TO AID OR NOT TO AID…
(it’s a problematic situation which just won’t go away)

The international community, especially the Western members of it, is in a quandary about what to do about the Syrian situation. To aid or not to aid…it’s a problematic situation which just won’t go away.

To be blunt about it, as a nation, Syria is definitely a failed state, and the cause of that can be placed squarely at the doorstep of the Assad regime. Unfortunately, those who finally rose up in outright rebellion against its oppressive rule have failed to coalesce into a sufficiently coherent entity. Instead what we have is a mixed bag of “resistance” groups, each more or less operating on its own, on its own turf, and following its own agenda.

Under such amorphous conditions the international community has understandably been reluctant to intervene in someone else’s internal conflict, primarily because it fears doing so would undermine the principle of non-interference with another’s -sovereignty-, setting a precedent which could affect a lot of other governments who could be in the same fix as that of Syria.

The real question here is this: At what point does any national government forfeit its “legitimacy” and thus its claim to sovereignty? The answer to that should be…when it turns its armed forces against its own people, just to retain control over the levers of power. There is no question therefore that, after nearly three years of mayhem and slaughter against its own people, the Assad regime merits such a forfeiture.

As usual, the United Nations has proven to be completely incapable of resolving this kind of situation because it continues to pursue the diplomatic fiction that the Assad regime is still “legitimate.” It clearly is no longer legitimate and should be declared as such.

Meanwhile, since neither side in this conflict is able to gain any significant advantage over the other, things are essentially at a stalemate, with mutual carnage and destruction the only prospect for some time to come. All of which threatens to become a serious contagion which is slowly infecting its immediate neighbors, the region as a whole, and drawing in outside parties besides.

We see that happening with the streams of Syrian refugees heading in every direction, outside parties taking sides (overtly, such as Russia and Quatar on one hand, and covertly, by Iran on the other), with the US, the UK, and France edging ever closer at becoming embroiled in the same mess with everyone else.

Since getting past the veto blockages on the Security Council is not very likely, given the current opposing interests there, the only other option is to try for an end run around it. That is, going to the General Assembly instead, for a resolution that declares the Assad regime, because of its actions, is no longer considered a legitimate representative of the Syrian people. In consequence of which, all members are urged to individually withdraw their diplomatic recognition of it, and, cut all commercial, financial, trade, and travel protocols with it. Concurrently, the resolution should urge all insurgent parties in Syria to coalesce into an interim –Free Syria Authority – which the General Assembly will then recognize as the new legitimate representation of all Syrians.

Such an action by the UN will remove much of the barriers to effective support for those in revolt against the Assad regime, enabling individual members to provide sanctioned no-fly zones, etc.. At the same time it will encourage all the disparate insurgent groups to join together into some kind of coherent entity the international community can recognize and deal with.

Until something of the sort happens nothing will be resolved.

CENTURION