for themselves.

    The jihadis are never really going to leave - the opposition's 'victory' has nothing to do with their war. The Syrians have 'won' a future of car bombs and amputees.

    ReplyDelete