Expdonaloaded News; The return of the Cold War

THE alert of this week, though not so alarm­ing as designed, has been that the Russians are getting ready a forward operation base in Syria. The Russians were seen on satellite constructing helipads and such other facilities as would give the impression they were constructing a huge military base in Syria for air and ground opera­tions.
The United States was the source of this ‘vital’ intelligence.
Over the corpses of nearly 350,000 Syrians most of whom died protesting Assad’s iron rule, Assad has refused to yield power even if it meant the utter destruction of the country and the de­population of Syria from which more than six million have fled. The country’s cities appear bombed out and everywhere there is desolation, rubble and misery plus the beheadings of the Is­lamic State to add to the Syrian menu.
US satellite images would seem to confirm Russian activity with the US arguing that this new Russian base would do more to lengthen the suffering of the already desperate Syrians who have led the new exodus to Europe. The Americans cannot understand why Russia should continue to support Bashir Assad when an overwhelming majority of Syrians want him out of power and out of Syria and excluded from any negotiation for a transition government in Syria. |With this new Russian support, the Americans are calculating that Assad would further entrench his position and be harder to persuade to be eased out of Syria to enable Syria attempt to form a new national government.
The war in Syria is one inescapable proof that the international is failing. The UN Se­curity Council seems to have exhausted itself without results. The UN Secretary General has tried every trick of his office. The Arab League has no clue, torn apart as it is on Syria. The European Union, the Group of 77, every other international power bloc with a potentiality to influence events in Syria, seem to have given up. The prayer was that the combatants will fight themselves until one side is exhausted. But the most optimistic predictions are that such an outcome will take four more years of fighting and no one is sure who will prevail. The forces fighting Assad are so disparate and in conten­tion with one another that getting them to unite has been futile.
The war in Syria, it must be remembered, is part of the “Arab Springs,” one dramatic revolu­tionary whirlwind which toppled Arab dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, attempted but failed in Bahrain, and seems to have ran its course but created the current stalemate in Syria thanks to Russian support of Assad and American unwill­ingness to get involved, “not again” in an Arab civil war.
The United States, it is clear from the start, wants Assad out. Indeed President Barack Obama explicitly said so. But he has no stomach for American involvement in the Arab world. It is not just that he did not want to start another war; he does not want the US involved under any guise. He wants to help the rebels fight­ing Assad. But Obama and Americans found that Al Qaeda is also fighting Assad. For once, an exception was made that ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend.’ Having fought side by side with Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan, the Americans would not want to re-live that nightmare ever again. Even when the Central Intelligence Agency partially endorsed the Free Syrian Army, nagging doubts prevented the Obama administration from coming full square behind the group. Such doubts have continued till this day creating what Republicans, who want to replace Democrats at the White House, call American policy paralysis and abdication in Syria. A series of Republican leaders has been to Syria to talk with rebel groups, each announc­ing it has found a dependable ally. But the ad­ministration was never convinced. Better to be safe than to be sorry. The nightmare of trying to trace the surface-to-air missiles given to al Qa­eda by the US during the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan was never forgotten.
The Russians have never hidden their support for President Assad, just as they also supported his father throughout the wars and skirmishes with Israel since the Six Day War of 1966. But the Russians want an additional role now: to join in the isolation and struggle against the Islamic Caliphate. The Russians want to help fight “the terrorists.” Now, the Americans also want the Islamic Caliphate destroyed. You would think that such common purpose would unite these great powers. The Russians think Assad is the only force with boots on the ground to actually fight the Caliphate in Syria. The Americans want to fight the Caliphate but do not want any­one to help Assad.
These are in addition to other complications like the fate of the Kurds, who, in my reckon­ing, are the most oppressed people in present-day world. They are found in Syria, in Iraq, in Turkey and elsewhere but not allowed to unite to form a single nation. They have distinguished themselves in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levante (ISIL), especially the Iraqi pershmega forces. Their most lethal foe is Turkey which has tried to suppress them for over 30 years.
Now, the return of a Cold War-like chill be­tween the West and Russia is an ill wind. It is still in its early stages but the consequences, if the trend continues, are dangerous for world peace. It came from two quarters. The hawks in Washington still love the American Empire con­cept. Obama who said he would end the Empire mind-set held out for years but seems to have lost his nerves, especially after Crimea. The Rus­sians, humiliated and ridiculed, found in Putin a nationalist determined to reassert Russian hon­or. The Russians may not be wealthy but they are people with great history, proud, courageous and patriotic. Each sanction imposed on Russia may hurt the Russian economy but it unites the country behind Vladimir Putin. It is inaccurate to describe the world as uni-polar. It has never been, even at the height of Rome. Obama has wandered off his winning reservation, he should return to mutual interest and mutual respect. He should remember his Nobel Peace Prize The Russians are only asking to be respected.
None of the ‘geniuses’ who are urging con­frontation would want to stake the cities of Los Angeles and Minneapolis in a nuclear exchange of intercontinental ballistic missiles in order to defend Ukraine. For now, the victims of the new Cold War are the Syrians but many more victims are bound to follow if reason does not prevail, especially in Washington and Brussels.